A Certain Want of Reason

Lucia Wright needs a holiday. After years of caring for her “eccentric” younger brother and sister in the country, she accepts a friend’s invitation to spend a few weeks enjoying the season in London only to find that life among the city’s elite may be even crazier than at home.

Lord Edmund Rutherford needs an escape. Sworn since childhood to a woman he cannot abide, he finds himself trapped by the strictures of society and the expectations of those around him. The solution seems simple—feign madness and be sent away for a short period, encouraging his intended bride to end their long engagement, thereby securing his freedom.

Lucia and Edmund are thrown together by chance, and while he should be the last man on earth she would find appealing, Lucia becomes fascinated by the gentleman who seems rational to no one but her. Together they are forced to weather a madhouse, the vengeful scheming of a woman who wants Edmund’s title at all costs and a world that appears to have lost all reason.