Led Astray By A Rake-Sara Bennett

Led Astray By A Rake
Sara Bennett
Avon, Jun 2009, $6.99
ISBN: 9780061336911

In 1837 recent Miss Debenham’s Finishing School graduate Miss Lucille Monteith knows she must marry a respectable suitor, but the only man she desires is the unacceptable Lord Dominic “Wicked Nic” Lacey, who proposed to her when she was ten. Olivia swears the scandalous Wicked Nic hides his caring soul from the world, but admits to herself that she may be biased by her feelings and her childhood memories of a kindhearted friend.

Dominic conceals a horrific secret that if revealed would destroy him because his Livy would hate him; thus he avoids her as the Wicked Nic. Still as servants matchmake the pair in that subtle manipulation those under the stairs can do, they fall in love, but each risks their respective heart, she her family’s wrath if he stays true to form and he his soul if he reveals what he knows and must tell her.

The first Husband Hunters Club is a terrific early Victorian romance starring a wonderful young lady and a male rake with incredible layers of depth that only his beloved and his caring servant seem to see underneath his façade. In many ways on surface the lead couple steps out of the nineteenth century romance prototype, but deep Dominic with his secret provides the freshness to a strong opening act. Fans will not be led astray by an author with Sara Bennett’s talent that shines through in this fine historical.

Harriet Klausner