Devonshire - Lynne Connolly

A wedding... or a funeral? Rose Golighty and Lord Richard Strang anticipate their long-awaited wedding. But dark whispers reach Richard's ears of smugglers threatening the county's peace. Events escalate until Rose's life is threatened. Richard knows he must act to save her and her friends from disaster. Even if his bride has to trade her wedding gown for widow's weeds.

Devonshire is the second book of the Richard and Rose series. We meet them again as they prepare for their wedding. However not all is well as in the village near where Rose lives some people are being attacked and there's rumour of a smugglers gang around. At the same time Rose has to face the competition of one other young lady for Richard's attention.

I did like the fact that we get to know Richard and Rose better. We get to know how deeply they feel for each other, how Richard is prepared to take revenge on people who hurt Rose in the past and how he has a sort of secret life organising a group of clever spies. That will come handy when he and Rose's friend Tom interferes with the smugglers operation which ends with Tom and Rose being kidnapped and held for guarantee of everyone's good behaviour while the smugglers wait for their last cargo.

The true villain of the story was a bit of a surprise and unlike other stories where the heroine always comes out safe Rose does have a hard time and is tortured by the villain. She feels dirty and ill used but she doesn't hesitate to tell the truth to Richard once they are safe. There's also not a clean ending, Richard is capable of violence when needed be and in fact when compared with the first book this one has a lot more of that.

I really enjoyed it and the small village atmosphere we have here, where all the neighbours know and gossip about each other. It was really fun to see Richard setting Miss Terry up for the fall while Rose felt so secure of his feelings.

Grade: B+