A Secret Surrender is the first book in The Pretenders series by Darcy Burke and I'm definitely looking forward to picking up the next one to see how this series moves forward.

This story involves Selina Blackwell, someone who has learned to do whatever she needs to in order to survive. When Selina returns to London to give her sister a Season, she does so in the form of Lady Gresham. The thing about Selina is that she also needs to make money to support them so she is also a fortune teller known as Madame Sybila and she draws the interest of a Bow Street Runner, Harry Sheffield, who's father happens to be an Earl...and not fully supportive of his wife's patronage of the fortune teller. Based on his father's nudging, Harry starts to investigate Madame Sybila and things begin to get interesting.

Selina has a lot of secrets but as she begins to form a relationship with Harry as Lady Gresham, she has to figure out what is most important to her. Not only is she trying to maintain secrets and multiple personalities but the brother she thought was dead just happens to be someone Harry is interested in tracking down. I enjoyed how these characters' relationship was built and thought Burke did a great job of keeping the core of the story at the front of mind.

The secondary characters were all interesting and I will definitely grab the next book in this series to see where Burke takes it. If you're looking for an engaging historical romance, check this one out!

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the review copy.