A Compromised Lady

Egads. Regency England romance. Thea was raped, but her father who machinated the match with the cad, believes she asked for it. Her brother killed the cad, but now 8 years later Thea has never married because she's damaged goods. Coming into her inheritance, dear old Dad tried to sell her off to another cad, but Thea finally stands up and thwarts him - and meets with a childhood friend who stands by her.

While this did play nicely into one of my favorite tropes - abused/traumatized heroine - it fell a bit short on my personal rating scale because of course the sainted hero would love and accept the heroine's child, and be nothing but loving and supportive about her trauma! While I love a hero who protects and heals rape victims, there was little of that in this storyline. Still enjoying this series though! (3.5 stars)

This book starts out quite good, loses it about 5/6ths of the way through, but recovers at the very end. While a bit heavy on the melodrama, the romance between Richard and Thea grows naturally and the book is well written and fairly fast paced - until about 80% of the way through, when I found myself skipping ahead. Too much time is spent at Richard's country estate, and it really starts to drag at that point. Despite that, this is a fairly good read for a boring afternoon.

Sequel to His Lady Mistress. Not as good as the first book, but nice to see the characters again - a secondary character in Mistress is the hero of this one. I'll still be looking for more by this author.

Thea is hiding a secret. Her childhood friend Richard, realizing he has fallen in love with her, uncovers it and must figure out if he still loves Thea.