Chase, Loretta - Not Quite a Lady

[oyceter]

This is the fourth installment of Chase's series on the Carsington brothers, all of which I've enjoyed so far, with the exception of Lord Perfect, which wasn't bad, but was boring.

Darius Carsington has been tasked with restoring an old estate within a year, or else get married. Charlotte Hayward is a twenty-seven-year-old not-really-a-spinster; she's charming and beautiful and for some reason never got married, despite everyone loving her. This is largely because she has perfected the art of Not Getting Married, right down to introducing prospective suitors to other prospective brides.

Little does anyone know that Charlotte had an illegitimate child ten years ago.

The back cover made this sound like one of those "handsome rake decides to seduce perfect lady and break down her perfect-ness on a whim" type plots, but it actually isn't. Darius is supposedly a rake, but he decides right off that someone's virgin daughter is off limits. And while both Darius and Charlotte are attracted to each other physically, they find that they genuinely enjoy the other's company as well.

This is a surprisingly angst-free book, considering the whole illegitimate child bit, and I particularly loved how the revelation of Charlotte's Big Secret was handled. See, if more romance heroes were like that, I wouldn't feel the need to slap them silly all the time. Even the person set up as the villain is honestly trying to do the right thing; he just doesn't realize that his idea of the right thing... isn't. I am wondering if Chase will pick up his story down the line, given how long this series is getting.

There are a few mentions to the prior Carsington books, but mostly only as Darius mentioning his family or Charlotte mentioning meeting one of his brothers. There are thankfully no cute "couple from prior book has sexy scene," and only one offspring shows up. I am ok with that, given that it was at a family event.

All in all, I had a lot of fun reading this, I liked all the characters, and it made me happy.

Links:
- minnow1212's review (scroll down, spoilers behind cut)
- gwyneira's review
- kate_nepveu's review

Comments

[slrose.livejournal.com]

I was wondering what you would think of it.

It does look like she's setting the major up for a sequel. After all there's only one Carsington brother left...

[oyceter]

I liked it!

And is that last Carsington brother already married? That's what I thought, but I can't keep all of them straight.

[susanw.livejournal.com]

I'm looking forward to this one. I adored Mr. Impossible and thought the other two Carsington books were good but not great.

[oyceter]

It was fun! I didn't like it quite as much as Mr. Impossible, but I really love Mr. Impossible.

[gwyneira.livejournal.com]

Waah, why doesn't my library have it yet? I'm pleased that you liked it more than Lord Perfect, which I also thought was boring (and disappointing after the first two, particularly Mr. Impossible).

[oyceter]

Lord Perfect was so boring! I never even finished it... I mean, it wasn't bad, but... boring.