Great read. Characters are believable and well thought out. Great happily ever after. Overall an intriguing and interesting book to enjoy and recommend.

I couldn’t put this book down, specially after the bit about the Knight in Shining Strawberry Jam. This novel is packed with witty banter, tender moments and steamy scenes but also covers issues like gossip and reputation, women’s rights, universal suffrage, covert activities and social reforms, seamlessly woven together with extraordinary characters for a very engrossing read.

I received an ARC from Netgalley and leaving my review voluntarily.

Benedict Southcott, is in love with Lady Lydia Dashwood, younger sister of his best friend and completely off-limits. So when her brother is on honeymoon and Lydia asks for his help what else can he do.

The third book in the Ladies Covert Academy, and the first I have read. This is a friends to lovers tale, with a little enforced proximity thrown in. I enjoyed the interplay between Lydia and Benedict.

I found it it hard to enjoy the story fully as there were a number of historical, geographical and lingual inaccuracies. For example the Stafford based group being referred to as being from the north west, Stafford is in the midlands. The upperclass Lady inviting working class women into her home is something that stretches credibility. Class structures in England are so rigid that I found it difficult to suspend my disbelief. The historical timelines don’t quite fit together either. The story is set in 1819 but the suffragist movement began around 40 years later, in the Victorian (not Regency) period. The use of the word sidewalk. These things kept pulling me out of the story.

I also found myself skimming parts about the reformers, these sections just didn’t hold my interest and took up far too much of the story (which wasn’t helped by them being completely inaccurate for the period). Overall some lovely, romantic elements but leg down by the lack of research on the time period of the suffrage movement.