About the Author

New York Times-, Publisher's Weekly-, and Wall Street Journal- bestselling author Mary Jo Putney is a graduate of Syracuse University with degrees in eighteenth-century literature and industrial design. She has won numerous awards for her writing, including two Romance Writers of America RITA Awards, the Romantic Times Career Achievement Award for Historical Romance, and four consecutive Golden Leaf awards for Best Historical Romance. Her books have also received frequent awards from online reader sites such as, The Romance Reader, All About Romance, Romance Readers Anonymous, and Under the Covers. The author of twenty-two novels, Ms. Putney lives in Baltimore, Maryland.

Reviews

-MS. PUTNEY JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!-
-NORA ROBERTS
-DEEPLY MOVING . . . PUTNEY DELVES FAR INTO THE REACHES OF THE HEART TO THRILL HER FANS.-
-Romantic Times

"MS. PUTNEY JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!"
-NORA ROBERTS
"DEEPLY MOVING . . . PUTNEY DELVES FAR INTO THE REACHES OF THE HEART TO THRILL HER FANS."
-Romantic Times

"MS. PUTNEY JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!"
-NORA ROBERTS
"DEEPLY MOVING . . . PUTNEY DELVES FAR INTO THE REACHES OF THE HEART TO THRILL HER FANS."
-Romantic Times

Putney's delicious post-Regency romance is married fittingly with Barbara Rosenblatt's amazing facility with characters and dialects and her perfect emotional pitch. Dominic Renbourne is asked by his identical twin brother, Kyle, to impersonate him at a visit to his fiance, Lady Meriel Grahame. Meriel is known to be mad, so it is unlikely that she will notice the difference. Dominic is captivated by Meriel's intelligence and spirit when, despite her refusal to speak, he recognizes that she is eccentric but not insane. Meriel, living in her own world on her estate since witnessing the massacre of her parents in India when she was only five, finds herself drawn to Dominic, for the first time seeking a connection to someone outside her world at Warfield, but both face obstacles to their happiness. Shadows from Meriel's past and Dominic's betrayal of his brother will threaten their future. Putney writes with attention to historical detail as well as emotional depth. Rosenblatt is superb throughout, finding the correct voice, nuance, and tone for each sentence. Highly recommended for all fiction collections.DMelody A. Moxley, Rowan P.L., Salisbury, NC Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Lady Meriel Grahame, the eighth heroine in Putney's Fallen Angels series, has lived in a world of self-imposed silence since the night of violence in colonial India that claimed her parents' lives. Deemed mad by her guardian uncles (one good, one evil), looked after by two widows (both good), she lives a life of fey barefoot willfulness, making weedy centerpieces for the mahogany dining table and communing with the animals who roam the gorgeous grounds of her ancestral home, Warfield. Lord Grahame, her evil uncle, would like to see her locked up in a mental asylum (Putney dwells on the horrors of early 19th-century "modern" psychiatry), but her good uncle, Lord Amworth, thinks a wedding and bedding might cure herÄand the time is now, while Grahame is out of the country. Since infancy, Meriel has been pledged to Kyle Renbourne, Lord Maxwell, the future earl of Wrexham. Heart-bound to escort his dying mistress home to Spain, Kyle dispatches his twin brother, Dominic, to court Meriel in his place. The novel is most enjoyable precisely where it's most predictable, and it's in the all-consuming attraction, body and spirit, between Dominic and Meriel that it reaches its peak. Allowed unthinkable liberties, Meriel paints henna designs on Dominic's trembling torso, laughs at his morality and offers up an irresistible bargaining chip: if she may have his body, he shall hear her voice. Her words may lack the eloquence of her silence, and the second half of the novel is altogether the weaker, but there's satisfaction for readers who like to see villains die and everyone else live happily ever after. Author tour. (Aug.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

-MS. PUTNEY JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!-
-NORA ROBERTS
-DEEPLY MOVING . . . PUTNEY DELVES FAR INTO THE REACHES OF THE HEART TO THRILL HER FANS.-
-Romantic Times
"MS. PUTNEY JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!"
-NORA ROBERTS
"DEEPLY MOVING . . . PUTNEY DELVES FAR INTO THE REACHES OF THE HEART TO THRILL HER FANS."
-Romantic Times
"MS. PUTNEY JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!"
-NORA ROBERTS
"DEEPLY MOVING . . . PUTNEY DELVES FAR INTO THE REACHES OF THE HEART TO THRILL HER FANS."
-Romantic Times