I enjoyed the stories. Each one held enough adventure, romance, and fun for a quick escape from reality.

This is a romp of a story by Mary Balogh, with quirky dialogue and cute characters. Young, impulsive Josephine Middleton has been unofficially betrothed to the Duke of Mitford by their grandfathers. She is unable to protest to her father's and grandfather's joy of the match, but handsome Mr. Porterhouse, who is visiting on a neighboring country estate, frightens her to panic with lies about how haughty and cold and rakish the duke is. Her panic escalates until the day before the duke's arrival, when she determines to run to her Aunt Winifred, whom she is certain will support her against her grandfather. Mr. Porterhouse persuades her to let him escort her, since it is only a one-day drive, but he sabotages the axle of his carriage and strands Jo in the Crown and Anchor Inn, 10 miles from Aunt Winifred's. Realizing his intentions to force her to marry him, Jo gives him the rough side of her tongue until he uses his strength to try to ravish her. But her screams bring help in the form of Mr. Paul Villiers, lodged in the room next door, who plants Mr. Porterhouse a facer right before Jo smashes a bowl over her would-be suitor's head.

But Mr. Villiers is really the Duke of Mitford, travelling incognito at an attempt at "adventure" before he embarks on staid married life. Raised as the heir and inheriting the Dukedom at a young age, Paul feels the weight of duty and has never done an improper or indecorous thing in his entire life, except for this one harmless jaunt as he travels to his betroth's house to formally ask for her hand. Jo instantly trusts the plain, kindly Mr. Villiers, who agrees to escort her to her aunt's house in the morning. Since no one at the inn knows who either of them are, he figures that a young woman alone in an inn room for one night will not harm her reputation...until Jo spies her FATHER lumbering up the stairs and esconces herself in Paul's room to prevent being caught. Trapped in the same room that night, Paul wonders how his life suddenly got so complicated...

For Jo's father has gone off in pursuit of his daugher to her Aunt Winifred's. But meanwhile, Jo's younger brother realizes that Jo probably eloped with Mr. Porterhouse, who had suddenly disappeared the same day Jo did. Determined to set off after her to Gretna, his sister insists on accompanying him but slows him down when she gets carriage sickness...

Meanwhile, Jo realizes that Mr. Porterhouse, who had removed himself from the inn after being so abused, had stolen her jewel case, with her mother's and grandmother's jewels. Raging mad, she determines to set off after him, reluctantly escorted by Paul, who is beginning to wonder if he is touched in the head. But naturally, he cannot simply abandon the girl to her wild chase... Poor Paul! So proper all his life, finding out the truth of his very improper betrothed, yet digging himself deeper into deception the longer he finds he cannot tear himself away from this maddening woman...

Throw in Paul's friend Sir Thomas and a beefy groom eager to pummel Mr. Porterhouse's face in, and you have a farce of characters running around each other with quite funny results. Mary Balogh has proven she can write in all genres of fiction, from tragedy to comedy.

Since I tend to like tragedies and dramas better than comedies, I can't say I enjoyed this book to the full, but it is excellent writing and consistent, solid characterization. If you have a better sense of the ridiculous, I am sure you will enjoy this book.

This is the sequel to Balogh's wonderful More Than A Mistress, and is the story of Tresham's younger brother, Lord Ferdinand Dudley. In MTAM, Ferdinand was portrayed as a loyal, somewhat timid and frequently hapless young man whose lack of ducal title wasn't the only thing he was missing in contrast to his brother.

Having won a country estate in a card game, Ferdinand sets out to view Pinewood. However, to his shock he finds it already occupied, and by a young-ish (ie mid-20s) single lady, Miss Viola Thornhill, who claims that it is her own, that she was left it as a bequest by the father of the current Earl of Bamber, from whom Ferdinand won it. Since neither is prepared to yield, we have stalemate. In order to try to force her to leave, though, Ferdinand insists on moving in.

