I thoroughly enjoyed the adventures of Elise Lanscarr and Christopher "Kit" Fitzhugh-Cox. Were there ever two people more suited for each other? Whether he was rescuing her from the clutches of men meaning to harm her or attempting to help her find her missing father or just helping her to get back home safely, "Kit" was her knight in shining amour. He was there for her whatever the obstacle even though he had no real idea who she was other than a lady in need of his help and someone be began to care for. I was happy with how the story progressed and that even though they were separated during the story, they ended up together in the end and were perfect for each other.

Miss Elise Lanscarr, Miss Gwendolyn, and Mrs Data Brogan are back. Data and Michael are NIW married and along with Aunt Tweedie, they live in one house. Elise is not happy that Michael married Dara, who knew she wanted Michael. Hurt, anger, and jealousy have reared their ugly head, now Slide wants out of that household. She wants her home, Wiltham in County Wicklow. So off she goes without telling anyone.

Along the way, they end up in a nasty storm, the mail coach driver insists on extra money for her to sit inside. He makes an obscene, offensive suggestion which Elise turns down. However, a stranger barks at her to get in the coach, and urges the driver to reconsider he choice and life.

Kit Cox, the vagabond, wanderer with not care crawls into the coach. They are bounced as they travel until lightning strikes too close and the mail coach is tossed, flipped, and so are they. The driver and guard are both killed, but Elise and Kit are saved.

Now they have to walk to the next inn to get another coach. They are befriended by a collie who Elise names Tamsyn. A fatherly farmer offers Elise a ride. Colorful farmers offer rude suggestions, and blisters make walking hard. Along the journey, Elise and Kit become friends, have lively discussions, and generally take care of each other.

So come join the walk about with Elise and Kit as they mature, learn to rely on each othet, meet eccentric people, family and not have prying eyes on them. Visit the countryside in England, make flower chain crowns, wade thru streams, and sleep under the stars.

As you unravel hearts, pride, and discover your identity. This heartfelt story will run the full emotional spectrum. laughter, witty banter, tears, and hope all abound. I would say more but then you would not have the pleasure of this delightful story, or to find out who this famed "young" duke is, Christopher Fitzhugh-Cox, Duke of Winderton,

I really enjoyed this book. Everytime I put the book down, I looked forward to picking it back up and finding out what happened next. Elise was a young, naive heroine but also strong and confident, but not overly independent as to be out of character for that time period. I absolutely loved Tamsyn! The pacing was a bit fast and there was a lot that happened in a short span of time. The end seemed a bit rushed and glossed over some plot points, but I’m hoping that subplot continues in the next book. This was my first time reading a book from this author. She reminds me of Julia Quinn & Eloisa James. I’m excited to read her other books.

ARC received from publisher through NetGalley

One Dangerous Night by Cathy Maxwell is part of a series but can be read as a stand-alone. It’s book 2 and I found it charming and well written. I gave it a high 4 ⭐️. It’s a slow burn romance about two people running from something. The romance had good banter and endearing chemistry. It had a happy ending and an endearing match. The love did feel a tad rushed for the time it happened but overall enjoyed it.
Thanks Harper Voyager via NetGalley.

Loved this one! I was surprised how much I enjoyed this book considering I haven’t read the first one in the series, but I found myself completely enamored with Elise and Kit. From page one, I could tell the nature of Elise’s personality was young and naive. I mean, the first chapter begins with her running away from her family, so it wasn’t too hard to gauge what she was going to be like.
I loved Elise’s character in this, which is pretty surprising because I usually don’t like the heroines who are so independent that they are mean to the other characters. I wouldn’t say Elise was mean, but she definitely stood her ground on her opinions, and I appreciated that. I loved how anti-men she was because I could absolutely relate to her on that front. She had been so used to people choosing her second that all she wanted was for someone to choose her first.
I loved Kit and he was just the man for Elsie. I loved that this was more friends to lovers than anything. Kit and Elise experienced a traumatic thing together which forced them to become close and a bond flourished between them that can’t be broken.
I just loved how their friendship gradually became something more. There was mutual pining for a good bit of the book, so it made their coming together that much sweeter once it finally happened.
I can’t wait for the next book. The epilogue set up the next book's plot very well and I’m looking forward to it. I’m also looking forward to going back and reading over the first book as well!

