Marriage with a Proper Stranger

This is the first book I have read by Karyn Gerrard and I truly enjoyed it! Entertaining from beginning to end, we find two people, both who have dealt with life's unfairness. Our heroine, Lady Sabrina Lakeside has been through a lot. She was forcibly made to marry, by her father, to an aged man who treated her terribly. Now a widow with no funds, she is forced to move back with her hateful father who is marrying her off again to the highest bidder. Desperate to get away, she comes up with a scheme with the local schoolmaster to help her out of her predicament. This is where is really becomes interesting. You see, Riordan Wollstonecraft ( yes you have heard that name before in exulted terms for women's rights and they are related!) is the grandson of an Earl. But he is determined not to engage his heart due to the family curse ( what curse you ask? Must read to find out!). He and his family are very social oriented as in trying to change the treatment of the less fortunate. So Riordan takes a job as the local schoolmaster so he can engage some of his ideas of forward thinking to the students. Nobody knows who he really is, least of all Sabrina! Sabrina has a plan and with Riordan's help they execute a daring marriage of convenience to save her from her current forced betrothed. As Sabrina and Riordan spend time together things seem to be changing and with a lot of twist and turns and even some suspense, this story will hold you captive until the end! Cannot wait for the other books in this series!!!

Marriage with a Proper Stranger is book one in the Men Of Wollstonecraft Hall series by Karyn Gerrard. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. This is my first time to read Gerrard’s work. She takes real people from the past and weaves them into the story. The Wollstonecraft men are plagued by a family curse that guarantees the death of the women they love. Riordan the youngest grandson of the Earl of Wollstonecraft Hall is resigned to his fate of being alone. He pours himself into being an educator and doing good works under another name. Lady Sabrina Lakeside is a beautiful widow who is desperate to escape being married to a lecherous and aging marquess. Will Riordan be her knight in shining armor? What will happen when Sabrina learns of his true identity and the curse he lives under? “The schoolmaster was not a docile, plain man of middling years, but a tall, handsome young man who took her breath away. She’d never seen such virility before, never mind being in such close proximity to it. Her heart fluttered, and Sabrina was shocked at her response, for it was strange and foreign. He dressed plainly, wearing a black frock coat stretched across broad shoulders, with a simply tied black cravat. No spectacles; all the better to see his piercing light blue eyes. His wavy black hair gleamed in the bright sunlight.”I am looking forward to reading the rest of this series by Gerrard.

Political aspects of this plot may JUST be accurate but the English vernacular even now-adays is farcical. Cinnamon scones? Don't tell that one to the British for starters. Ha ha ha! The sexual aspect is overdone to a quite billious level. No reference is made to the hero without describing his 'sensual mouth.' I wouldn't read another for all the Earl Grey In China.