The Undoing of a Lady
The Brides of Fortune’s Folly – Book Three
HQN, August 2009, 384 pp
ISBN_10: 0373773951
ISBN-13: 978-0373773770
Regency
$7.99 (US) $8.99 (CDN)
Reviewed by Mary
August 2009
Nathaniel Waterhouse lived his life with honor, grace and allot of following the rules. He took his position in society as serious and wore the title of Earl with respect. His friend for nine years Lady Elizabeth Scarlet was the flip side of this coin. She was a hoyden who had little respect for honor, stature of any position nor any desire to follow rules as they were meant to be broken – every last one of them. When her mother deserted her and then her father died she has lived an unstructured and undisciplined life with her half-brothers and they let her run amuck.
Laura Cole the dowager Duchess of Cole felt she was exempt from this, and after having survived an abusive and neglectful relationship with her late husband she is not anxious to enter into another loveless marriage. Laura decides to fight back with her own outdated laws and turn the tables on the men. She is not aware that one of the men is the one man she truly loved, Dexter Anstruther. They shared a night of reckless and explosive passion that produced a daughter he is unaware of and she has a longing for him that never dissipated.
But one thing Lizzie has always taken seriously is her feeling for Nat and the love she has felt for him since their first meeting even though she was just a child. She has always kept these feelings hidden from him for fear of rejection but knew that they were meant to be together even though she feigned otherwise. So when Nat decides to enter into a loveless marriage to a woman with a fortune that will free him and his family from debt Lizzie decides to take matters into her own hands to prevent this. She pushes her plan of action into effect on the eve of his wedding by asking him to meet with her in a secluded location. Lizzie knows he will come because he always does when she requests it. But after he shows up and she imprisons him until after the wedding a chain of events she never expected occur. Lizzie finds herself compromised by Nat, his marriage called off and herself trapped into a marriage with Nat she was not prepared for. They light up the night with their passion and intense lust for each other but can that keep the fire burning through the years. Lizzie is not convinced of this but Nat is sure she is his perfect match.
Then Lizzie’s brother is murdered and everyone becomes a suspect and wonders who did this terrible thing and if anyone might will be next. Monty was not loved by the village due to his reinstatement of the Dames’ Tax but is that enough to provoke someone to murder him? Nat has always been the protector of Lizzie and this tragedy forces him to try even harder to get her under control which only results in Lizzie acting more inappropriately and doing such outlandish things that no can believe how brash she is.
THE UNDOING OF A LADY is a complete and total delight on every page and the perfect conclusion to Nicola Cornick’s “Brides of Fortunes Folly” trilogy. You have Nat and Lizzie knocking heads at every instance with this intense and overpowering passion, the underlying mystery of who murdered Monty and all the high drama of how the village is going to combat the latest tax scheme. These characters are so endearing and true to form that you are rooting for them to succeed at their individual successes as well as the chance to figure out that they love each other and get on with it already. The back story with Lydia is a tear jerker as you know this woman deserves better than she is getting but all the friends (Alice & Laura) pull together to show that even in the Regency period of time women were strong enough to run the world.