In New York Times bestselling author Cathy Maxwell’s glittering new series, wedding bells are ringing… until the return of a rake throws a bride’s plans— and heart—into a tailspinEvery debutante aspires to snag a duke. Elin Morris just happens to have had one reserved since birth. But postponements of her marriage to London’s most powerful peer give Elin time to wonder how she will marry Gavin … will marry Gavin Baynton when she cannot forget his brother, Benedict.
Already exasperated at being yanked from the military to meet “family obligations,” now Ben must suffer watching his arrogant sibling squire the only woman he has ever loved. Joining the army saved Ben from sinking into bitterness, but seeing Elin again takes him back to the day they surrendered to their intoxicating desire.
As the wedding draws near, Elin tries to push Ben far from her thoughts. When danger brings them together, there is no denying their feelings. But can Elin choose love over duty…?
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Fantastic author!
It’s always a wonderful experience to start a new Cathy Maxwell series and this beginning has proven to be a winner. There are enough interesting characters, romance and intrigue to entertain the reader throughout the book. I look forward to reading the next one with great anticipation.
I enjoyed this book quite a bit. Cathy Maxwell has always been one of my favorite historical romance authors but it’s been a few years since I’ve read one of her books. I always buy them when they come out but they’ve been sitting in my TBR pile forever!
I’d been on a long contemporary romance kick for a while and decided to go for something different! I’m glad I did. The Match of the Century was a nice change!
The layout of this book is different than majority of romance novels. The hero and heroine fell in love as kids and lost their virginity to each other when they were 16/17. Then they were kept apart for 7 years by their parents.
I was glad that once Ben and Elin were forced to be in each other’s company, that Ms. Maxwell didn’t drag out the negative feelings. She had them clear the air and admit love still existed fairly quickly. That was nice because then the focus of the story became ‘who was trying to kill Elin’ and ‘how are we going to be together.’
On that note, this book had a nice suspense element that I enjoyed. The last historical series I read (different author) had a suspense storyline in each book that didn’t work for me, which was why I was hesitant to start a new historical series with a suspense storyline. I liked that the murder plot was there, but it wasn’t the sole focus of the story. There was also some family drama going on in the story too!
At first, I totally thought Ben’s older brother and Elin’s fiancé, Gavin, was the killer and was pleasantly surprised it wasn’t! Ms. Maxwell caught me off guard and I like that! The third book in the series is about Gavin, and as I was reading this book, I wasn’t too keen in the idea of reading a book about stuffy Gavin, but as the story progressed, so did Gavin, and now I’m looking forward to it!
I was disappointed that the missing brother Jack, whom was spoken about a lot in this book, was never found. This disappointed me mostly because the next book is about Jack! Even if there had of been a one liner from Gavin’s man saying, “I have a lead on your brother…” I would have been ok with that.
One other thing that bothered me was the spelling of the name Elin. When has Ellen ever been spelled Elin? It looks wrong to me and it was very distracting.
Other than those couple of things, this was a solid 4 star book and I’m looking forward to the next two books!
This is a lovely story about two brothers trying to marry the same young lady. There is mystery, adventure, kidnapping, murders and attempted murder, blind belief in a prophesy and growing strong love, but to find out whose you will need to read this book.
I really enjoyed this fast read. The words flowed off the pages and scene followed scene in an easy sequence. I would be quite happy to read others stories by this talented author.
I was lucky enough to receive my copy free of charge and this is my unbiased review.