BOOK REVIEW: A Lord Apart by Jane Ashford

I received this book for free from Netgalley. That did not influence my review.

Jane Ashford’s new Regency Romance series, The Way to a Lord’s Heart, showcases her talent for sweet, entertaining romance. Her protagonists come with troubled back-stories and find their way to one another with gentle support and occasional banter.

Book one in the series, Brave New Earl, introduces the theme (which reminds me a bit of the theme of the linked stories in Mary Balogh’s Survivors Club.)

The Earl of Macklin is an older man, a widower, who has decided to put to use his knowledge of grief to help grieving younger gentleman move on with their lives. Previously, he aided his nephew. Now, in book two, A Lord Apart, he hopes to help the son of an old friend.

Daniel Frith, Viscount Whitfield, has inherited his father’s title and estates after the sudden death of both parents in a shipwreck during a trip to India. His grief is muted by the resentment he feels. His parents ignored him throughout his life, choosing travel to exotic places over the mundane duties of parenthood. Even when he grew old enough to accompany them, he was never included. Now Daniel is trying to sort of the accounts of the ancestral home, a chore he finds dull and impossible.

Penelope Pendleton is a baronet’s daughter who has been thrown out of the home she grew up in through no fault of her own. Her brother, an activist who was killed at the Peterloo massacre, was posthumously found guilty of treason against the crown. She was imprisoned and questioned mercilessly by government investigators who could not believe she knew nothing of her brother’s activities or friends. Fortunately, just as she emerged from custody with nowhere to go, she learned that she had inherited a cottage in another town. Her benefactor was anonymous and wanted to remain so.

Penelope is too grateful to question, though her curiosity is immense.

The cottage is part of the estate of Viscount Whitfield. When he learns of her arrival and that the cottage is now hers, his curiosity is also piqued. Moreover, he’s annoyed. Not with her, per se. He has no intention of wresting the cottage from her. But he feels it is another example of his parents’ disdain. Why shouldn’t he know why part of his father’s lands have been willed to a stranger?

The two characters have a lot of baggage, but they are reasonable people and kind to one another. It isn’t long before they are spending a good deal of time puzzling out the mystery of the inheritance. And falling in love.

The government agents aren’t through with Penelope yet. And the strange lives of Whitfield’s parents leave much to be explained.

The romance is enjoyable and the plot swift moving. It is a little annoying that Whitfield’s title effectively protects him from the rough treatment Penelope has to endure. And the ending was a bit too pat with the resolution of the crisis being achieved much too easily, thanks to Whitfield and Macklin’s connections.

Nevertheless, there are a couple of other grieving young men Macklin is determined to help. I look forward to seeing their stories unfold.