Viola responds by massing the staff and the local inhabitants to make Ferdinand's life miserable: cold meals, smoking chimneys, inhospitable local pubs and so on. But Ferdinand is a charming man with not much in the way of aristocratic hauteur, and he quickly begins to win people over... everyone except Viola, although she can't forget the memory of their kiss.

And then Tresham arrives and recognises Viola from her infamous life in London, a life she's been trying to escape for the past two years. The revelations here change Viola and Ferdinand's relationship completely.

I've been looking forward to this book for a year, since I read More Than A Mistress, which is quite possibly the best long Regency Mary Balogh has ever written. Unfortunately, for me, No Man's Mistress doesn't live up to the promise. I suppose it was starting from a disadvantage in the first place, as Ferdinand is no Tresham, although I did like Ferdinand a lot.

Part of the problem is that I simply cannot believe in the rehabilitation of 'Lilian Talbot'. It's not that I can't believe that Viola could reform - since she'd never wanted that life in the first place, this isn't a problem at all. I just cannot suspend disbelief so far as to accept that the ton, as prudish as they were during Regency times, would accept into their midst a woman who had been a notorious courtesan. Even though Viola was accepted by the powerful and influential Duke of Tresham, I cannot see that as being enough.

What I liked most about this book, though, was renewing my acquaintance with Jocelyn and Jane from More Than A Mistress; and also getting to know Angeline, the female Dudley sibling. At some time in the not too distant future, Balogh intends to write the story of Angeline and Hayward, her husband, as a prequel to the Mistress books; I'll look forward to that one and hope that it's better than No Man's Mistress.

No Man's Mistress, a regency historical, is the sequel to More than a Mistress by Mary Balogh.

I adored the character of Ferdinand, the hero, a refreshing change from the usual rakes that seem to dominate regencies and regency historicals (for a brilliant regency historical featuring another such hero, I recommend Forbidden by Jo Beverley).

Ferdinand Tresham is a man unconsciously in search of something missing in his life (he has been leading the aimless life of a fashionable Corinthian). He arrives in the country village, where Viola, the heroine, is living on her estate. And we see him falling in love with the country lifestyle of a landed gentleman farmer with close ties to a country community. Finally, Ferdinand has found something that matters.

However, I couldn't relate to Viola, the heroine, immediately. She is one of those rather difficult heroines, and it's not because of her past either. I have found other Balogh heroines much more sympathetic or easier to understand. However, a slightly imperfect Balogh is still head and shoulders above most regency/regency historicals around.

By the way, I must congratulate the publishers on a gorgeous cover, based on an actual historical portrait. It indicates the level of expensive fashion that women of the highest society, including the most expensive courtesans, wore. It's refreshing to see such a classy cover on a Regency/Regency historical.

Life seems just about perfect for Viola Thornhill. She owns a profitable English estate, makes enough from the rents to support her family, and is respected in the community. When Lord Ferdinand Dudley arrives and announces that he has won her estate in a card game, she reacts with disbelief, then increasing horor. If she doesn't really own Pinewood Manor, then her future is in danger--and she may have to return to the horrors of the past.

As a younger son, Ferdinand sees property, even a minor estate, as something special. He is surprised to find a woman living in his estate, but firm that the title lawfully rests with him. He is an English gentleman and that means that he'll make sure that Viola finds some suitable situation, but his leniency goes only so far. The undeniable attraction Viola holds for him--an attraction he's never felt for another woman--is something to be denied. One thing Ferdinand knows--marriage and love are myths, not reality.

Talented author Mary Balogh continues where she left off in MORE THAN A MISTRESS. Using the backdrop of Regency England, where reputation matters more than reality, Balogh spins a fine story of love and doubt.

One aspect of NO MAN'S MISTRESS weakened the otherwise compelling novel, however. Even when Ferdinand knew the worst about her, Viola never explained her motivations and her danger to him. While this device may have enhanced the conflict between them, the conflict seemed contrived.

