Double Deception: A Regency Romance

by Amanda Troy

Aurora Marshingham knew all too well the part that money played in love. When she had been left penniless after her father's death, the only man she ever loved vanished, leaving the auburn-haired beauty bitter, but determined.

In London to find a position, Aurora is attracted, in spite of herself, to the brutally handsome, impossibly arrogant James , Sixth Earl of Roxton. Then the lovely pauper is torn between desire and pride when the haughty aristocrat offers her the greatest insult of all—marriage!

184 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published July 1, 1982

Reviews

[Claire S · Rating 2 out of 5]

Aurora is invited to London to as a companion to a relative (youngish widowed cousin, I believe). Being penniless, she's hoping her cousin will be able to help her find a paid position as a companion or governess. She eventually meets her cousin's brother-in-law who's autocratic and misinterprets her relationship with the cousin's love interest. The selfish cousin is constantly putting Aurora in compromising positions creating animosity from the Earl. There's more to the story but that's the gist of it.

I liked the heroine. She was strong and was able to hold her own against the Earl. She was reasonable 90% of the time. The idiotic 10% was so that the author could create misunderstandings between her and the Earl. So the real problem here is the "hero". The only thing he does is be verbally abusive to Aurora calling her horrible things such as Cyprian and light-skirt throughout the entire book. Since the author seemed to have a good handle on the heroine, I thought she was going to eventually turn the hero around. I was expecting that at some point the hero would have found an opportunity to assist the heroine or at least rescue a stray pup or poor child but he doesn't change throughout the entire book except to fall in love with Aurora. We're even denied the "big reveal" when the Earl discovers that the heroine was innocent of wrongdoing all along. That happens off page. So now you have a mostly sensible lady falling in love out of nowhere with an abusive man, and we're supposed to find it romantic. At the very end, the heroine is impressed that the Earl loved her even though he thought her to have low morals. I'd give this three stars if the hero had been able to redeem himself.

This is a clean book and one other quibble is that the author seemed to have difficulties with the titles within the Earl's family.