An arranged marriage, but to whom?

Synopsis

The gorgeous and spicy new romance from Emma Orchard, perfect for everyone waiting for their next Bridgerton fix!

June, 1817

Sir Dominic De Lacy – one of the season’s most eligible gentlemen – has recently proposed marriage… to a woman he scarcely knows. But his father’s choice for him, Miss Maria Nightingale, seems amiable, and at 29, Dominic cannot live the life of a bachelor forever. He hopes he can provide a happy future for her as they learn to care for each other.

Maria, however, has other ideas. Midway through their engagement celebrations, she confesses to Dominic that she is not Maria at all, but her identical twin sister, Margaret. Maria has disappeared, and Margaret’s been persuaded to take her place until she’s found – and for that she needs Dominic’s help. The pair quickly find they make a formidable team, but with just three weeks to avoid the biggest scandal of the season, time is against them.

But even if they find Maria, can they really hope the wedding will happen? Because, as they are starting to realise, chemistry can’t be arranged – and Sir Dominic might just be engaged to the wrong Miss Nightingale…

My review

Sir Dominic De Lacy might be the most eligible gentleman, but his mind isn’t set at getting married at all. That is until he hears from his mother that it was his father’s last wish to see him marrying Miss Maria Nightingale. So even if he doesn’t know the young lady at all, he cannot ignore his father’s wish. And he hopes that one way or another he can give Maria a happy marriage, especially as after a first encounter, he finds Maria rather amiable. But the person he has met, isn’t Maria at all, but her twin sister, Margaret. Margaret is posing as her twin sister since Maria disappeared. And Margaret doesn’t want anything more than finding her sister. Even if that means confessing to Dominic who she really is. Deciding to join forces, they are on a quest to find Maria and why she disappeared. But it’s also a race against the clock, as the wedding date is set, and coming closer and closer. Will they find Maria in time for the wedding? Or will the joined forces cause a scandal the pair of them didn’t foresee at all?

There are plenty of Regency – stories in the world. There are also plenty of swapping places stories in the world. But the combination of these the two? Well, I am not that sure that there are that many. And add a layer of steaminess, and I am sure that a search would not give many results.

Luckily, we have Emma Orchard who took matter in her own hands, and gave us an amazing story, with exactly all the above!

In Regency, things aren’t done like they are done now. Marriage isn’t about love, but about gain. And even in this book, the initial arrangement is more about what to gain than two people that love each other.

But where in many books, in arranged marriages, there is a party that is just wrong and even evil, it’s clear that both parties in the arrangement are both lovely characters, forced to wed for reasons outside their own volition.

Of course, as a reader, we know that Maria is in fact Margaret, impersonating her twin after Maria just went missing. And I liked that about Margaret, the lengths she is going to not only cover for Maria, but how she also wants to find her sister.

It wouldn’t be so strange in normal circumstances, but the more I read the book, the more I understood that there is nothing normal in Margaret’s family. Things ended badly between her father and her mother, causing a literal separation between the twins. And that also gave them complete different upbrings and a total different character development.

But it was sweet to read how despite the distance, the sisters kept in touch, writing to each other about their lives. So Maria’s disappearing without Margaret just having a clue why, for sure raised several question marks in my head too.

Luckily, Margaret finds a surprising ally in Dominic. He wants to help Margaret with her search, and not only for his own best interests. He is truly invested in finding Maria, as he wants to know her reasons, and also as he sees in how much distress Margaret is. If that isn’t a proof of his good character…

Dominic is truly a good man. While many others would have been furious about Margaret’s deception, he is ready to listen to her reasons, and shows a lot of compassion. Not only that, but he offers to help Margaret to find her sister.

Now, obviously Dominic himself has his own problems, as he cannot understand why his father’s dying wish was to see him married to Maria. That doesn’t match with the relationship he had with his father…

Slowly we get to learn that there is more than sees the eye in this book. More is being revealed about not only Maria’s disappearance, but also about the reasons for the wedding. And let me tell you, it goes darker than imagined.

Luckily, there are plenty of lighter moments too, and it was funny to see how Margaret attempts to impersonate Maria. But it was also nice reading how Dominic and Margaret are bonding during tie, no matter how pressing that time is.

It doesn’t come as a surprise that not only things heat up, but also how feelings start to develop. And I more than liked reading how the heart in fact sees more than the eyes in fact do. Because even if Dominic has no interest in Maria whatsoever, there is something he cannot deny or ignore with Margaret.

In this book we see not only an unlikely collaboration, but also developing emotions, a perhaps inexplicable connection. And of course several heated moments.

I liked it how this author put so much depth in a book, depths that perhaps weren’t expected or required. Yet it only added more to the story itself, which perhaps initially may seem like an easy read, but shows us real characters, in a setting where things aren’t that evident at all, yet makes all the characters that matter even braver and likeable.