I received this as an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

I really enjoyed this book! Elise is heartbroken over being set aside by the man who was courting her for her own sister, and her solution is to literally flee London. Cue a carriage crash and that's how she meets Kit, our secret duke who is a commoner in disguise. I loved the dynamic between these two- there's so much push and pull as they embark on their road trip, Kit is a messy man with an equally messy past, and Elise is a bit of a brat but an endearing one so you can't help but root for her. This book is a bit of a slow burn and from what I remember, there is one sex scene. Overall, I enjoyed this book and I'm curious to see how the final sister, Gwendolyn, gets her own happily-ever-after.

Thank you to Avon and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my review.

Rating: 4/5
Heat Level: 3/5
Publication Date: March 26th

What a delightful adventure this book by Cathy Maxwell was. I so enjoyed this second installment of the Lanscarr sister’s saga. The trio are a force to be reckoned with and have.a seriously awesome dose of girl power to boot. Elise’s story is not only a fabulous romance but also one of self discovery and finding your true friends and family. Kit was everything you could ask for in a Duke, and I loved getting the glimpses of Dara, Gwendolyn and Mr. Steele. Now to eagerly await Book Three and find out about the elusive Beckett.

When an author takes two secondary characters from previous books for whom I struggled to find one ounce of affection and gives them a growth/redemption arc that not only turns them into characters I happily cheered for but they end up being one of my favorite Cathy Maxwell couples? That's a five-star read. Maxwell's ONE DANGEROUS NIGHT publishes on March 26, 2024 but is available for pre-order now. I loved it.

This book stands well on its own but If you want to fully understand the backstories of Kit and Elise, I recommend reading His Secret Mistress (Book 1 - A Logical Man's Guide to Dangerous Women) and A Kiss in the Moonlight (book 1 - A Gambler's Daughters).

ARC received from publisher via NetGalley. @avonbooks #theromancedish #cathymaxwell #avonbooks #onedangerousnight #historicalromance #thegamblersdaughters #fivestarread

What I liked:
Tamsyn
Road-trip story!
The mirror internal experiences of both MCs
The lightness

What I did not like:
CW: THERE ARE THREE SEPARATE INCIDENTS OF CREDIBLE THREATS OF SEXUAL ASSAULT.

That's... a lot and really people need a CW for THREE (!) SEPARATE (!) SEXUAL ASSAULTS.

I love Cathy Maxwell. but rape should not be a go-to for plot points.

Three and a half stars but mostly for Tamsyn.

Elise decides to run home to Ireland from London. She can’t take living with her married sister since her sister’s new husband had courted her first. On a disastrous trip she meets up with Kit, a duke, who is traveling incognito around England. They face several adventures where they learn they need to trust each other. Can they trust enough to fall in love? I received an ARC from NetGalley and Avon for my honest review.

What a sweet romp of a romance! I love me a road trip romance and this one hits all the right spots. It’s low angst and yet the characters are well written.
Maybe it’s because I’m a pushover for forced proximity, maybe it’s because of the dog, but this really hit my sweet spot. It felt creative and unique.
The reason I gave it 3.5 and not higher are twofold- I haven’t read the first book in this series and I think that affected me; and I felt like some plot threads were left loose. However, once I read book one I might change my mind!

Star Rating: 3.5/5
Tropes: Road trip, hidden identity, forced proximity
CW: Sexual assault, classism

I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I’m giving this book four stars, although it missed the mark for me. It’s largely due to personal preferences, though, rather than anything about the writing. The character traits and some plot details just ended up being not a great combination for me. It was well written, however, and I think it will work for a lot of people,

I received an ARC from NetGalley. This is my honest review.

This was a fun little road trip romance! Elise is on the run after she feels betrayed by her sister and on the road back home to ireland she meets Kit, a gruff but helpful stranger. I really liked the chemistry between the main characters and I loveed Tamsyn the dog. I kept wondering if maybe Kit existed already in the author's other stories because I felt like we didn't get a lot of development on him right away, and then suddenly about 70% into the book we got a lot background information about him dumped on us, the way that tends to happen when the character has already appeared in universe before, and we're just catching a new reader up.
Either way, I did like Kit. I thought he was a very sweet hero and a good match for Elise. The twist in this book -that has nothing to do with the romance and more to do with Elise's family- absolutely enraged me -in a good way. I was devastated for Elise and I was rooting for her happy ending so much more after The Twist happened. Good on the author for working that in.
I also really liked how all the story's loose ends got tied together. it was convenient but very fun and well executed.