Balogh's strong conclusion delivered a strong and satisfying emotional impact.

Mary Balogh makes a habit of giving her readers 'different' heroines or heroes, and situations which are somewhat out of the ordinary: just read Heartless, A Secret Pearl, Indiscreet, More Than A Mistress and many more. In Secrets of the Heart, her hero and heroine are divorced from each other. Divorce, of course, was very rare in the Regency period; a man could only sue for divorce (and only via the House of Lords, no less) if his wife was mentally incompetent or unfaithful.

Sarah was not a virgin when she married George, the Duke of Cranwell. As we find out very soon, she was raped repeatedly as a teenager by her cousin, who also blackmailed her into keeping it a secret. Once he realised that she wasn't the virgin bride he'd been expecting, Cranwell had walked out on her.

We meet them four years later, when they run into each other in Bath - Sarah has finally been persuaded to return to society, in a limited way, under a different name. Cranwell is horrified to see that his sister and his (new) fiancee actually like this woman whom he perceives as little better than a whore, and he would love to shun her... but he finds that he can't.

While I very much sympathised with Sarah in relation to her past and the beginning of her marriage, what I really didn't like about this book was that when she was given an opportunity to mend fences with Cranwell by telling the truth, she not only failed to take it, but she deliberately made matters worse by pretending to be sluttish. And she does this several times. There comes a point when, even in the most painful of situations, people have to take some responsibility for their misfortune. In this book, Sarah failed to do so, and by around halfway through it, I found myself in full sympathy with Cranwell and deciding that she didn't deserve him. And despite the happy ending, which Balogh is so good at, I don't by any means consider this to be one of her best.

- this work should be right up your alley. Why is that most romances have tortured heroes (as in heroes with a troubled past) and the heroines have at best an icky uncle, stepfather, or mother? I was wondering about this issue, when I realized that Balogh (and to a certain extent) Carla Kelly and Allison Lane specialize in heroines with very troubled pasts. In most Balogh books, you will be reading about heroines who have experienced much and have suffered much, and have internalized it all. Consider for example, her THE SECRET PEARL, or HEARTLESS or even the more light-hearted traditional Regency LORD CAREW'S BRIDE (light, by comparison, that is). By suffering, I do not mean that the heroine has been physically tortured, but that she has been placed in difficult and even dangerous situations, that she may have been sexually abused, that she has almost certainly been emotionally abused. Other authors write such heroines, but only Balogh writes with stunning emotional intensity. When it works, it works.

Unfortunately, SECRETS OF THE HEART did not quite work for me. It might be that I felt that the heroine was not completely honest with the hero from the outset, explaining her circumstances. It might be that I did not believe Sarah's helplessness in that I felt that she had other choices at the time, and that she elected to choose what she did. [It is not that I make any moral judgments about this, or about her failure to seek help, but in a romance, I would like a heroine who is more perfect that I am!]. Be that as it may, Sarah makes one fateful decision which will haunt her through her brief marriage - and subsequent divorce - from a Duke, no less.

The story actually picks up when the Duke encounters Sarah after many years. She is now in company with his younger sister, much to his dismay and appears to be encouraging a bounder to court the young heiress. As to why Sarah acts the way she does, you will have to read the book. This is one story about which it is difficult to write without giving away the whole story, ending included.

I think why I responded to Sarah less favorably than to Priscilla (A PRECIOUS JEWEL) was over her honesty. Priscilla, a high-class prostitute, is open about her profession and how it will be viewed by society. She is scarcely older than Sarah, when she has to make a difficult choice, and she makes that with courage, with understanding of her future, and in the face of the fact that she has no family, no friends, and no money. Sarah has all three, and yet, she chooses a very different way, closing her eyes to her past actions and how society (or a future husband) might view them. What lodges in my throat is not what happened to her (entirely believable and very tragic) but the fact that she does not confront these sad events until it is almost too late.

