Customer Reviews

An Unexpected Engagement

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Charlotte Engle is on route to her sister, who is about to have her baby. Naturally since this is middle 1700s, she is accompanied by her elderly aunt, Maude. However, life is about to take an exciting turn as their coach is stopped by a Highwayman. Charlotte is hardly your shy, retiring miss, so she wields her barbed comments and her accurate pistol work to save the day. Mother dearest thinks darling daughter needs taking in hand and so arranges a betrothal to Lord James Houghton. Charlotte is not so thrilled, as she has an eye set on being a writer, despite this was hardly the goal of a proper lady.

More so, she meets Kenley Fairfax who encourages her wicked ways. She is delighted with the man who appreciates her wit in a time when women were supposed to be dullards. Only, she is smart enough to see Fairfax is more than he seems.

Reinke is a fresh voice in romance writing. You get a clear sense she is more than willing to follow in the footsteps with the tried and true writers of the genre who have gone before, but she is going to do it drumming to her own beat. That shall set her apart and quickly engage readers.

I am looking forward her her Kensington debut release, Dark Thirst. I hear it's a very different vampire romance that will quickly gain her the lion's share of the spotlight.

In 1748 heeding her mother's call to come home from London as her sister is about to give birth, Charlotte Engle returns to the family estate in Essex County accompanied by her Aunt Maude. However, the notorious Black Trio highwaymen stop her coach. Unable to sit idly by she fires a shot at one of the thieves, punches another, and hooks the heart of the one accosting her with her sharp tongue. No one is harmed, but her mother misinterprets what happened and decides her daughter needs the protection of a husband, selecting Lord James Houghton who declares he loves Charlotte though she rejects him.

At a party, Charlotte, the author of insightful essays on social and economic ills, meets Kenley Fairfax, who admits he not only has read her chapworks but admires her intelligent arguments. He even suggests that she hide her gender so men would get past their horror of a female author and read her logical opinions. They are attracted to one another and when her mother tries to force James on her, Kenley intercedes insisting they met in London and have an arrangement. However, as she falls in love, she realizes her beloved has secrets (ironically readers know both though the heroine does not) that could end their relationship before they say I do.

Though James's greed fails to surface until very late (his arrogance is in the reader's face from the onset), AN UNEXPECTED ENGAGEMENT is a delightful Georgian romantic suspense with the thriller aspects coming late. The story line centers on the heroine who knows what she likes and loves and what she detests, and is unafraid to act on her judgment. Readers will appreciate Charlotte's courage as she unravels a web of deceit that would send most of her female peers into vapors.

Harriet Klausner

This is the same book as Outlaw Lover, so if you have read that book, dont buy this one...Outlaw Lover is free to download on Sara Reinkes website, that is how I read it.

This was a fantastic book and I could not put it down! The plot is intertwined with a little bit of everything...mystery, thriller, romance. One of the best romance novels that I have read in a very long time. I bought this book on impulse and was not sorry in the slightest!