"A Fun Chapter in the Mayfair Square Saga"

THE ORPHAN is another installment in Stella Cameron's Mayfair Square series. In this book businessman Latimer More meets Jenny McBride, who is an orphan working in a London shop. Latimer decides that he wants to marry Jenny to help her and also to rescue her from the clutches of her landlord, Mr. Morley Bucket. Bucket is one of Cameron's patented hissable villains who are easy to hate.

As in the previous books the story is told by Sir Septimus Spivey, a ghost who wants to drive all of the residents from 'his' house. As in the previous books none of his efforts are successful and usually have the opposite effect he intended.

Jenny is not quite the poor little waif that Latimer thinks she is and she initially resists turning all of her problems over to him. Our hero sometimes seems a little overbearing in his efforts to aid Jenny, but his intentions are good and ultimately I found myself rooting for this couple.

This is a fun series and Cameron does a good job of creating a different setting for the Regency era; that of the middle class. Sometimes one reads Regencies and thinks everyone was either a lord or a servant, but a bustling middle class was developing and it is fun to see non-peers falling in love. Linda Hurst

Reviewed by Linda Hurst
Posted March 21, 2002

Labeled "England's Most Daring Lover" by his aristocratic peers, Latimer More of 7A Mayfair Square was hardly expected to fall for a pretty--and penniless-Scottish lass. But Jenny McBride's optimism and spirit intrigued the mysterious entrepreneur, as did the beauty's insistence on pushing him away. Yet, from the desperation and haunted look in Jenny's green eyes, Latimer sensed that a dangerous secret lurked just below the surface and that there was much more to her denial of him than met the eye . . .

Summary

Latimer More, lodger at 7A Mayfair Square and widely known as "the most daring lover in England," has finally found the woman of his dreams--Jenny McBride. But what startles everyone--Latimer's fellow tenants, his family and even Jenny--is what an educated man of business sees in a poor, orphaned milliner's assistant. However, Latimer has looked past the surface--past the demure protestations and patched clothing--and seen the fiercely independent and generous soul within the auburn-haired Scottish lass.

Latimer may be sure of his intentions, but Jenny has her doubts. Can she trust a man with the sort of reputation Latimer has with the fairer sex? Surely he is only toying with her and intends to toss her aside after he has tired of her? Moreover, even if Latimer is serious and Jenny were to accept his marriage offer, it would mean revealing the hold that the vile Morely Bucket has upon her.

The odious slumlord, Bucket, presses Jenny, behind on her rent, to offer up sexual favors in exchange for canceling her debts. Jenny has resisted so far, but Bucket has become more and more forcibly persistent as time has passed. Jenny believes that if Latimer were to find out that she was involved in such sordid goings-on that his interest in her would quickly vanish. But Jenny doesn't know Latimer More well enough. He does find out, and it only intensifies his resolve to free the valiant waif from the clutches of the archfiend Bucket--but not before enlisting the aid of everyone at 7 Mayfair Square.