If you like a flawed hero and heroine who are really unable to communicate with each other and, where the hero believes the worst of the heroine (and the heroine then lies to him), this book may appeal to you. If on the other hand, you want a Balogh story where the hero and heroine are flawed but at least one of them has a backbone earlier in the narrative, you might want to try one of the other Balogh titles I have mentioned - HEARTLESS (which is a stronger rendering of SECRETS OF THE HEART in my opinion), THE SECRET PEARL (which begins with a married man picking up a prostitute for the night), or A PRECIOUS JEWEL (where a shy and not-very-brave hero goes to a society brothel).

Good but not Balogh at her best is my summary.

From the back of the book: Theirs should have been a perfect marriage. Sarah was as wildly in love with the Duke of Cranwell as hi was with her... until, no their wedding night, Sarah was forced to reveal the secret of her past. And that, midst great public scandal, ended their marriage almost before it began.

Then in fashionable Bath their paths crossed again. The stunningly beautiful Sarah knew it was folly to think this dashing and sought after lord would ever get over her shocking betrayal. His fury made it painfully clear that they should separate again, this time forever.

Sarah could find a thousand arguments against the wisdom -- or likelihood -- of so miserable an edict. For one, the duke's ridiculous masculine pride was no match for the sensuous power of her affection for him... as she counted on love to melt the last shred of his resistance to her passionate surrender...

Miss Rebecca Shaw had lost her heart once in her young life-lost it and had it broken. At last it had mended-mended enough for her to say yes when the handsome, high-minded young Reverend Phillip Everett asked her to be his wife. But now Christopher Sinclair had returned. He was free now of the marriage that had given him fabulous wealth at the price of leaving Rebecca behind and betrayed. He was free now to turn Rebecca's head again.. But was she foolish enough to turn toward a love that had proven faithless once.

Rebecca Shaw, schoolteacher daughter of the late vicar, is engaged to be married to the current vicar, Philip Everett. It's a passionless relationship of friends who respect and like each other; it will be a marriage in which each does their duty to each other and to the parish. However, what Philip doesn't know is that Rebecca was once engaged to Christopher Sinclair, who, now widowed, is returning to the village...

Seven years ago, Becky and Christopher had been crazily in love. Until he broke her heart when he came to tell her that he'd met a wealthy woman in London and he was engaged to marry her. He dumped Becky and married for money. And she'd never seen him since.

Now, though, he's back. And she's running into him at every turn - in the village, at the school, in her home. And it's very hard to ignore him, so she has to be civil to him even though she loathes him. And Christopher himself doesn't make it easy; he talks to her, engages her in conversation, and even suggests that he still cares about her.

And when he apologises for abandoning her, and even kisses her, one day after escorting her home, she doesn't know how to react. Quite apart from the fact that she's engaged to someone else, how could she ever forgive him for the way he behaved to her? How could she forget that he was a fortune-hunter, and that if he broke his promise to her once he could do it again?

She is also hearing stories about Christopher's behaviour towards his wife which are not to his credit at all, which makes her opinion of him tumble still lower. And yet his behaviour since returning, combined with her knowledge of him before he'd jilted her, is completely at odds with these rumours about him. What can she believe? And does any of it matter anyway, since she's going to marry Philip?

This is a book with a cast of secondary characters to match Jane Austen, and there are plenty of very delightful sub-plots, secondary romances and entertaining figures. The will-they-won't-they plot between Becky and Christopher takes us almost to the final page, and it's worth every second of the read. Balogh does separated lovers and angst very well indeed.

I had the opportunity recently to read two of Mary Balogh's earliest books - A MASKED DECEPTION and THE DOUBLE WAGER. Compared to her later books, I have to say that both were kind-of disappointing. The books were not badly written, the characters were more or less rounded (but not completely fleshed out in the characteristic Balogh style that develops later), and the plots were slightly unusual. However, THE DOUBLE WAGER in particular troubled me, perhaps because of the similarity it bears to a much better book (in my opinion) Heyer's THE CONVENIENT MARRIAGE, where the hero, heroine and villain(s) are all more interesting.

