Delicious angst!!! This was right up my alley. Such a satisfying read. ( )

Just okay. Doesn’t make me want to read any more by this author. A little hokey. A little contrived. The author seemed to push her characters around in a rather inorganic manner. ( )

Prizefighter gains a wife—the wife gains?

Marriage of convenience trope is given a good run for its money is this Hart series contribution. Dorothea Hart has been the backstop for her siblings and families forever. Too old to come out when that might have happened she’s been relegated to spinster aunt / sometime chaperone / carer of small children / problem solving hostess for her brother the Duke and his wife. All very well but really those brothers needed their heads knocked together. The backstory here is rather sad
Griffon Oake, widower and prizefighter is looking for a chaperone / governess for his wild child daughter from his first marriage. Someone who will lend him respectability, preferably mild and unobtrusive. Someone to help his daughter eventually make her way through society’s traps for the unwary.
What he doesn’t know is that Thea has a guilty secret—him.
Still Thea wasn’t looking towards marriage, that was beyond her, until a situation arises when both find themselves with their feet placed firmly on the rung of matrimony.
There’s a long way to go before the problems are ironed out in this “convenient” relationship!
I liked Thea, Griff needed lessons in listening—and then some!

A Dragonblade ARC via NetGalley
Please note: Quotes taken from an advanced reading copy maybe subject to change ( )