Amazon US $4.04 $12.68
Romance
/Nautical adventure
1800s
England /
France
Unlike many of
women of the ton, Lady Joanna West has vowed to never marry, even though at
twenty-five, her brother the earl believes it is high time she wed. She also
refuses to stand idly by why the villagers of Chichester starve from lack of
work and the inability to pay high taxes. To that end she begins delivering
food baskets to the poor, but now oversees the delivery of smuggled tea and
brandy and makes sure the goods reach their proper destinations without
alerting the revenue agents.
One night in
April 1784, her men row her out to meet a new partner, a stranger who could be
a free trader or a spy.
Captain Jean
Donet silently watches from the shadows as his new partner inspects the
merchandise and haggles with his quartermaster. Before the Englishman departs,
Jean suspects the stranger is actually a woman in disguise. But that
possibility intrigues, rather than discourages him, for he, too, is more than
he appears to be. Disowned by his father, he is a French spy, was a privateer
for Benjamin Franklin during the American Revolution, and is now a successful
smuggler with a fleet of vessels. He is also the comte de Saintonge, a title
inherited after the untimely death of his father and older brother. He must
finally return to the estate he left years ago, but first he must attend
several events leading up to the christening of his new grandson.
Since her
brother has yet to marry, Joanna serves as his hostess at a party honouring the
new prime minister, who is determined to put an end to the smuggling that
plagues England. Two other gentlemen in attendance also catch her attention,
but for different reasons. One commands the sloop of war responsible for
hunting down vessels engaged in this illegal trade. The other is a
forty-year-old Frenchman who seems taken with her younger sister, who has just
come of age. Joanna will do whatever is necessary to keep Tillie from becoming
a sacrificial lamb…
Echo in the Wind is the second
book in the Donet Trilogy and takes place five years before the storming of the
Bastille and the start of the French Revolution. As in the previous title, To Tame the Wind, Walker opens with a
list of “Characters of Note” so readers can acquaint themselves with who’s who
before the story begins. Aside from Chichester and London, she whisks readers
back to eighteenth-century Lorient, Saintonge, and Paris to experience first hand
the discontent of the people and the callow disregard of the nobility. Walker
also includes an author’s note where she discusses the history behind the
novel.
Chapter one
places readers in the midst of the action and shows great promise of suspense,
but the pace slows thereafter and doesn’t pick up again until after page 100.
Those pages focus more on character development, with only minor hints of
possible adventure and misadventure. Yet stalwart readers who brave the trials
and tribulations that they and the characters experience will be richly rewarded
with a wonderful love story.
© 2017 Cindy
Vallar
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