Romancing the Countess
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- ¥710
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- ¥710
発行者による作品情報
Sebastian Madinger, the Earl of Wriothesly, thought he'd married the perfect woman-until a fatal accident revealed her betrayal with his best friend. After their deaths, Sebastian is determined to avoid a scandal for the sake of his son. But his best friend's widow is just as determined to cast her mourning veil aside by hosting a party that will surely destroy both their reputations and expose all of his carefully kept secrets...
Leah George has carried the painful knowledge of her husband's affair for almost a year. All she wants now is to enjoy her independence and make a new life for herself-even if that means being ostracized by the Society whose rules she was raised to obey. Now that the rumors are flying, there's only one thing left for Sebastian to do: silence the scandal by enticing the improper widow into becoming a proper wife. But when it comes to matters of the heart, neither Sebastian nor Leah is prepared for the passion they discover in each other's arms....
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
March (Seducing the Duchess) challenges the dramatic Victorian mourning protocols with some success in this ambitious historical. Leah George, a 20-year-old widow, knew for a year that her late husband was cuckolding his best friend, Sebastian, Earl of Wriothesley. The news is a complete shock to Sebastian, who attempts to suppress the truth, though the adulterous pair died in the same carriage accident. When Leah, sick of hypocrisy, decides to flout society's norms for grieving widows, Sebastian plays along in hopes that a seeming romance between them will scotch rumors about their spouses. The plot develops nicely to this point, and March's elegant style is a joy in a genre that often suffers from slipshod technique, but plausibility soon crumbles away as the protagonists become increasingly reckless and inconsistent. It's an intriguing effort nevertheless, and March shows promise as a prose stylist if not yet a plotter.