Balogh does not completely rip off Heyer, in the style of some particularly shameless writers. She introduces some twists to the story - firstly the notion of a double wager, one made in London by the hero the Duke of Eversleigh, and the other made in the country by the heroine Henrietta Tallant, who prefers to be known as Henry. The Duke, a member of a group of friends who are trying to avoid matrimony, is nevertheless persuaded to wager on the point, when he determines to marry - simply to cut out his unsatisfactory cousin and heir presumptive. [Actually there is a story behind the Duke's dislike of his cousin, of course].

In the country, young Henry Tallant wagers with a group of friends that she, who hates being a girl and despises the idea of a London Season, can nevertheless catch the most elusive man, the Duke of Eversleigh. Her friends think that her loss is a foregone conclusion, given that Henry is so hoydenish and the Duke is notoriously determined to remain a bachelor (besides being rather elegant).

Henry is one of a rather large family - her eldest brother Sir Peter Tallant lives in London with his eminently proper wife Marion; the young Henry lives in the country with her brother Giles, two younger siblings, the twins Philip and Pen (Penelope?), a flustered governess who is unable to control the children, and a couple of unusual pets. This entire menagerie travels up to London, for no particular reason, upsetting the Tallant household. It does serve a useful plot device - in that the dismissal of the governess and the threat to send the youngest children to school acts as a powerful stimulus for Henry to accept the Duke's offer. And of course, the Duke does offer, ostensibly because Henry amused him at her ball.

In the background, the discarded mistress of the Duke forms an alliance with his cousin. They hope that the Duke will be forced to divorce his wife for adultery and worse, which will leave the succession clear. The mistress hopes to marry the Duke, or at least not to share his attention with a young wife.

The Duke and his new Duchess win their wagers, but neither informs the other of course, that their marriage came about only because of the double wager (hence the title). The Duke learns about the wager made by his wife from her indiscreet brother, after the latter has run into trouble. Curiously, he does not judge Henry badly. I wonder why? You would think that his pride would be hurt, or that he might wonder if his wife really loved him. Perhaps he had no illusions anyway about the marriage.

Henry is not an admirable wife, let alone a perfect Duchess. She will not have the marriage consummated, and she will associate with the Duke's cousin despite his warnings (even when he tells her why he so dislikes Oliver). When she gets into trouble, she will not ask for help, since she believes that she is as good as a man. Rather, she will borrow from untrustworthy persons and get into scrape after scrape. She chooses to listen to a man who has proved himself to be less than good, rather than listen to her husband (or ask someone else for advice). Generally, she is a rather spoiled and immature 18-year-old who seems younger than her age.

I found the denouement somewhat improbable, and as you can tell, I did not like the heroine at all. The story lines, borrowed from THE CONVENIENT MARRIAGE and AN APRIL LADY, could have worked beautifully if the heroine had been different. The denouement seemed both farcical and melodramatic to me, even though they might be in keeping with the heroine's general character. But to the end, I could not figure out what attracted the duke to his duchess, and I did not think their marriage would be a successful one. To the end, Henry (or Henrietta) showed that she did not trust her husband, and that she felt that she could go through life on her own - even though she had been rescued by her younger siblings more than once.

What was attractive about this book were the younger siblings - Philip and Pen. They were beautifully drawn, as was the confusion they created in the Tallant and then in the ducal household. Their love for their older sister and determination to protect her from her own folly was well-portrayed. I have some doubts about the ways in which they were apparently able to slip into and out of the duke's house, but that is a small point.

There is one major flaw in the plot - the issue of the villain's motivation. Making the villain the duke's father's sister's son and therefore the duke's heir was somewhat unusual, given that most titles of dukes were created with remainder to heirs male (meaning the sons, the sons of sons, and so forth of the person so honored). There are only a few titles that pass differently (and do so by Act of Parliament, or as Scottish titles). This was not well-explained. That, and Oliver's reckless behavior, did not add up to me.

