Ruining Miss Wrotham by Emily Larkin

Narrated by Rosalyn Landor

Ruining Miss Wrotham is the third full-length book in Emily Larkin’s Baleful Godmother series of historical romances with a touch of fantasy. While characters from the other books do appear, it’s perfectly possible to listen to this one as a standalone provided you’re familiar with the basic premise; that each heroine receives a magical gift from their faerie godmother once they reach a certain age. The magical aspects in each book are fairly low-key though, so if you’re looking for witches and spellcraft and battles of magic, you won’t find them here. What you WILL find is a well-crafted and well-told road-trip romance imbued with warmth and sensuality featuring two engaging protagonists.

Eleanor – Nell – Wrotham is anxiously counting the days until her twenty-third birthday. This is when she is due to receive her visit from Baletongue, the devious, malevolent faerie godmother who is bound to deliver a supernatural power to the females of her family line as the result of an ages-old curse. Nell knows exactly which gift she will choose; the ability to find missing people. She’s impatient to receive it so she can locate her sister Sophia, who ran off with her lover four months earlier and has since gone missing. But when Nell receives a months-old note suggesting that Sophia is in London – in Seven Dials – she can wait no longer and even though she still has a few days to go before her birthday, she wants to go there immediately, regardless of the fact it’s one of the most dangerous areas of town. She asks her former fiancé – who jilted her after learning of her sister’s disgrace – if he will accompany her, but he refuses; and as she is storming out of his house, she bumps into the gorgeous but hugely disreputable Mordecai Black, bastard son of the Earl of Dereham – and the last man she’d ever have thought of turning to for help. But when he learns of her intention to venture into Seven Dials alone, help is exactly what Black offers, saying he’s willing to search on her behalf, but Nell will have none of it.

Very reluctantly, Black escorts Nell to the rookeries and slums of Seven Dials and to the house the note was sent from – but Sophia is not there, and they learn that she left with a friend some time ago, and is likely in Exeter, at the home of someone who helps fallen women. Naturally, Nell wants to set out for Exeter immediately, but Black will not hear of her going alone and insists on escorting her himself. He also insists on procuring a disguise for her in order to protect her reputation, despite Nell’s protestations that the fact of her sister’s elopement has already ruined her good name and she has no reputation left to protect.

The bulk of the story follows Eleanor and Mordecai Black on their journey to Exeter and then as they travel from place to place making enquiries. It’s clear right from the start that there is more to Black than meets the eye, and as he and Nell spend time together travelling, questioning and discussing their findings, she starts to realise that Black’s reputation as a rake and all-round reprobate is completely undeserved. What she finds instead is a perceptive, honourable and trustworthy man who lives life on his own terms and doesn’t give a fig for society’s opinion of him – and she’s unnerved by the visceral pull of attraction she feels towards him. She’s also surprised to discover that he had once asked her father for permission to pay his addresses and been refused out of hand – and she’s furious that her father never told her of it. She can’t imagine why Black should have offered for her – they barely know each other – but can’t help being flattered that such an attractive man should want her. In spite of that, however, she tries to steel herself against temptation and tell herself she isn’t attracted to him. He’s too high-handed and dictatorial for her taste, and having been manipulated by her controlling father her entire life, the last thing she wants now he’s dead is to give up her newly gained independence to a husband.

The romance is a sensual slow-burn as Black – who is a truly delicious hero and my favourite of the series – determines to give Nell time to realise that far from being opposites, they’re kindred spirits. The sparks fly between them from the start, and their over-dinner conversations are a delight, their enforced proximity leading to shared confidences and a growing sense of trust and intimacy. And lots of Extra Brownie Points for the way the author shows them both learning to compromise in order to keep each other safe; romances are full of heroines who are repeatedly warned against putting themselves in danger and then do just that, and of heroes who want to keep them wrapped up in cotton wool, but Ms. Larkin doesn’t fall into that trap. Nell doesn’t like it when Black is high-handed, but she understands that his intention is to protect her, and he comes to see that she wants to keep him safe as well, so they learn to adapt. It’s not always easy for them, but their willingness to try is what’s important, and speaks volumes as to the strength of their feelings for one another.

When the longed-for visit from Baletongue finally happens, things don’t go according to plan, and a rift develops between the couple. Fortunately, however, Marcus, Earl of Cosgrove (Unmasking Miss Appleby) and Letty and Icarus Reid (Trusting Miss Trentham) are on hand to help sort things out, but while I was glad to see them, their sudden and rather convenient appearance felt contrived and smacked of the deus ex machina, and the ending is a bit rushed.

Rosalyn Landor returns to narrate this instalment in the series, and as I haven’t listened to her for a little while, it was a real pleasure to once again immerse myself in her dulcet tones and know that I was in very safe hands as far as the narration was concerned. While much of this story is a two-hander, there are a fair number of ‘bit players’ who have only a handful of words or lines in the form of servants and jarveys, and as usual, Ms. Landor voices them all appropriately according to station and applies a variety of timbre and accent to differentiate them all effectively. The larger secondary roles are similarly well-realised – from the nasally tone assigned to the sanctimonious Miss Pender to the roughly-accented thug, Billy English. The two leads are attractively realised; Nell’s inner strength is there in her voice, and Black’s lower-pitched, velvety tones make a nice contrast and his open, generally even-tempered speech and demeanour reveals a man who is comfortable in his own skin. It’s an intelligent, well-paced performance that shows once again why Ms. Landor is such a beloved narrator of historical romance.

Although I did sometimes find Nell’s tendency to see Black’s concern for her safety as attempts to control her a little irritating, it works within the context of her character, and I liked her in spite of it. In Mordecai Black, Emily Larkin has created a truly memorable, swoonworthy hero who will win you over immediately, and all in all, Ruining Miss Wrotham is a touching, sensual historical romance that injects a sense of whimsy into well-used tropes.

Caz

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