What a fun quick read! Finished it in one evening as I wanted desperately to see what would become of Marianne and Lord Ravensford. Marianne is managing her fathers estate and is passionate about getting traps removed off the land that she seeks out her new neighbour without a proper chaperone. As Lord Ravensford is anything but a gentlemen he misunderstands her intentions at visiting and starts off on the wrong foot with Marianne. Marianne is a bold, outspoken, beautiful woman and tells him exactly what she thinks of him, except for the fact that she is strangely attracted to him and never had any man bring out blushes to her cheeks like he did. He curses himself when he realizes who she is - his best friends sister that he is supposed to be protecting! Kit (Marianne's brother) has got himself not some trouble with Luke to blame (who is lord Ravensford) or so they think and must have Marianne trust him which will need some work! and Luke must restrain his attraction to Marianne when he learns that she is not a lightskirt but a lady! So starts an interesting tale about love, attraction, conspiracy and France! Yes there is adventure in this novel and Marianne will find herself in the midst of it regardless of Luke's opinion on the matter. Lol. Fun light read for those romantics at heart!
Finally! A good, clean romance at last. With just enough mystery, angst, and adventure.At first the heroine annoyed me at the end when she took bits and pieces of information and assumed the worst then cowardly refused to talk to the hero. But I decided to forgive her, as we've all done stupid things when we're in love and terrified of being hurt. An epilogue would have been nice as well. I love a good epilogue.The author is British, so it was written and edited in British English with different rules of punctuation. That threw me a little and took a while to get used to, and I think a few periods and quotation marks got lost.Overall, loved it. (sigh)
What do You think about Anything But A Gentleman (2001)?
I was captivated by Amanda Grange's amazing talent for writing and capturing the regency era perfectly when I read her series of diaries when she told the story of the much loved Jane Austen novels from the heroes point of view. And then I decided to try some of her other regency romances, starting with this one (also know as 'The earl next Door'), and I was not disappointed!She once again caught the style of period perfectly, and with a very interesting and intriguing plot, some wonderful 'unconventional' characters and a wonderfully romantic story between the hero and heroine, this was a lovely read and I look forward to reading her other romances as soon as I can, I only wish they were all made into paperback versions, not just Kindle versions as it seems with some of the books!
—Soph
