Devil in Spring

Devil in Spring (2017) Lisa Kleypas

Set in London in 1876

Lady Pandora Ravenel doesn’t want to marry. She wants to make board games and live on her own, because women lose all their right as soon as they marry. But when she’s found in a compromising position with Gabriel, Lord St. Vincent, he is forced to propose, and she has to decide if her independence is more important than well-being of her family in light of the impending scandal.

“What does in flagrante delicto mean, exactly?”

“The literal translation? ‘While the crime is blazing.’”

This was an incredibly sweet book.

Pandora is a wallflower–for very good reasons. She can’t dance, has issues with the dark, and generally prefers to spend her time planning and creating board games. She also has absolutely no desire to get married. For extremely good reasons.

(I)f I marry you, everything I have, including my company, would immediately become yours. You would have complete authority over me. Every shilling I made would go directly to you— it wouldn’t even pass through my hands. I’d never be able to sign a contract, or hire employees, or buy property. In the eyes of the law, a husband and wife are one person, and that person is the husband.

People tend to forget about things like that in historicals.

She also have a family who loves her and wants to protect her.

“Lady Berwick told me there’s no choice. If I don’t marry, the only other option is to hurl myself into the nearest live volcano. Wherever that is.”

“Iceland. And the only way you’ll marry St. Vincent is if you can convince me that you’d prefer him to the volcano.”

Gabriel is not looking for a bride. He has a reputation as a rake–one of the things he inherited from his father as well as the title of Lord St. Vincent, so he’s kept his head down. He is a genuinely nice guy, who feels the pressures of society, and still wants to do well.

They even had lovely and supportive families.

“Did you tell your sister about my problem?”

“Only that you have difficulty dancing. I didn’t tell her why.”

“Oh, thank you, now she thinks I’m clumsy.”

“We’re in a large, basically empty room,” Phoebe said from the piano. “There’s no point in whispering, I can hear everything.”

I kept waiting for the grave misunderstanding, but it never came–the second half of the book was actually a short mystery that allowed you to see how the two came to terms with the compromises they have to make.

It’s a delightful book, with no angst or emotional misery, just two people coming to know each other, and learning to compromise.

Plus the mystery bit at the end.

Publisher: Avon
Rating: 8.5/10

• Browse the archives:
  
• The Governess Game » »
• « « Wicked and the Wallflower