Of all the Baloghs, I have read, this book was the most disappointing, for the reasons I stated. The writing is immaculate, as usual. But the heroine and the hero, let alone the intrigue, simply did not draw me in.

Rating = 2.8 (upgraded to 3)

We liked this story. It was typical of formula historical romances and lent humor in unexpected areas. Basically, you have
a willful woman named Henry who gets into a family jam and accepts a Duke's "proposition" to become his wife. It's a duel
of wills and passionate hearts. Good characters, delightfully
surprising story, highly recommended.

Tis is by far one of the creepiest books I have ever read. I felt like I needed a shower after reading it. Yuk...Clara, an unattractive, crippled heiress agrees to marry handsome, fortune hunting Frederick, who lies and schemes, as she feels it is her only shot at a chance to marry. Frederick does not really have any friends left as he kidnapped a girl who he grew up with (that story is written about in a previous regency), before she was to marry his friend as he needed her money. Then he has to leave town and he runs into Clara, an easy target for Frederick to charm with his good looks. The scenes in bed were awful, Frederick is a creep, Clara is a fool. The book was one of the most unromantic books I have ever had the misfortune to read.

I was not sure how this all would work out and indeed we are left with hope but not assurances of a happy ending. This is a dark, moving story of a very weak and disillusioned man and the strong woman who loved him in spite of his faults. There are only two positive notes about Freddie, his looks and his apparent wish to bring Clara some much needed happiness in her life. He succeeds with bringing Clara out of the cocoon her father wrapped her in. Clara brings him the absolution he so desires. This was a very realistic portrayal of a couple that marry for reasons besides love. A very interesting book!

Wow, what a unique romance! Mary Balogh has the reputation of turning out stories with unlikely heroes and heroines and DANCING WITH CLARA is no exception.

Miss Clara Danford is a sickly, crippled heiress who desperately wants to have something healthy and beautiful in her life. And she has no scruples about spending some of her inheritance in order to get that. That is why when the virile, handsome rake-wastrel that is Mr. Frederick Sullivan offers for her, she decides to marry him despite her knowing him to be a fortune-hunter.

The truth is that Freddie, by which our hero is generally known to his family and friends, is deeply in debt at the beginning of the story. He needs to marry a rich heiress--quick!--to keep himself out of the debtor's prison and his father's wrath. So, yes, the premise of DANCING WITH CLARA is the conventional marriage of convenience, but this is definitely not the same old, same old you might be expecting.

Now, Clara is not the typical sort of ugly-duckling-in-disguise heroine. She does not undergo some major make-over or wind up a beautiful swine in the end. Clara remains, throughout the story, simply the same plain Clara, although Freddie comes to regard her in a totally different (and flattering) light as the story unfolds. I've heard some people complain that Clara is too much of a "push-over." To me, however, Clara is just being sensible, patient and understanding. Her willingness to forgive Freddie for his debauchery and unfaithfulness, off-putting as it may be to some readers, is reasonable, consistent with her personalities, and admirable.

Freddie, on the other hand, is just as lovable as Clara. It did not take much time for me to warm up to him. (I mean, he can be really charming and gentlemanly if he chooses) Although his intention to marry Clara is less than noble, he is not heartless or cruel in any way: he vows to treat Clara well and strives to bring whatever happiness he is capable of producing into Clara's lonely life. He does indeed do some unsavory things--gambling, drinking himself into oblivion, bedding other women--even after he marries Clara. Nevertheless, he engages in them with a stricken conscience and a deep sense of self-loathing. He tries, oh how he tries, to drag himself away from the corrupting mess of a life he's got himself into, but he is in for a bumpy ride. Watching Freddie struggles to cut off drinking and gambling, sometimes successfully, sometimes only to give in later, is heart-wrenching. And I held my breath for the moment when Freddie came to the realization that his reformation was almost improbable without Clara's love and support......

