Ladies of Hanover Square

by Rona Randall

Dulcima Howard, former Gaiety Girl, madame of a fashionable card salon, and mistress of young Lord Ashleigh, yearns for marriage and respectability. But Justin Ashleigh seeks more violent pleasures, for he has inherited the pale amber eyes and the insanely sadistic streak that runs through his family. Deborah York, Dulcima's niece and daughter of a Sussex vicar, falls in love with archaeologist Simon Davidson. But he is still married to Justin's faithless, headstrong sister Caroline. Delia Davidson, Simon's daughter, is infatuated with Peter Maynard, the artist. But he only has eyes for Deborah. These are the ladies of Hanover Square, and the story of how their tangled loves unfolds against the transitory splendour of Edwardian society.

Genres: Fiction

544 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1981

About the author

Rona Green Shambrook
aka Rona Randall, Rona Shambrook, Virginia Standage

Rona Green was born on 16 June 1911 in Birkenhead, Cheshire, England, UK. Her education includes: Pitmans College in London, a Diploma in English Literature at Royal Society of Art, Birkenhead School of Art Literary. She married Frederick Walter Shambrook, and had a son.

A former actress, before writing, she worked also as journalist and sub-director of publishing company Amalgamated Press, and as assistant editor of George Newnes Ltd. Published since 1942, she started publishing mainly contemporary doctor nurse romances, before writing also gothic romances, and when the market for gothic novels softened, she wrote historical mystery romances. In 1970, Broken Tapestry, her contemporary novel about a broken family, won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award by the Romantic Novelists' Association. In 1989, she wrote her The Model Wife: Nineteenth Century Style, a book about social constumbres, including clothing. In 1992, she wrote Writing Popular Fiction, a complete guide for writers.

Reviews

[Kendall Piechura · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s interesting because I struggled to get into this book. There were a lot of characters to remember and their storylines to follow. But by the end, I felt that the cliffhanger had me wanting more. A bit of a rollercoaster of a story.