Review: A Marquess for Convenience

A Marquess for Convenience by Bianca Blythe
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Two and a half stars.

Lady Madeline Mulbourne is living a secret life, while the ton think she is the epitome of a titled noblewoman she is secretly the author of a series of books on art published under her husband's name. Even after his death she continues to 'find' new works to publish. Despite being wealthy Madeline has also taken in upon herself to steal five priceless pieces of jewellery, parts of a set belonging to an impoverished Italian family, which were confiscated by Napoleon's army.

Lord Arthur Carmichael, Marquess of Bancroft, is a British spy who disguises his activity by acting like a pleasure-seeking rake. However, now the war is over his lifestyle may jeopardise his career ambitions, unless he can find a suitable wife to lend him respectability. In the meantime he has been tasked with catching the thief who has stolen jewellery from four high ranking French officials before it creates a rift in the newly formed peace between France and England.

Years ago Madeline and Arthur shared a passionate kiss but because of a misunderstanding he left London and she married Lord Mulbourne, will their old feelings complicate matters?

I received an early ARC of this book (bad me for taking so long to review it) and it is riddled with typos, I assume they have been corrected in the final version of the book.

This book, in my opinion, suffered from too much 'telling' and not enough 'showing'. We were 'told' about Madeline and Arthur's previous relationship, we were 'told' about Arthur's wild reputation, we were told about Madeline's first husband. It felt almost like an outline for a book waiting for someone to put in the passion and the characters. I didn't really feel any connection to either Madeline or Arthur, possibly because we didn't really get any real drama. Madeline gets arrested, Arthur runs to the rescue and 'boom' she's free. Something similar happens later in the book. It's sad because I think that Bianca Blythe had some unusual ideas but nothing got developed properly before it was bam, on to the next thing.

I see that this is the fifth book in a series, perhaps if I had read the previous four books I would have seen more of Madeline and Arthur and better understood what we were told but ddn't see in this book.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.

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