DANCING WITH CLARA is a great testament to the redemptive power of love and to why Mary Balogh is continued to be hailed as one of the best writers in the romance genre. I enjoy it really much, as, I believe, will you.

I got so tired of the heroine only responding to the earl in one word answers. I thought the character development was a big zero. I usually love Balogh books but this one was a bore. There was virtual know passion between the two so called lovers. If you want passion and tension stay away from this regency from Balogh.

I think this is the first Balogh book I've read which I was disappointed in. She's established a scenario in which her characters have met before and have reasons to dislike or distrust each other, but finding out where they met before, under what circumstances and what actually happened is like getting blood from a stone. Balogh does give us quite a bit of introspection, but instead of the usual technique of using the introspection as a means of filling her readers in on what happened in the past, she tries to combine this with a 'closed mystery' style, in which we only find out the full story at the same time as the hero and heroine. This makes the book very frustrating.

Even when all is finally resolved, the ending is unsatisfying because I feel she finishes the book too soon. I wanted more discussion about the past and what went wrong, and about the future. I wanted to *see* the characters reconciled - and I didn't get that.

So, while I'll keep this book as part of my Balogh collection, I won't be re-reading it much.

No, this book isn't Mary Balogh's best, though it's hugely better than books from the vast majority of other Regency authors. It is much more low-key than her other books, and as such there isn't much to get excited or sad about. It's not a tear-jerker, although there is no doubt that the heroine has had a tough life.

I would have liked to find out more of Christina's and Gerard's background sooner; the information came in dribs and drabs and it was a little frustrating waiting to find out *why* she had married his cousin instead, and what the issue was with her father. The book also ended very abruptly; Balogh could have brought the characters together a little sooner and thus spent more time on the resolution.

Still, it's worth buying and reading, even if I won't be re-reading it as often as some of my other Baloghs.

I read this book some time back (nearly a year ago) and criticized the history and some other aspects of this on a Balogh fan list. [Whoa! Never criticize Balogh to her most die-hard fans]. The love story is not bad, although I had a hard time believing in many aspects of it, partly because of the serious historical mistake that Balogh makes. Since the other two reviews explain why the romance leaves them cold, I will not go into details on that. The romance actually worked better for me than did her second-to-last book MORE THAN A MISTRESS (which I really could not find entirely credible). The problem I had with this book is Isabelle's ability to jaunt to and from France *during* the Napoleonic Wars. I am not doubting that free-traders and spies were wont to cross to and fro; however, it beggars the imagination that a young woman (even a promising actress) who was English would have been able to make her way to France - and launch a career *and* a marriage to a Frenchman. Even if this occurs at the time of the Peace of Amiens (1802), the timing of Isabelle's return is a bit off to say the least. As a Frenchwoman (by marriage), the earliest she could have returned to England and re-launched her acting career would be 1814. There is of course the little problem of Waterloo in between, not to mention the fact that even Mrs Siddons would require some time to establish (or re-establish) herself. The dates did not quite match the age of Isabelle's child; that was one of my problems.

The second problem I had was in believing that the youthful romance between Jack and Isabelle could be kept secret in London. Possible yes. Likely, perhaps. But it strains my credulity again.

The third problem I had was in Jack's family welcoming Isabelle into their homes as a guest, given her status as an actress. Very famous actresses might be acceptable, but even then, unless they were clearly happily married, they might not be considered equals - let alone allowed to socialize with the younger unmarried ladies. Isabelle was a widow, albeit of a French noblewoman. If she had previously been invited to other country house parties, it would have been as a noblewoman, not as an actress. Again, a little build-up to the Duke and Duchess's decision to have an actress come as an equal to their country house would have been helpful; i.e. understanding that they were not precisely conventional stick-in-the-mud types. [In fact, reading the prequel THE FIRST SNOWDROP helps here].

