Review: Snow Angel

Snow Angel by Mary Balogh
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Three and a half stars.

For a book written in 1991 it hasn't dated (snort, it's an historical novel).

The widowed Lady Rosamund Hunter is being driven to her brother's estate in anticipation of her grandfather's 70th birthday celebrations, by her much older brother Dennis, Viscount March when they have one of their rip-roaring arguments and Rosamund jumps out of the carriage determined to walk down the road (and haven't we all had one of those arguments in the car?). Unfortunately the weather is bad and it has started to snow, Rosamund is cold, wet and feeling sorry for herself when she is rescued by Justin Halliday, Earl of Wetherby on his way to spend a week in a hunting lodge. Unbeknownst to Rosamund, her brother's carriage lost a wheel and he was stranded in a ditch unable to rescue her.

Justin had intended to spend the week with his mistress in a last hurrah before they said goodbye in anticipation of his impending nuptials to a friend of the family some 12 years his junior. Instead, she is lying in bed with a head cold and Justin travelled to Northamptonshire alone with a trunk of brand new, never worn, women's clothes strapped to the back of his carriage. Gradually, over a few days snowed in together Justin and Rosamund become friends and have a torrid love affair. Both view it as a moment of madness, an escape from life. Both also slightly fudge their identities (mainly by calling themselves plain Mr and Mrs).

One month later, Justin arrives at the home of his fiancee-to-be's parents only to discover that Rosamund is the girl's aunt (Dennis' only daughter). What unfolds is a pleasant country house romance in which everyone is in love with the wrong person - it's almost Shakespearean!

Whilst I enjoyed this it didn't move me to laughter or tears, I didn't really feel deep emotions about Rosamund or Justin and I didn't feel that either character's motivations were really explored. Why exactly would Justin agree to marry a young girl just to please his family? He seemed to have a strong moral code yet had no issue marrying a woman he barely knew. Rosamund had been married to a much older man, her reasons appeared quite unusual and worth exploring but they were just swept aside - maybe it was a device to make the heroine almost virginal?

Anyway, having said all that, I have started and discarded several books recently and this was the only one that caught my attention.

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