BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Mary Balogh’s The Secret Mistress.Mary Balogh has no equal when it comes to capturing the complex, irresistible passions between men and women. Her classic novel, The Secret Pearl, is one of the New York Times bestselling author’s finest–a tale of temptation and seduction, of guarded hearts and raw emotion…and of a love so powerful it will take … love so powerful it will take your breath away….
He first spies her in the shadows outside a London theatre, a ravishing creature forced to barter her body to survive.
To the woman known simply as Fleur, the well-dressed gentleman with the mesmerizing eyes is an unlikely savior. And when she takes the stranger to her bed, she never expects to see him again. But then Fleur accepts a position as governess to a young girl…and is stunned to discover that her midnight lover is a powerful nobleman. As two wary hearts ignite–and the threat of scandal hovers over them–one question remains: will she be mistress or wife?
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I was surprised and excited when I realized that I had never read one of Mary Balogh’s most famous books, The Secret Pearl. This story opens in a very tragic way. Our heroine, Fleur has been reduced to bartering her body in order to eat. Her very first time is with Adam who is unfeeling at best, although afterwards, he can not stop himself from …
It would have seemed unlikely that I could love a book where love starts as “physical intrusion” yet it was the case with this one by Balogh! Original plot and convincing characters – I think many people here would agree with this!
Another Balogh work of genius.
I’m used to quiet, sedate Mary Balogh books. This one is a lot darker. It starts with a gentleman taking a prostitute for the night, only to discover she was a virgin. He feels so bad that he hires her as a governess, and from there, they slowly fall in love. There were a lot of red flags for me that this was treading on dangerous territory, but I …
There aren’t many authors who could pull off what Mary Balogh has done with this book–characters who’ve made hard, edgy survival decisions, and who take responsibility for their actions to move forward in life even though though it creates (seemingly) insurmountable obstacles to their happiness. Plus some awesome Bad Guy schadenfruede!
Mary Balogh is a master at creating original, poignant, memorable characters that stay with you long after you’ve finished a book, and The Pearl is one of those stories that has stayed with me. It’s classic Balogh–emotion, conflict, struggle–and two wonderful characters overcoming odds to fall in love and have a well deserved happy ever after.
I love all her books
Wow, I can say it has the most interesting meet cute of any romance novel I’ve ever read. The hero is a nobleman who hires the heroine for a night and then proceeds to…whoops no spoilers! There’s no romanticizing what follows but what an opening. For how it begins with a traumatizing experience for the heroine, I found it to be a tender love …