Last year I had the pleasure of reading Fair Deception by Jan Jones (click here to read my review) and so was simply delighted when a familiar sounding thud on my door mat a few days ago meant a book had arrived and, on opening the parcel, found a copy of her latest book Fortunate Wager.
As with Fair Deception, the story is set in Regency Newmarket, but horse racing is very much more central to the plot in this latest story. Lord Alexander Rothwell, the hero of our narrative, is very much in the Mr Darcy mould "....he was tall and well made, had dark brown hair with a meticulous fall of curls across the left side of his brow and eyes of light hazel.......the only slight flaw was that his face held an impatience suggesting he was often bored witless by other people's stupidity" He meets Caroline Fortune when he comes to collect a horse lost by her brother to him in a wager and is incensed when he discovers that the horse belongs to Caroline and, therefore, he cannot collect his winnings. Caroline finds him antagonistic and arrogant and is glad to put him in his place, but then discovers that there is another part to the wager - Lord Rothwell has left her an unmanageable horse, Solange, and the Fortune stable has to train this horse to win a race in a month, or lose a large sum of money.
Lord Rothwell is also in Newmarket for another reason - he is there to investigate the possible fixing of races and as Henry, Caroline's brother seems to be vastly lucky in his betting and winnings,he comes under suspicion and his lordship he needs to get close to them to see what he can find out. However, he finds that he becomes closer than he anticipated as they discover him one morning left for dead at the racing stables and he has to be taken into their household where they care for him. If I tell the reader that Lord Rothwell found Caroline to be 'an oddity and plain' and she thinks he is 'insufferable' then you might be able to guess at what is going to happen when they are in close proximity and she is nursing him, and you would be right. But sling in a dubious friend of Lord Rothwell who is deep in debt, Caroline's need to keep hidden that she dresses as a boy and rides the horses herself, and that her brother Henry is in love with Louisa, whose father, a rich goldsmith in Bury St Edmunds, disapproves of the match, and you have a great mix and a rattling good story.
Jan is a friend of mine and I always enjoy reading her books, she clearly loves her subject and her research is impeccable as one night Lord Rothwell attends a ball in the Assembly Room in Bury, another scene is set near Abbey Gate and we visited both these places these earlier in the year. So I know the description of the rooms is spot on and, as always, when a scene in a book is set in a familiar venue it really helps to place the book and the characters.
'Was it very flat in Newmarket tonight?' asked Caroline.
'By no means' said his lordship austerely 'but it is a fine evening and as I had already had occasion to mark the elegant exterior architecture in the town, we took a fancy to see these rooms. They are as handsome as report indicates'
I shall be meeting Jan next week when we have one our regular lunches in Cambridge and eat sticky toffee pudding and catch up on all the gossip and chat and I am going to take my copy of Fortunate Wager with me to make sure it is signed by the author and looking forward to it very much.
As I mentioned in my earlier post on Fair Deception, the fact that Jan is a friend of mine makes no difference to my review, just in case you were wondering, as she knows that if I didn't like it I would say so. Pretty sure that this was going to be highly unlikely and it was...
