Breakaway Books

Authored by Mary Balogh; Published 2003; Romance

⭐️⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️🏖️🏖️🏖️

Slightly Married is basically just the Victorian-era version of a fake dating story. It turns out a rom-com trope is a rom-com trope, regardless of the setting.

In Slightly Married, Eve is facing a devastating dilemma: Following the death of her brother in the English war against France, she must marry within a week in order to keep her inheritance and continue to provide for the unfortunate souls whom she has taken in as employees on her estate after they’ve failed to find jobs elsewhere. Enter Colonel Bedwyn, a fellow English army officer who swore to protect Eve at her brother’s request. The colonel’s honor compels him to propose a marriage of convenience, but you’ll be shocked to know, it turns into something more.

While much of this novel is standard romance fare, I did very much enjoy the heroine, Eve. Sure, some elements of her character are exaggerated—her affection for and service to those who are down on their luck, although certainly appealing, is so dramatic as to border on unrealistic. But her defiance of Colonel Berwyn and his siblings, who are so aristocratic that they don’t seem to be able to conceive of a life without riches, can’t help but endear her to the reader. Eve absolutely refuses to be told what to do. She is proud of where she came from, not at all intimidated by the ducal Bedwyn family, and she directs her own destiny. I was a little surprised to find such a headstrong, even rebellious, protagonist in this staid and traditional romance.

The set up and progression of the plot is about as formulaic as you might expect; bound by his extraordinarily strong sense of honor, Colonel Bedwyn takes the promise he makes to the dying Captain Morris to aid his sister to heart. He delivers the news of his death to Eve but then goes above and beyond, marrying her upon learning about the predicament of her father’s will. A huge amount of the plot rests on the colonel being extremely serious about both his own honor and the perhaps less-than-well-thought-out words of a dying man, but such is the nature of romance novels. Eve and the colonel then grow to know each other quite well and even begin to like each other—all the while already married. For me, it goes on about 10% too long, with the two of them perpetually assuming the other had no true romantic feelings for them. But it did whet my appetite for the stories of the other Bedwyn siblings!

Slightly Married is not exactly groundbreaking, but if your version of a perfect escape includes court presentations and country balls, you will love this one.