Marian's Christmas Wish (Signet Regency Romance) [Paperback]

Carla Kelly (Author)

Book Description

Series: Signet Regency Romance | Publication Date: December 5, 1989

Miss Marian Wynswich is a rather unconventional young lady. She plays chess, reads Greek, and is as educated as any young man. And she s certain falling in love is a ridiculous endeavor and vows never to do such a thing. But everything changes when she receives a Christmas visit from someone unexpected--- a young and handsome English lord.

--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Signet (December 5, 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0451163311
• ISBN-13: 978-0451163318
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #784,758 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Could They Have One Last Happy Christmas Together?, October 2, 2010

By 

R. Stickley (Virginia USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Marian's Christmas Wish (Signet Regency Romance) (Paperback)

This would be their last Christmas in their ancestral home, and Marian Wynswich is determined that it will be a happy one despite the death of her father the previous Christmas Eve and the pressure her elder sister, Ariadne, is undergoing to marry for money to save the family home. Shortly before Christmas her diplomat brother, Percy, comes home with two men: a highly objectionable marital candidate for Ariadne (who is deeply in love with their vicar), and a friend in the diplomatic corps whom he has invited on the spur of the moment. On the same day, Marian's younger brother sneaks home to her having been kicked out of Eton. The prospects for a joyous Christmas are not promising.

Carla Kelly is currently my favorite novelist. Having read her recent stories, I have been tracking down her out-of-print books, like Marian's Christmas Wish. This story contains the qualities I like best about Kelly's work. Her protagonists have physical attraction; but they also have qualities that will wear well over the years: they have a shared integrity, are compassionate, responsible, and have shared interests as well as a genuine concern for one another's welfare. The problem that has to be overcome in her stories often revolves around a difference in age, class, or situation with a dash of past trauma. Her characters are rich and well-drawn, and she always manages to maintain the dramatic tension to the very last. Marian's Christmas Wish is no exception. At the same time, the male protagonist does some things near the end of the story which are nearly unforgivable and which caused this not to be a favorite Carla Kelly work, though it is a very fine story.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Back cover blurb (not a review), May 21, 2007

By 

Anna Chen - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Marian's Christmas Wish (Signet Regency Romance) (Paperback)

A VOW NOT TO LOVE

Miss Marian Wynswich had not been raised to be a proper young lady. Instead she had been educated to be as good as any man in everything from reading Greek to playing chess.

Thus it was with dismay that she saw what falling in love could do to the most sensible of females, as she watched her sister Ariadne turn giddy when a gentleman captured her heart. Never, Marian vowed, would she ever commit that feminine folly.

Then the dashing Lord Gilbert Ingraham came to pay a Christmas visit. And the question was not only if this worldly lord would make Marian break her vow... it was also if this man who could have any woman he wanted would also break her heart...

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Watch out for the Rabelais in the library!, May 31, 2010

By 

bobeeb (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Marian's Christmas Wish (Signet Regency Romance) (Paperback)

"Marian's Christmas Wish" was a great read. The supporting characters are so vivid that it's really more of an ensemble cast, where two of the characters happen to fall in love. I laughed out loud in several parts and there's some real suspense at the end. So glad I tracked this one day and bought it - but really, how can you go wrong with anything written by Carla Kelly?