Sparkling eyes captivate!

Always the Wallflower (Never the Bride #5) 

by Emilya E K Murdoch       

Wallflower from solid ton background meets rake of first order. Her best friend is his adopted sister. Not that that makes much difference as they barely speak to each other (there's a mystery here!)

Lady Letitia Cavendish is painfully shy in large gatherings. She doesn't dance. Well that's not right. It's just that no-one ever asks her. So she's perfected the hanging out amongst the curtains, loosing herself in a crowd, fading into the background as a way of coping.

Only Edward Wynn, the Viscount of Stulsemere, practiced seducer and rake really notices her when they're forced to dance. He is shocked when he pushes Letitia beyond her painful silence and she leaves him standing in the middle of the ballroom. Rejection is something Wynn's unused to. He's fascinated, and then he's taken by the fact that the shy Letitia is downright gorgeous when she lifts her head and stares him down.

But is that fascination strong enough for a confirmed rake to pay attention to the stirring of his heart and is Letitia brave enough to take what she wants?

I've got to say I cooled off from Wynn. I was rather startled by Letitia's willingness to cosy up with him, in the family home two bedrooms away from her parents! What!! Oh hi, yes here I am, the man of your dreams, standing in your bedroom having just bribed the footman. Yikes!

I warmed to him even less when he reverted to type and sets about playing seductive games in the middle of a ballroom with an attractive heiress, as Letitia looks on! What a cad! Sure he gives an excuse. The sort of, 'Sorry honey I can't seem to go against my base nature--the lure of the chase you know.' A craven meaningless apology.

But back to Wynn's so called adopted sister Mariah, Letitia's best friend, who reads books at social occasions. I am puzzled by her persistence with the reading of A New Mathematical and Philosophical Dictionary which she finds riveting and keeps trying to persuade Letitia into reading. A rather strange reoccurrence leading where? Will we find out?

Despite all these strange little threads, this tried and true trope of wallflower and rake is a tad different, and although in my mind I felt it was never quite grounded. I do however look forward to Mariah's story.

A Dragonblade ARC via NetGalley

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