[PDB]∎ PDF Free Counterfeit Betrothal Signet Regency Romance Mary Balogh 9780451172563 Books

Counterfeit Betrothal Signet Regency Romance Mary Balogh 9780451172563 Books

Download As PDF : Counterfeit Betrothal Signet Regency Romance Mary Balogh 9780451172563 Books

Counterfeit Betrothal Signet Regency Romance Mary Balogh 9780451172563 Books

I will share with my sister who is also a fan of Mary Balogh. Nothing else to add.
Don't know why I have to have a minimum number of words. I'm not much for talking or typing


Tags : Counterfeit Betrothal: (Signet Regency Romance) [Mary Balogh] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Determined to bring her estranged parents back together again, Lady Sophia Bryant announces her false betrothal to Lord Francis Sutton,Mary Balogh,Counterfeit Betrothal: (Signet Regency Romance),Berkley,0451172566,Romance - Historical - Regency,Fiction,Fiction General,Fiction Romance General,Fiction Romance Historical Regency,General Adult,MASS MARKET,RomanceRegency,Romance: Regency,Romance: historical

Counterfeit Betrothal Signet Regency Romance Mary Balogh 9780451172563 Books Reviews

Lady Sophia Bryant isn't enjoying her first Season. She doesn't want to get married, because her own experience of marriage is disastrous her parents separated when she was four and neither has seen the other since then. Talking to some friends, a scheme is borne if Sophia pretends that she wants to marry someone her parents will find ineligible, but is of perfectly good ton, then maybe they will have to join forces to talk her out of it.
Step forward Lord Francis Sutton, youngest son of a duke - a duke who happens to be the Earl of Clifton's (Sophia's father) oldest friend. Sophia and Francis have known each other since they were very young children - and unlike characters in another author's books I've been reading recently, these two really do sound as if they've known each other all their lives. Francis and Sophia have quarrelled all their lives, too, and even in agreeing to pretend to be madly in love they fight. It's already apparent that this pretend engagement is going to be a lot of fun - and that Sophia and Francis are actually not as indifferent to each other as they pretend.
And now we meet the principal characters of this book Sophia's parents, Olivia and Marcus. Although they're the parents of a debutante, they are actually relatively young still Marc is 40 to Livy's 36. But they haven't seen one another for 14 years. Olivia rejected Marc after a stupid mistake of his drunk, he slept with a prostitute because his friends were egging him on, and he compounded his error by telling Olivia. At her young age at the time - just 21 - she'd put him on a pedestal and couldn't cope with discovering that he was human. She didn't know how to rebuild their marriage at the time, so she told him that she couldn't forgive him.
So how do Marc and Livy cope, meeting each other after all this time? Has time healed the wounds? Are they now two strangers? Or can they be indifferent to each other, behaving like polite acquaintances? Or is it possible that they are each still in love with the other?
We get two love stories for the price of one in A Counterfeit Betrothal. Frances and Sophia's is fun all the way; extremely humorous, and it's entirely obvious that the two of them have bitten off far more than they can chew in pretending to their families that they are madly in love and can't wait to be married. But... is it really all a pretence? Is it possible for two people to be quite so convincing? And will they actually be able to extricate themselves before they really find themselves in front of a vicar? But then, as Francis keeps telling Sophia, they're both headed for Bedlam anyway.
And then, in stark contrast, Marc and Livy's story is utterly poignant. Their separation left each of them bitter, Marc because he'd pleaded with Livy for six months to forgive him, and Livy because of Marc's betrayal. Seeing each other again is unbelievably painful for both. Being together, pretending to be the happily married couple for friends and relations - and especially in front of Sophia, so that they don't spoil her engagement and wedding plans - takes its toll on both. Is it too late for them? Once the wedding - what wedding? - is over, will Olivia just go back home and never see Marc again?
It takes a very good, very believable, angsty romance to make me cry. This one did. It takes something special in a book to make me think and obsess about the characters when I'm not reading it - I do have to work sometimes! - but this one did. Unfortunately, like just about all of Balogh's early Regencies, it's out of print. But if you can get hold of it second-hand, grab it. You won't want to let it go.
Just perfect!
wmr-uk
There are two relationships in this novel, one involving the only daughter of estranged parents who schemes to reunite them by undertaking a counterfeit betrothal to a rakish young man she's known since childhood -- he was always trying to shake her off and go have fun with friends -- and a more complicated relationship between the parents, who parted badly 14 years ago over his drunken betrayal of her with a whore during the revelries prior to a friend's marriage. She lives a retired life in the country; his name's been connected with a genteel woman in London for years.

The older couple's relationship is far more fraught and emotional than the younger twosome's. It also gets more coverage, page-wise. I didn't mind this, nor did I mind that the fraught relationship was played out in the heads of the two characters trying to navigate their emotions, their frustrations, their pride, their mistakes, etc. They yearn for each other and dare not make themselves vulnerable to yet more pain. They misinterpret each other in their anxiety to read the other. I found it involving and very touching. And frustrating, as these sorts of stories can be. Why doesn't she unbend? Why doesn't either one 'fess up that they have only loved the other? What will it take to let the past go and carry on? But people are like that. Not just in novels, in life.

For some readers, the wife's remoteness/pride and seeming lack of forgiveness may be too much; for me, the author's skill at depicting the complex emotions warring within each is not needless churning or angst but a moving portrayal of the deep wounds caused by betrayal and the struggle to gain perspective, finally, before it's too late. In other words, I am glad the younger couple's funny squabbling took a backseat to the more challenging romance featured.

4.5 stars, it's a great story for the category, but Balogh has even better, so must save room for those.
How this book could have gotten any Excellent reviews is incomprehensible. The plot looked a lot of fun, plus you got two romances for the price of one, great! The only character I did like was Francis, the rake. All the other characters felt so extreme, tedious, and not very human. The romance between the young couple was fun to read at first, but a birdbrain girl can only be cute for so long. Everything she said was so immature, thoughtless, rash, and stupid that I wondered why Francis fell for such an idiot. The romance between the older couple felt like such farce. They both proclaimed an undying, steadfast love and yet are swayed into frustrating misunderstandings that just killed any sympathy you might have felt for them. What I found frustrating were the pages and pages of inner turmoil, soul searching, hypothetical narrative, and yet the little straight forward dialogue between them. Both characters should have stayed alone and gotten exactly what they deserved. Trust me, Mary Balogh NOT at her best.
It is beyond me how it is called romance.H is idiot ,h is art historian and philosopher and classic scholar and healer and...there is also very detailed description of monkey and his stupid endless mishaps.do not forget very very very detailed 24 years description of h' childhood attempts to injure or kill H... Waisting money and time.
I will share with my sister who is also a fan of Mary Balogh. Nothing else to add.
Don't know why I have to have a minimum number of words. I'm not much for talking or typing