From Amazon.com
Setting: England 1537
Sensuality: 7
Beautiful, brilliant, and sophisticated, Lady Guinevere Mallory is only 28 but has buried four wealthy husbands. When seasoned soldier Hugh of Beaucaire contests her ownership of a parcel of land, he brings Guinevere's rich estates to the attention of financially needy King Henry VIII, setting in motion events that threaten her status and her life. Traveling to her estate on the King's orders to investigate her fourth husband's death, Hugh expects to find a woman who has earned the label "The Black Widow." Instead, he discovers a lady whose elegance, quick wit, and warmth threaten to make him her next willing victim.
Despite the danger that Hugh poses to her family and holdings, Guinevere finds herself drawn to the handsome soldier but knows she dare not give in to the attraction nor can she allow herself to trust him. In the end, perhaps only Hugh has the power to save her from Henry and Thomas Cromwell's scheme to claim her wealth and destroy her family. Cromwell is not a man who gives up easily, and family members may die if Hugh doesn't learn to trust in Guinevere in time to save them.
Jane Feather has a fine hand for detail in colorful 1530's costuming and the minutiae of life in Henry VIII's England. That vivid scene setting combined with the political scheming and terror instilled by Thomas Cromwell, the equal balance of strength, intelligence, and wariness in hero and heroine, and the warm charm of secondary characters all add up to an excellent historical novel well worth reading.--Lois Faye Dyer
From Publishers Weekly
At age 28, beautiful Lady Guinevere Mallory has been widowed four times, and each bereavement has brought her more land and more wealth. Is she a murderess, a sorceress or simply a clever, though unlucky, woman? Set during the reign of Henry VIII and his dreaded minion, Thomas Cromwell, Feather's (The Least Likely Bride) latest historical romance is rich in detail and rife with intrigue. Lord Hugh of Beaucaire, himself a widower, believes his young son Robin has a legal right to some of the lands left to Lady Guinevere in the four marriage contracts she apparently wrote herself. He seeks the king's aid to secure his son's rights, and Cromwell, the king's Lord Privy Seal, encourages his investigation of Lady Guinevere. Lord Hugh does not know that the Privy Seal has plans of his own for the widow's riches. Hugh's stay on her estates gives him both reason to believe he may be right and reason to hope he is not, for he falls in love with Guinevere and her two daughters. He learns that two of her husbands apparently met their ends naturally, but discrepancies in her servants' stories about the most recent death require him to take her to London, where her saucy tongue sends her to the Tower. Will Lord Hugh save Lady Guinevere, and if he marries her, can he ever trust her? Typical of Feather's novels, the story succeeds as romantic fiction, with fine characterizations, sound historical background and an effective evocation of the precarious times when a king's favor or disfavor meant life or death. Striking cover art, romantic yet dignified, will draw in readers. (Jan. 9)
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