Showing results by narrator "Susan Duerden" in All Categories

Nell is 26 and has never been to Paris. She's never even been on a romantic weekend away - to anywhere - before. Traveling abroad isn't really her thing. But when Nell's boyfriend fails to show up for their mini vacation, she has the opportunity to prove everyone - including herself - wrong. Alone in Paris, Nell finds a version of herself she never knew existed: independent and intrepid. Could this turn out to be the most adventurous weekend of her life?

Harriet, Duchess of Berrow, is tired of her title and the responsibilities that come along with it. Enough with proper tea parties and elegant balls; what Harriet really wants is to attend an outrageous soiree where she can unleash her wildest whims and desires. But to attend such an event - especially if the event in question is Lord Justinian Strange's rollicking fete, filled with noble rogues and rotters, risque - ladies and illicit lovers - would be certain scandal. That's why she must disguise herself.

Lavinia Tempest has been eagerly anticipating a spectacular season. But one disastrous pile-up on the Almack's dance floor derails all her plans. Added to that, the very stunning revelations about her mother's scandalous past have become the ton's latest on dits. Lavinia's future has gone from shining bright to blackest night in one misstep.

Lord Vandeimen returns home from Waterloo to ruined estates, his family all dead. His attempts to recreate something of his heritage leave him deep in debt, and he is ready to commit suicide when a woman bursts into his room with an extraordinary proposal. Mrs. Maria Celestin, widow of a wealthy foreign merchant, will pay him a small fortune to pretend to be her betrothed husband for six weeks. Van cannot refuse, but he is wary of this outrageous good fortune. He is also intent on getting into the widow's bed.

When Gia Landon is tricked into a London season by her father, she is pleased to have found a friend who shares her love of horses in the Duke of Roxburghe. The surly Scot enjoys living in London and hates the country, while Gia despises everything about society.

Harriet Hathaway has only ever wanted one man: The Earl of Roxley. After a passionate interlude at a house party, Harriet is convinced Roxley will do the right thing and propose. But when she returns to London, she finds the roguish earl on the verge of proposing to another. Yet Harriet refuses to believe that her hopes of a happily-ever-after are completely lost - for she can see the desire still flickering in the earl's eyes when he looks at her from across the dance floor.

Wedding bells celebrating the arranged marriage between the lovely Duchess of Beaumont and her staid, imperturbable duke had scarcely fallen silent when a shocking discovery sent Jemma running from the ducal mansion. For the next nine years she cavorted abroad, creating one delicious scandal after another (if one is to believe the rumors). Elijah, Duke of Beaumont, did believe those rumors. But the handsome duke needs an heir, so he summons his seductive wife home.

The second immortal volume in this dark and fantastic series, Fangs is a scintillating and sinister collection of vampire stories and part of the now legendary vampire archives. Including Clive Barker, Anne Rice, Arthur Conan Doyle, and many, many, more...Featuring: Bloody fangs, dark and foreboding crypts, mysterious nighttime apparitions, and languid ladies.

When a promised inheritance turns out to be a fraud, shy spinster Charlotte Wilmont makes an impetuous wish that despite her lack of charm and fortune, she could capture the heart of the one man whom she's forever adored - Sebastian, Viscount Trent. With that utterance, Charlotte awakens shocked to find herself entwined with her beloved Sebastian. But the respectable man she knew is now a most rakish devil and she is...well, by some inexplicable magic, London's most infamous mistress.

One spectacular Christmas, Lady Perdita Selby, known to her friends and family as Poppy, met the man she thought she would love forever. The devilishly attractive Duke of Fletcher was the perfect match, and theirs was the most romantic wedding she had ever seen. But four years later, behind closed doors, the spark of their love affair has burned out. Unwilling to lose the woman he still lusts after, the duke is determined to win back his beguiling bride's delectable affections.

