A Masked Deception

This is a Regency version of That Swoony Feeling by Megan Quinn that I read just before this. One of Ms. Balogh's back catalog, I didn't feel she did the man in love with two (but the same) women trope justice. This is partly because I think it's hard to deceive a man in real life with only a mask while in Ms. Quinn's book the heroine had the advantage of letters rather than in-person interactions with the hero. I always feel the guy isn't really paying attention to either woman if he can't tell they are the same person. It was an okay read, but not my favorite Balogh book by any means.

The ending felt a bit rushed and I loved how she stood up to him.

Margaret Wells has loved Richard, Earl of Brampton ever since a masked ball and he is intrigued by her too but he doesn't know who she was and he is now just doing his duty. When she dresses as she did before he engages in an affair with her, not knowing that it's his wife and he's torn between the two.

Add in a romance between her sister and one of his friends and his brother and a girl he met in Spain during the war and you have a lot of room for interesting stories.

Entertaining and light. The cover on my edition is terrible.

This is Mary Balogh's first book, and I quite enjoyed it. It has much the same feeling as some of her early books, such as "The Secret Pearl" or the "Web" series. In other words, it's quite emotionally bleak, and has quite a sad feel to it. Balogh is good at portraying hopelessness and desperation, and this comes out through Meg's character, who is trapped in a loveless marriage with a man she secretly adores. I quite enjoyed this book!