I didn’t love the first book in the series, but I was hoping I’d love the second one. The set up is my kind of bananas plot line setup dream. But unfortunately, I just didn’t believe in Kit and Elise as a couple and was so frustrated with Elise in the first half that it was hard for the latter half to make up for it.

A couple of strangers, one a runaway debutant and the other a Duke disguised as a ruffian, stuck together after a carriage crash leave them stranded should have been perfect for me. And it was! Until Elise continued to act completely immature and ridiculous for way too many pages. For someone that goes on tangents about the world being unfair to women (which is true), she spends a good chunk of her time blowing up over nothing and running headlong into dangerous situations for zero reason? Kit is very accommodating and respectful and she’s throwing tantrums and kicking her feet like a toddler because….she said he smelled bad so he bathed?? I think Maxwell was trying to paint Elise as an independent minded Bluestocking. But what we ended up with was an extremely immature character that was almost insufferable to read about for 200 pages.

Once we hit the 60-ish percent mark, I started to enjoy Kit and Elise together (although I didn’t feel like they loved each other in a week long span). But there were still plot lines that weren’t fleshed out well (Kit’s backstory) and I kept expecting a more emotional resolution to the big plot twist, which unfortunately ended up being really really unsatisfying.

I’m interested to see where the final Lanscarr sister, Gwendolyn, ends up because her story snippet at the end has my interest piqued, but this installment wasn’t really enjoyable for me.

Thank you to Avon and Harper Voyager for an ARC! All thoughts and opinions are my own!

For a book based on one night, this was a very long night, but I did read the second half of the book in a few hours. I could not put it down.

This is the story of Elise and Kit who fall in love while they are both on the run. Elise is running from her sister who married the man she was in love with and is trying to return home to Ireland. Kit is acting as Prince Hal, trying to find himself after he feels that he is a “disgrace to his family and his title” (6%). The story begins with the carriage crash that is the catalyst for these two to spend so much time together that Elise finally demands “you reek. You smell. You are--” (27%) to which Kit immediately storms off, but Elise doesn’t realize he has taken her advice to heart and the ruffian goes to bathe in the stream. God these two go through so much drama on this trip. They even adopt and train a dog, Tamsyn, on the journey.

My heart broke for Elise, when she acknowledged that in the end Michael used her to get attention from her sister, Dara. Who can blame her for running away and wanting to be free from living with the man she wanted to marry. Then the second half of the book really picks things up.

We have a big reveal with the father (which I really did not like in the story), gambling (which I also have learned I don’t care for as a character trait for a hero), and a romance that was such a slow burn and so perfect.

We get to see this couple go from animosity, to friendship: “See I knew you were an intelligent man,” she said. “All I had to do was agree with you” (58%). Then finally to love, “Real love. Not infatuation but something earthier and stronger” (58%). We watch these two fall in love, and recognize it themselves before they ever have sex or even kiss! It was so refreshing and different to read these events happening in this order.

Their first kiss was perfect, the first time they got together was so sweet, but my absolute favorite part of this book was the very ending when these two got back together. Without any spoilers, I was squealing the entire time waiting for them to be reunited once I figured out how it was going to end. And wow, I couldn’t imagine anything more romantic or perfect. The life or death situation, the stress of them being separated, then them getting back together the way that they do, all I can say is this is the emotional rollercoaster I look for in a romance novel.

The last time we saw Elise she was devastated the man she “loved” picked her sister. She cannot stay under the same roof has her traitor sister and her lost love she’s going back to Ireland. Her plan is almost immediately interrupted by her stagecoach crashing and only being able to rely on a man called Kit and a dog.

Now this book surprised me. I don’t usually like “roadtrip” books but I did enjoy this one! Elise and Kit are both hiding from some real truths (her real reasons for leaving her home and him his real identity) but they do trust one another. I thought this book was cute and not silly.

