Showing results by author "Georgette Heyer" in All Categories

Endowed with rank, wealth and elegance, Sylvester, Duke of Salford, posts into Wiltshire to discover if the Honorable Phoebe Marlow will meet his exacting requirements for a bride. If he does not expect to meet a tongue-tied stripling wanting both manners and conduct, then he is intrigued indeed when his visit causes Phoebe to flee her home. They meet again on the road to London, where her carriage has come to grief in the snow. Yet Phoebe, already caught in one imbroglio, now knows she soon could be well deep in another.... 

When Sophy is sent to stay with her London relatives, she finds her cousins in quite the tangle. Cecilia is besotted with an attractive but feather-brained poet, Hubert has fallen foul of a money-lender and the ruthlessly handsome Charles is engaged to a pedantic bluestocking who seems to bring out the worst in him. Fortunately, Sophy has arrived just in time to sort them all out - but Charles is eager to rid his family of her meddlesome ways. Has the grand Sophy finally met her match?

Stepping into the wrong carriage at a Sussex village, Elinor Rochdale is swept up in a thrilling and dangerous adventure. Overnight the would-be governess becomes mistress of a ruined estate and partner in a secret conspiracy to save a family's name. By midnight, she is a bride, by dawn, a widow. 

Brought to you by Penguin. Vernon Alverstoke sees no reason to put himself out for anyone. But when a distant connection asks for help, he is quickly plunged into one drama after another by the disorderly Merriville family. Surprisingly, he finds himself far from bored - especially when he...

Annis Wychwood delights in her independence. Beautiful, rich and far too busy for love, she has turned down the advances of many a hopeful suitor. But when she becomes entangled in the affairs of a runaway heiress, she encounters the girl's guardian, the notorious Oliver Carleton. While Oliver may be a reckless and uncivil rogue, Annis can't help but be drawn towards his wild ways.

Her eccentric and childless guardian, Mr. Penicuik, is leaving Kitty all of his vast fortune - but with one condition. She must marry one of his five grand-nephews. However, Kitty's clear favourite - the rakish Jack Westruther - doesn't appear at all interested in the arrangement. To make Jack jealous, Kitty impulsively convinces his cousin, the kind-hearted and chivalrous Freddy Standen, to enter into a pretend engagement. But the more time she spends with Freddy, the more Kitty wonders whether Jack is the right choice after all....

Arabella, the daughter of an impoverished country parson, dreams of a new life in London. But her beauty and charm will only get her so far - and when Arabella embarks on her first London season armed with nothing but a benevolent godmother and her own notoriously short temper, she quickly runs afoul of Robert Beaumaris.

Adam Deveril, the new Viscount Lynton and a hero at Salamanca, returns from the Peninsula War to find his family on the brink of ruin and the broad acres of his ancestral home mortgaged to the hilt. It is Lord Oversley, father of Adam's first love, who tactfully introduces him to Mr Jonathan Chaleigh, a city man of apparently unlimited wealth with no social ambitions for himself, but with his eyes firmly fixed on a suitable match for his one and only daughter.

Brought to you by Penguin. In all her twenty-five years, Venetia Lanyon has never been further than Harrogate. Nor has she enjoyed the attentions of any man aside from her two wearisomely persistent suitors. Then, in one extraordinary encounter, she meets a neighbour she only knew by reputation...

The Priory may look ramshackle in appearance, but Peter, Margaret and Celia are totally charmed by their newly inherited country house. But there's more to The Priory than meets the eye. Left empty for years, hardly a single person has set foot inside, and down in the village, the locals whisper of a ghostly figure that roams the halls. When a murder is committed, the new owners start to fear the rumours are true - but is their new home really haunted, or is someone trying to scare them away?

After her father's death, Kate was left an orphan, striving to make ends meet as a governess until her Aunt Minerva rescues her from poverty. Kate hardly knows what to expect at the grand house of Staplewood. Her uncle lives in one wing, while her handsome, moody cousin, Torquil, occupies another; guests are few and far between, but even family dinners are rigidly formal. And, over it all, Minerva's word is law. But the sudden arrival of Cousin Philip throws Minerva's control over the household into doubt, and Kate begins to suspect the shocking reason for Minerva's generosity. 

Beautiful heiress Judith Taverner has her pick of London suitors. But her luck takes a turn for the worse when her hapless brother, Peregrine, becomes the target of a would-be-assassin. To Judith's great annoyance, their mysterious guardian - the handsome Earl of Worth - seems far more intent on wooing her than saving her brother, but all is not as it seems. When the truth is revealed, Judith will finally discover if the earl is after her money or her heart.

Leonie Bonnard is being drawn into a 12-year-old feud. Justin Alastair, the duke of Avon, is a reprehensible rake with an axe to grind. Decades ago the Comte de Saint-Vire did something unforgivable, and ever since Justin has been lying in wait to settle the score. When Justin meets Leon, a street urchin with a striking resemblance to his nemesis, he aims to use him as a pawn in his plans for revenge on the Comte. Except Leon is in fact Leonie, a beautiful young ingénue who may just steal Justin's heart.

The Honourable Christopher Fancot, on leave from the diplomatic service in the summer of 1817, is startled to find his entrancing but incorrigibly extravagant mother on the brink of financial and social ruin - and more than alarmed to find that his twin, Evelyn, has disappeared without trace. Christopher - Kit - is forced into an outrageous masquerade by the tangled affairs of his wayward family: his rigid uncle, Lord Brumby; the surprisingly wily Sir Bonamy Ripple; the formidable old Lady Stavely and Evelyn's betrothed, Cressy.  

This anthology of rare stories of crime and suspense brings together a selection of tales by masters of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction for the first time in book form, including a newly discovered Agatha Christie crime story that has not been seen since 1922. At a time when crime and...

Abigail Wendover has no time for love. She is far too busy protecting her niece, who has fallen madly in love with a suspected fortune-hunter. But her efforts become vastly more complicated with the arrival of Miles Calverleigh, the black sheep of his family - a reckless bachelor with a scandalous past. Abby soon discovers that, despite successfully managing her niece's love life, she has far less control over her own unruly heart. 

The 60th birthday party of Silas Kane was marred by argument and dissension amongst his family. And then, the morning after the celebrations, Kane is found dead at the foot of a cliff. The theory that Silas accidentally lost his way in the fog is confirmed when the coroner returns a verdict of death by misadventure. But then Kane's nephew, and heir, is murdered, and threats are made on the next in line to the fortune, throwing a new and sinister light on Silas Kane's death. 

Sir Waldo Hawkridge - wealthy, handsome, eligible, illustrious and known as 'The Nonesuch' for his athletic prowess - believes he is past the age of falling in love. But when he comes North to inspect his unusual inheritance at Broom Hall in the West Riding, his arrival leads to the most entertaining of ramifications.

Miles from anywhere, the isolated mansion Darracott Place is presided over by the irascible Lord Darracott. The recent drowning of his eldest son has done nothing to improve his temper. For now he must send for the unknown offspring of the uncle whom the family are never permitted to mention. Yet none of that beleaguered family are prepared for the arrival of the weaver's brat and heir apparent.

Renowned gamester and the first to admit that he is entirely void of a romantic disposition, Max Ravenscar regards all eligible females with indifference and unconcern. But when he meets the woman his young cousin Adrian is bent on marrying - the beautiful Deborah Grantham, mistress of her aunt's gaming house - he finds that none of his experience in risk and gambling has prepared him for such a worthy opponent.