Witty, orphaned Tess Essex faces her duty: marry well and marry quickly, so she can arrange matches for her three sisters. But just when she begins to think that all might end well, one of her sisters bolts with a horse-mad young lord, and her own fiancé just plain runs away. Which leaves Tess contemplating marriage to the sort of man she wishes to avoid - one of London's most infamous rakes. Tess consents to marry him, but it may be for the worst reason of all. Absurd as she knows it to be, she may have fallen utterly in love....

In Lady Vernon and Her Daughter, Jane Rubino and Caitlen Rubino-Bradway have taken Austen's original novella and transformed it into a vivid and richly developed novel of love lost and found and the complex relationships between women, men, and money in Regency England.

Bespeckled and freckled, Lady Stella Corsham at least has a dowry that has attracted a crowd of fortune-hunting suitors—which definitely doesn’t include the sinfully handsome Silvester Parnell, Duke of Huntington, who laughingly calls her “Specs” as he chases after elegant rivals. And then—The worst happens. Marriage. To the duke. To a man marrying her for all the wrong reasons.

Witty and elusive Eugenia Snowe has all society begging for one of her premiere governesses - except the powerful Edward Reeve, who bursts into her office with his arrogant demands. No question that Eugenia enjoys crossing wits with the brilliant inventor, but Ward wants far more than a governess. He wants Eugenia, and he'll stop at nothing to have her - including kidnapping. Will Eugenia lose her heart in the most reckless gamble of her life, or will she discover the sweetest pleasure she's ever known? All it will take is seven minutes.

England, 1942. The Nazis' relentless Blitz may have paused, but London's nightly blackouts continue. Now, under the cover of darkness, a madman is brutally killing and mutilating young women in eerie and exact re-creations of Jack the Ripper's crimes. What's more, he's targeting women who are reporting for duty to be Winston Churchill's spies and saboteurs abroad. The officers at MI5 quickly realize they need the help of Special Agent Maggie Hope to find the killer dubbed "the Blackout Beast". A trap is set.

When Laird Taran Ferguson's nephews refuse to wed and secure his birthright, he takes matters into his own hands, raiding a ball and kidnapping four likely brides - a bonny lass, an heiress with a slight reputation problem, a rich English beauty, and a maiden without a name or a fortune. But which one is ready to fall in love with the Scottish lord?

Tormented at home and bullied during her studies abroad, second-born Iona of Wessett hides in the quiet corners of her father's castle. Her art and music provide refuge, but her cruel sister Lisenn ever lurks like a monster stalking its prey. Such has been her life for 20 years. However, a promise of reprieve and retribution arrives when the neighboring kingdom of Capria proposes an alliance between their new crown prince and Wessett's heir to the throne. The treaty will rid Iona of the toxic Lisenn, and the potential groom is none other than her erstwhile bully, Jaoven of Deraval.

Science fiction is a portal that opens doors onto futures too rich and strange to imagine. Fantasy takes us through doorways of magic and wonder. For more than a decade award-winning editor Jonathan Strahan has sifted through tens of thousands of stories to select the best, the most interesting, the most engaging science fiction and fantasy to thrill and delight readers.

Maggie Hope has come a long way since serving as a typist for Winston Churchill. Now she's working undercover for the Special Operations Executive in the elegant but eerily silent city of Paris, where SS officers prowl the streets in their Mercedes and the Ritz is draped with swastika banners. Walking among the enemy is tense and terrifying, and even though she's disguised in chic Chanel, Maggie can't help longing for home.

The handsome, rakish heir to a dukedom, Lord Roland Northbridge Wilde - known to his friends as North - left England two years ago, after being jilted by Miss Diana Belgrave. He returns from war to find that he’s notorious: polite society has ruled him “too wild to wed”. Diana never meant to tarnish North’s reputation or his heart, but in her rush to save a helpless child, there was no time to consider the consequences of working as a governess in Lindow Castle. Now everyone has drawn the worst conclusions about the child’s father, and Diana is left with bittersweet regret.