... horses, hearts and hurts!

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A Gentleman's Game (Romance of the Turf #1) by Theresa Romain

I had such high hopes for the romance between Nathaniel Chandler and his father's secretary, Rosalind Agate. The beginning started well with Nathaniel and Rosalie working together, helping to cure the sickness developed by some of the thoroughbreds trained by the stables of Nathaniel's father. Nathaniel knows that his father doesn't trust him. It's obvious. It takes us some time and a heap of hints for us to discover the cause. And it takes a long time for the story of Rosalie to come to the fore. Rosalie is trapped in a web of deceit not of her own making, but to which she is beholden.
Nathaniel is a rather wonderful man, who has grown beyond his childish actions yet is hampered by his father's outdated view of him. Hence the rather inane reference to 'milkmaids', Nathaniel's code for problems he comes across as he travels England and beyond on missives for his father. I grew heartedly tiers of those references.
There is mystery, romance and family secrets, the excitement of Derby Day at Epsom, the simple pleasures of an English village fete and a story of three people, each in their own way, learning to trust.

A NetGalley ARC

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