To Catch a Spinster by Megan Bryce

To Catch a Spinster by Megan Bryce

[image error]In most Regency novels, the man seduces the innocent woman and is forced to marry her. This is a regency novel that turns the genre on its head with a woman more interested in losing her virginity than keeping it and refuses a proposal of marriage afterwards.

Olivia is 27 years old with five married sisters. She has accepted her lot in life as a spinster but would like to experience being courted and bedded at least once and live on the memories. She chooses Nathaniel Jenkins, 39, who is being henpecked by his mother to wed. He is not interested in the young girls dressed in orange.

Olivia asks her brother-in-law to introduce her to Nathaniel and she offers to pay him to court her and bed her. Nathaniel, being a gentleman, refuses but is intrigued by Olivia. They are well-matched and likable to the reader. As he gets to know her, he changes his mind and after a night of lovemaking, he proposals.

Olivia, much to his surprise, refuses him. The families on both sides try to change Olivia’s mind through most of the book. She is afraid they will fall out of love like her parents and other couples she has known.

I enjoyed the writing and the twist about Olivia being the seductress but the plot was too simple. I expected more to happen. But for writers, this is an excellent example of taking an idea and adding to it. So much more could happen to the heroine in your version with similar circumstances. It’s all in the telling, after all.