I really fell for Kit and Elise’s story. 5 stars!

Thank you Avon and NetGalley for this ARC!

What do you do when living with your sister and the man that you're in love with gets to be too much? Run away back to Ireland, duh. One Dangerous Night, is the second installment in The Gambler's Daughters series; and its one of those sequels that outshines the first. This book takes off with a bang, in the first scene alone we're awarded: a storm, a mail coach and a regency era traffic accident. Kit & Elise are both so angry at life having been passed over time and time again, and it is so healing that they get to have each other. This book is a slooooow burn with a secret identity that is done SO well. These two have gone through the ringer in matters of love, and to see them get it right was a gift!

Ok this is book rocked my socks off. This is part 2 of The Gambler's Daughters series, but can be read as a standalone. Although I highly recommend book one, not only because it’s fantastic, but because you are going to get a lot of backstory about Elise and her dilemma.

One thing Cathy Maxwell is gonna give you is a banger opening scene and she doesn’t disappoint here. Our headstrong heroine, Elise, has flounced out of London, running away to the family home in Ireland because living under the same roof as her sister and the man Elise is in love with is too much. (Can you blame her?) She comes off vain and whiny in the previous book and I love it that here we get inside her head and see what’s she’s really going through. Both of these characters grow so much during the story.

Anyway, first scene, there’s a mail coach, a storm, a crash, (isn’t that always the way? If I was a historical heroine I’d basically never get in a blasted mail coach, you know bad things are going down) and then suddenly she’s alone in the pouring rain with this mysterious and dangerous looking stranger, who’s giving her funny feelings she’s never had before.

The book immediately tears off into an adventure caper as they try to get on their way, soon joined by a smart and adorable dog. These two are both furious at life, having each been thrown over for another, and they’re both running away in their own way, which makes it so lovely that they get to fall in love 🥰

Kit is a protective reformed-rake cinnamon roll, but he has to keep his true identity as a duke hidden from Elise. I love secret identity and it’s done wonderfully here.

This is a slowwww burn, they don’t kiss until 64% into the book but they’re having such a grand adventure I hardly noticed. Their banter is adorable and there is something exciting happening on every page. You've got the 'will they, won't they' vibe, he's running from a guy trying to kill him, she's trying to get to Ireland but redirects halfway through the book, it's really fun).

There is one prolonged love scene that was tender and beautiful. The third act breakup is more of a brief separation, which was great. I wouldn’t say this book is necessarily low angst, as both of them feel a lot of pain about their life experiences, but the angst is not directed toward each other.

The proposal scene had me bawling and the epilogue got me drooling for Gwendolyn’s book. A rare and happy 5 stars for me!

Thank you so much to the publisher and Netgalley for the ebook in exchange for my honest review

I love when a book surprises me! I'm not going to lie, but I thought book one what meh. I almost didn't pick up the second book-- that's how 'meh' the first book was. HOWEVAH....this was so cute and definitely what I needed.

Elise is the youngest of the 3 Lanscarr sister. Readers might remember her as the sister in book one who was slighted. She believed herself in love with the hero from book 1 and when her middle sister had her HEA with him, she went on a rage. Book 2 picks up at that rage, with Elise running away (back home to Ireland). She then meets Kit (who is secretly the 'young duke' we hear about in Book 1) disguised as a vagabond and he takes it upon himself to protect Elise and help her get to Ireland. Shenanigans ensue.

Although this was a bit vanilla, it was just a cute love story and I'm not mad at it.

Thank you #NetGalley for providing me with eARC in exchange for my honest review.

Elise wants to be perceived as a confident independent woman, but she seems to me mostly a very immature young lady. She leaves home in a fit of temper, finds herself on a mail coach with a mystery man that crashes. She's propositioned, nearly raped, taken captive, and then when she returns home, she's lovesick for her mystery man but goes on to return to society like nothing has happened to her.

Kit is a bit better. He at least is learning from his mistakes. We get this maturing via a great deal of inner dialogue. Every incident he finds himself in he gets injured. Black eye, bruised, beaten almost to death.
At least he's a rich duke.

They have their HEA, but its sadly has no tingly feels.