Maybe it’s my fault for expecting so much, but I was utterly confounded by A Promise of More. I hoped that it wouldn’t contain any distressing social missteps. I expected well-wrought characters, good writing, an interesting, fast-moving plot, and a compelling romance. You may remember that I read (and was ambivalent about) the first book in this series, A Kiss of Lies. I had fairly high expectations for A Promise of More based on the many things I enjoyed about the first book. However, it isn’t long before Sebastian’s plan for a marriage of convenience unravels, and he’s caught up in the exhilarating undertow of seduction. Beatrice promises to be the ideal wife a woman who hates him with an all-consuming passion is far too sensible to expect romance. Although he’s had women more beautiful, she is pleasing to the eye, and besides, it’s time he fathered an heir. The little drowned mermaid has an interesting proposition indeed one that Sebastian is surprised to find quite agreeable. That is, until she realizes those arms belong to Sebastian Hawkestone, Lord Coldhurst himself. But while greeting his ship, Beatrice takes a tumble into the Thames-only to be fished out by a pair of strong masculine arms that tempt her to stay locked in their heated embrace forever. She’ll make the wealthy Lord Coldhurst pay for the rest of his life. She’s determined to blackmail the man into a loveless marriage. When Beatrice Hennessey sets out to confront Lord Coldhurst, the notorious rogue who killed her brother in a duel, her intent is to save her family from destitution. Every now and then when I'm reading a book, I think, what would do? And I realize she'd stop reading.

A Promise of More by Bronwen Evans