Thursday

A Proposal to Risk their Friendship by Louise Allen

June 24, 2021
Hey! Guess what! The title and story are simpatico!

https://www.louiseallenregency.com/
A Proposal to Risk Their Friendship, is the fifth book in Louise Allen's Liberated ladies’ series. I don't remember the other books in the series, which in my case doesn't really count for anything. I do intend to refresh my memory, and either read, or reread the others.

Our heroine is Melissa Taverner, a part of the liberated ladies. Somehow, she has managed to talk her family into letting her live on her own in London, with only an odd, forgetful chaperone for company. My eyebrows did go up when the chaperone was on the page. She was a pretty loose chaperone, and I was puzzled as to how Melissa’s despot of a father allowed this to happen. But oh well. The lack of supervision did allow our heroine the ability to run all over London saving damsel’s in distress. When Melissa isn’t saving damsels, she’s a want-to-be-writer. It is at one of these damsel-saving events that our hero, Lord Henry Cary, first spots her. He's mighty impressed by her tactics, and introduces himself.

He is intrigued with Melissa, and invites her for a walk. She accepts. And, they walk, talk, and become involved in each other’s lives. Their friendship grows, and becomes all encompassing. Henry even goes so far as to include Melissa in some of his government spying activities. Henry’s “let-me-talk-about-spying” business also happened to raise my eyebrows. My eyebrows were very busy during this book. But, I will be honest with you, I overlooked all the eyebrow raising moments in this story. Why's that, you may ask. Well, my little Petunia's, I really enjoyed watching Melissa and Henry form a friendship. They had some great chemistry. They talked, laughed, discussed, and were fun to listen to. This story created a tension in me, because I knew that sometime, someplace, something would happen to ruin their friendship. That something was called sexual attraction. Neither Melissa or Henry wanted to ruin their friendship by admitting they were attracted to each other. So, it was interesting to see how they handled everything.

If I were to look at this story logically, the hoops which Melissa and Henry jump through are way over the top. But, this is not a logical story.  This is a love story. A Proposal to Risk Their Friendship, is a well-written, character driven romance. The friendship formed between our two main characters was delightful, and a pleasure to read. Even with all the eye-brows at the top of my head, I found this a refreshing story. I enjoyed reading about the amazing friendship formed between a man and woman. I do highly recommend this story.
 
Time/Place: Regency England
Sensuality: Warm Hot

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