Her Master's Touch

by Patricia Watters

She's the mystery debutante of the season, who arrived on the London scene as if from out of nowhere. But Lord Damon Ravencroft knows her dark secret. Two years before, when she was roaming with Gypsies and living by her wits in India, he hired her as a housemaid and she stole from him a rare and valuable opal once belonging to the Empress Josephine. Damon intends to be compensated for its loss, which set him back years in his quest to prove his innocence in a crime he's accused of committing. The sizable dowry that comes with Lady Elizabeth Sheffield's hand in marriage is a start. It's also his price to keep her secret from all of London. But there's more to the marriage of convenience Damon proposes than Elizabeth anticipated, but by the time she learns what it is, she's trapped in a marriage to a man who both stirs her passions and fuels her resentment for the man she was forced to wed.

Genres: Romance, Historical Romance, Historical, Historical Fiction, India, Fiction, Erotica

242 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 5, 2011

About the author

Born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, Patricia gave up city life and now writes from a hand-built log cabin nestled on thirty acres in the evergreen forests of Oregon's Coast Range. An author with Harlequin and Avon-Harper Collins in the past, Patricia specializes in romance. Although writing is her number one love, over the course of her lifetime she's raised laying hens, milk goats, and Tennessee Walking horses, built, plumbed and wired three houses, been a professional photographer, written photo essays for national and international publications, and slept outside under the stars for one whole summer. She invites you to visit her website and drop her a line. She loves hearing from readers and responds to all notes: www.patriciawatters.com

Reviews

[Jacqueline J · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this story set in India in the Victorian age. The first half was marginally better than the second half. Enjoyable portrait of colorful India. The author made it fairly menacing and the hero and heroine both wanted to leave.

I enjoyed learning something about the opal jewel called the Burning of Troy which had once belonged to Empress Josephine. I went and checked it out further on line. It's always fun to see factual tidbits in a novel.

I felt that there were several opportunities to ramp up the angst factor that the author skipped over which I know is really only me and my love of angst that makes that in anyway a problem.

My emotions were however engaged throughout most of the book, especially in the middle where the poor girl was being coerced into marrying the hero who was totally being an asshat. You could just feel her frustration. True to the times in the way that women many times had no real power in their lives in previous ages.

I got this as a free Kindle read and will be looking up more by this author.

[Trupti Dorge · Rating 3 out of 5]

I downloaded this book for free from Amazon and read it at a time when all I wanted was a quick romance book. And Her Master's Touch was a perfect fit. I loved the first half where Eliza as an Anglo-Indian gypsy woman, tricks Damon, into taking her in as a housemaid so that she can steal a precious Opal which Damon has bought. This Opal was stolen from a gypsy tribe and Eilza wants to return it to them so that she can prove that she is one of them.

The second half, will not go into detials, was a little boring with nothing really happenning other than Doman and Eliza trying to control their attraction for each other. It was very repetitive. But overall it was fun and as I said it was a quick and entertaining read.

[Radd Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Disappointing. Started slow and then the ending felt rushed. There’s a very long build up and lots of sexual tension, but it is lacking in the end. The heroine’s story is all over the place: she had to take care of herself, she went to boarding school, she hates her father, she loves her father, there is a tragic past why she knows Cedric, she has missing memories, what happened to her mom, etc. Too many stories and none really fleshed out. The ending was too quick.

[Jody · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel was romance and historical fiction with a lot of adventure. It is the story of Lord Damon Ravencroft of England trying to get back a rare opal (given by Napolean to Josephine) believed to be in India. There he meets the intriguing Lady Elizabeth Shefield, who schemes to also get the opal. She has a muddled past that she cannot remember. She lived in India with a gypsey mother and an english earl as her father. Her mother has died and she ran away from school and her father. She also wants the opal to appeal to the gypsies who see her as "half blood" and don't accept her. They both scheme and distrust each other. . . It was a quick and enjoyable read.

[LadyCalico · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was one really cute little Romance/Adventure . Please, don't try to make too much sense of the story because it is all just for fun, and sheer fun it surely is. Lately I've had the misfortune to read a lot of books where the author gets so involved expounding on some pet issue that she totally forgets that what the reader is looking for, and paying for, is entertainment. Ms. Watters does not forget that she is a very entertaining story-teller, and in this dashing romp, she does her duty to her readers and delivers big time.

[Christy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author put great detail into showing the cultural difference for England to India which I appreciated. In terms of romance this story was timed, more of a love story than anything overly erotic which I think was actually quite nice. I do feel like Elizabeth's past and what she remember of her Mom was kind of odd, there has been so much pretense and then it was kind of explained away in a page. But I liked the gypsy references and enjoyed cheering for Elizabeth and Damon to get past their differences.

[Jamie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I just couldn't get into this. First, when I started it, there is a character (Mara perhaps) that whenever I read her speaking parts I thought it was all typos. If that's not the case, the author should have described her and said something that would make the reader realize that it was a dialect and not just a bunch of bad grammar and/or typing. It's too bad, because I liked the premise of story, but just didn't find a single thing that held my interst.

[Carrie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Relationship between hero and heroine wasn't well developed. He suddenly fell in love with her about 3/4 through the book, and she thought she might have feelings for him, but the happy ending seemed very forced.

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

it was a good and fast freee read. a little unbelieveable that a gently reared 14 year old girl could run away from boarding school, make her way to india, and live with gypsies in the 1870's but maybe i'm just being too persnickety! the hero wasn't particularly likeable at first either.

[Stephani · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ahhh...I read it. Wasn't throughly impressed. Story was good, but drawn out and pretty slow. Great, original idea on love story, but to me it seemed rushed and forced, and she was really mean, but so was he. I dont know, wasnt a "melt your heart and make goo goo face" romance...

[Mackenzie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had a really tough time getting into the book in the beginning while the main characters were in India. When the story brings us back to England the story picks up only yo waiver back and forth once back in India.

[Leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love this book! It was a great romance. I'm going to read more of her books! I am adding all her books to my "to read" list! Wow! Thank you Watters!!

[Shawna Hansen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun, fast-paced and exotic read.

[Candace · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story. A quick read.

[Tracy · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a short read, but very interesting.

[Jeanne Mccartney · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the book. It had several twists and turns which kept you wanting to learn what was next.

[Sandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fairly good book

The story was good and the path to love interesting but it was a little drawn out. There was a lot more detail about the area that w a s unnecessary to the story.

[Claudia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Tedious, repetitive, awkward. I did not enjoy this book :(

[Kirsten Lenius · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a reasonably good historical romance set in India, during Victoria's reign.