Retro Friday (26) - Devil In Winter by Lisa Kleypas

Retro Friday is a weekly meme hosted at Angieville and focuses on reviewing books from the past. This can be an old favorite, an under-the-radar book you think deserves more attention, something woefully out of print, etc. Everyone is welcome to join in at any time! 

For this week I'm continuing with The Wallflower Series by Lisa Kleypas, and tacking the third book Devil in Winter

At First Sight:
Desperate times call for desperate measures and Evie Jenner is desperate. Her father is at death's door and her mother's family is plotting to take everything Evie stands to inherit and then dispose of her.

But Evie is about done taking the abuse of her mother's family and runs off to Sebastian, Lord St. Vincent - a notorious rake who just a few days before tried to kidnap Evie's friend Lillian (now the Countess of Westcliff) - with a shocking proposition.

If he marries her, she'll hand over her dowry, and sleep with him once to make the marriage valid; and require nothing more from him than to return her to her father's gambling club once the deed is done.

St. Vincent needs the money - hence the attempted kidnapping - and Evie does have a lot of money, so even if his ambition wasn't to marry a Wallflower, he agrees and they set off for Scotland.

But things don't go as planned, as they get to travel to Scotland and back, and become rather attached to each other, even if they are still learning to trust one another. 

Second Glance: Evie is one of my favorite Wallflowers, she has a type of vulnerability that I find very endearing while she never comes across as whinny or annoying - even if she does jump to conclusions once or twice where Sebastian is concerned.

Sebastian is a villain that redeems himself, he did something very foolish in the previous story and betrayed his best friend, but he eventually realizes he made a stupid mistake. Learning his story and watching him fall in love is awesome to see each and every time.

I love Evie and Sebastian together and I love them apart, and how they become each other's family. As always, I love the Wallflower's friendship, but I also loved seeing - in this book in particular - a bit of the male friendships, too.

Bottom Line: Devil in Winter is one of those romances that often get voted as fan favorites, and I do think it's worthy of that praise. It has good characters - both old (the other wallflowers and their husbands) and new (like Cam Rohan) - and I love that it's set in a gambling club, it brings back good memories from Dreaming of You.

1/2