In the first of a brand-new series set in Victorian England, a young woman returns home from India after the death of her family to discover her identity and inheritance are challenged by the man who holds her future in his hands.
Rebecca Ravenshaw, daughter of missionaries, spent most of her life in India. Following the death of her family in the Indian Mutiny, Rebecca returns to claim her family estate in Hampshire, England. Upon her return, people are surprised to see her...and highly suspicious. Less than a year earlier, an imposter had arrived with an Indian servant and assumed not only Rebecca's name, but her home and incomes.
That pretender died within months of her arrival; the servant fled to London as the young woman was hastily buried at midnight. The locals believe that perhaps she, Rebecca, is the real imposter. Her home and her father's investments reverted to a distant relative, the darkly charming Captain Luke Whitfield, who quickly took over. Against her best intentions, Rebecca begins to fall in love with Luke, but she is forced to question his motives—does he love her or does he just want Headbourne House? If Luke is simply after the property, as everyone suspects, will she suffer a similar fate as the first “Rebecca”?
A captivating Gothic love story set against a backdrop of intrigue and danger, Mist of Midnight will leave you breathless.
In the recent past years I discovered a new author, Christine Lindsay, and her novel Shadowed in Silk was my first experience reading characters set in India. While Mist of Midnight is actually set in Victorian England, it has an Indian native flavor with the heroine living her growing years as a youth to missionary parents and aristocratic English gentry. Yet disaster sends her home to what might no longer exist.
Intrigue, friendship, romance, hardship, pride, adventure, feminist independence, and gentlemanly flirtations all reside within these pages.
Sandra Byrd writes across the genres yet I know her for Christian Historical Fiction. I fell in love with her narrative pen in her Ladies in Waiting (Henry VIII - Tudor) series and I'm delighted to anticipate the rest of the Daughters of Hampshire series. Mist of Midnight is a different experience as a Gothic Romantic Mystery which brings to mind Jane Eyre and Northhanger Abbey, but is told in a narrative voice I enjoy with plenty of wit on the page.
I found myself to be captivate from the first paragraph to the back cover. Enough mystery to keep me going and enough romance to keep me hopeful. Sandra weaves and incredible historical tale (and keeps my up reading well into the night!)
Now I'll have to bide my time waiting on the next in her series by going to Christine Lindsay's sequel in her Twlight of the British Raj series Captured by Moonlight and the latest Michelle Moran's Rebel Queen (released February 2015!).
posted: http://creativemadnessmama.com/blog/2015/03/06/mist-of-midnight/
I received this product free for the purpose of reviewing it. I received no other compensation for this review. The opinions expressed in this review are my personal, honest opinions. Your experience may vary. Please read my full disclosure policy for more details.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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29 January, 2015:
Finished reading
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29 January, 2015:
Reviewed