Georgette and the Unrequited Love

Series: The Sisters of Castle Fortune, Book 1

By: Alicia Cameron / Narrated By: Helen Taylor

Length: 8 hrs and 33 mins

Oh how grand!!! Oh what HEAVENLY sighing over here!!!

I can’t tell you how often I do it: Check out the Amazon Author pages to see if my favorite authors, Lynn Messina, Audrey Harrison, Julie Klassen, even Mary Kingswood! have anything new out. If they do? I dash over to Audible to see if whatever’s come out in audiobook.

Imagine my delight when I checked out Alicia Cameron (She who brought us the aDORable Honoria and the Family Obligation) and found Georgette and the Unrequited Love! Oh how I sighed, oh how delighted I was, oh how quickly I chucked a credit out for it. Oh how I lost NO time listening to it.

And oh how completely and unutterably thrilled I was with it when the end credits finally came around.

Georgette and her sisters, what with their mother having passed a few years ago, have been raised more like a pack of wolves than genteel daughters of a spendthrift Baron of a papa. There were ten sisters to go with the one son and heir, and the two eldest are now happily wed, and two of Georgette’s younger sisters are wed now and off the Baron’s hands. This leaves him with six daughters to marry off and, after two failed Seasons, ‘twould appear that Georgette is quite on the shelf, a spinster in the making. Yes, she did have two offers of marriage, but she accepted neither.

Because, you see, her eyes happened to meet the Uber-handsome Marquis of Onslow’s eyes in a moment of sheer mirth, both of them seeing the utter absurd hilarity in a situation, and now Georgette is lost: She’s a woman in love. That Onslow happens to be in love with the exquisite Miss Julia White just means she is sure to die a lonely death, her days filled with unrequited love. No matter; Georgette is pragmatic, and soon her days are filled with trying to better the shabby Castle Fortune the family resides in.

Soon, however, she’s frantically trying to get it up to snuff because dearest papa Baron Fortune has invited MANY guests for a house party in an effort to throw younger sister Jocasta together with young Lord Paxton. It’s a lost cause. And what makes it worse?

Onslow joins one Sir Justin Faulkes for the house party. Does he now have eyes for Georgette? Uhm, not really cuz something even worse has happened. Miss Julia White, back from a bracing trip from abroad (She just jilted a Duke…) has turned up like a bad penny also. Georgette is so sad, but to end her torture, she decides she WILL get the pair together, if only to end her torment.

What follows is a sweet trio of a friendship growing as Georgette’s morning rides turn into a chance for Onslow and Faulkes to join her, Onslow getting to know her, Faulkes (One of the men she turned down) mooning silently over her (But not in an obnoxious or forward way).

There are plots and miscues, high emotions, and bits of precious amusement. And when a handsome nabob turns up and seems to have eyes for no one save Georgette, who may have dishonorable or (Even worse!) HONORABLE intentions? There’s room for emotions to run high.

What I reeeeeally love about Cameron is that her stories are about ALL the people in them. Yes yes yes, that there are six sisters DEFinitely means we have the setup for a series, but Cameron doesn’t write solely about them. Here in this book, sure there’s Jocasta’s interactions with Lord Paxton, and a truly delightful bit of itty bitty 14-year old little sister Leonora deciding she’s really not fond of chins and might just be of an age to marry a certain shy (And chinless) young man in three years. But there’s so much more. There’s, of note, the cold man who’s given up on love, bullied by his shrew of a mother. He miiiiiiight be seeing someone good and kind, and he miiiiiiight even be smiling.

I LOVE that! Side characters get their own wooings and doings, their own romances, their own Happily Ever Afters. So HUZZAH to Ms. Cameron!

And what is NOT to love about Helen Taylor doing the honors for ANY Regency? She has a deep enough voice to be able to carry off the Heroes’ voice in a swoon-worthy fashion, as well as delivering the sly snippiness of, say, a conniving Miss Julia White or the shy hesitancy of a stammering (And chinless!) young man faced with a lioness of a little girl. Top that all off with the Baron’s Out Loud Tho’ He Doesn’t Realize It musings, all of them harsh but hilarious, and Taylor is quite simply one of my favorites!

Top-notch!

What else did I see when I hit the Amazon Author Page?

Welllll, that The Fentons series that has Honoria as the first has two more… PLUS! A fourth now out in print.

Be still my beating heart. The Fentons and Georgette kicking off this new series?

Oh my dear Accomplice: My heart is all a-flutter!!!