Review: The Husband List

The Husband List by Ella Quinn
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Lady Madeline Vivers and her two sisters have drawn up a list of qualities they require in a husband, all of which seem fairly reasonable to the modern reader. The most conventional of the sisters, Madeline just wants a home in the country, children and a dog, also her mother wants her to marry a nobleman. So the way her heart pounds when she is near the ambitious barrister turned MP Mr Harry Stern is rather unfortunate. But as Madeline steps out with a number of eligible suitors it seems that only Harry meets all her criteria.

For his part, Harry is looking for a woman to help him in his career, not a pampered member of the aristocracy, aside from his instant attraction to Madeline, he is also struck by her innate kindness and the way in which she helps those less fortunate than herself - perhaps she would be the ideal wife for a hard-working MP after all.

I think this could have been a fun novel. Unfortunately, not having read each and every one of the previous books in the Worthington series and its spin offs, I was totally adrift in a sea of cousins, second cousins, half-sisters and the like together with their spouses and their spouses' siblings. Actually it turns out that I have only read one previous book in the series, which probably added to my confusion because I expect I was remembering a different series with a similar cast of thousands (possibly Lisa Kleypas?). Added to which, this is clearly a trilogy about Madeline and her two twin sisters (Alice and Eleanor) where their stories run concurrently, hence there was a story about someone attacking Eleanor which was referenced vaguely and glossed over - presumably because it happened in the first book in the trilogy (The Marriage List - which I have just see is indeed Eleanor's story). All of which means there feels like very little actual plot concerning Harry and Madeline, they are just being tugged along by the juggernaut that is the Worthington saga (for reference I believe that Madeline, Alice and Eleanor have two older married sisters, a (possibly) older unmarried brother, and at least three or four younger siblings).

Pleasant enough but doesn't really work as a standalone.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.

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