I could not really care for Jack's attitude to Isabelle, and the opinions he holds of her. Generally, romances where the hero behaves badly towards the heroine (on little or no grounds) and then is forgiven easily at the end appeal less and less to me. That made the romance part a little hard to swallow.

This is certainly not a bad book. I would say that Mary Balogh's "duds" are still pretty good compared with the average output in the Regency market. In fact, CHRISTMAS BELLE comes off well compared with three of the last four Baloghs I have read and reviewed - A MASKED DECEPTION, THE DOUBLE WAGER, and A CHANCE ENCOUNTER (the fourth being THE COUNTERFEIT BETROTHAL). Mary Balogh has achieved the angsty note that is peculiar (i.e. unique) to her, but the plot and the romance in this book is not entirely convincing. For a better read on the theme of youthful love and separation from the same author, try THE COUNTERFEIT BETROTHAL (still not one of her best, because the secondary romance is actually the primary romance). Or try LORD CAREW'S BRIDE, the story of a young girl who gives her heart to the wrong man. This book rates at about 3.5

Much as I hate giving a Mary Balogh book less than five stars, this one is not her best by any means. It's a shame, because a lot of the time she writes Christmas very well; witness A Christmas Promise. However, with this and The Last Waltz, I was disappointed.

I'm not really sure why; the story had plenty of potential to grip my emotions. Jack and Isabelle were lovers years earlier, but both misunderstood the nature of their relationship, each in love but believing that the other saw their relationship as only representing a transaction: sex in exchange for money. Isabelle, an actress with a passionate desire to succeed in her craft, knew that Jack hated what she did, and that he resented other men looking at her. In his response to that resentment, he emphasised that her role in his life was as his whore; she hated that description and the implication that he didn't care for her at all, and so she claimed to have other lovers, and then she walked out on him.

Now they meet again, eight years later; she's a widow with two children, and he's about to become betrothed at a house party to which they're both invited. Gradually, as they find they can't avoid one another's company, they work through the misunderstandings and realise that they were in love all along - and are still. But Jack's still committed to making an offer to Juliana, his chosen bride, and Isabelle still has a secret untold...

Some nice secondary characters, although the family gets very confusing if you haven't read the first book in this mini-series. Overall, though, Jack and Isabelle never made me love them sufficiently, and the book left me unsatisfied.

A great actress, Isabella Gelle, Comtesse de Vacheron, is invited to spend Christmas at the country home of the Duke and Duchess of Portland. The widowed Isabella and her two children will be honored guests at the family gathering; Isabella has also been asked to present a short program as part of the Chtistmas Day entertainment.

Isabella is anxious about accepting the invitation, aware that the Duke and Duchess's grandson, Jack Frazer, is also likely to be present. Years before, at the start of her career, they had been lovers, but they had parted bitterly. Now Isabella is both hoping - and dreading - that Jack will be there.

This is one of a series of novels and short stories set around Christmas in Regency England by Balogh, and, as always, the description of the festivities is wonderful. She handles a large cast of characters with ease: I particularly liked Isabella's young daughter, Jacqueline, whose passion for the violin Isabella tries to suppress, in a mistaken attempt to protect her daughter from the hurt she herself has suffered in pursuing her own gifts. Jacqueline finds an unexpected champion, and the relationship that develops between the two is touching.

Jack is under pressure from his grandmother to find himself a wife. He finds it enormously difficult to deal with Isabella's unexpected presence at his family's gathering. She is the only woman he has ever loved, and he was deeply hurt when she disappeared from his life.

Isabella and Jack's resolution of the bitterness of their past, while under the ever-watchful eyes of his vast family, is emotionally wrenching. In the end, secrets are revealed and family expectations are satisfied in unexpected ways.

What spoiled this book for me, a little, was Jack's intemperate language when talking to Isabella. It made him less likeable, and flawed an otherwise moving story.

[Note: some of the same characters appear in The First Snowdrop.]