Pandora Ravenel gets herself accidentally compromised by Gabriel during a ball. Neither party wants or needs this marriage, yet rumors abound from the ton, pushing them to come to a resolution.

This story was slow to start, giving some personal time for each main character to be viewed with their family. You get a judgement of their personalities and desires in life. Pandora is independent and has no interest in marriage. She wants to focus on making her board game and being an entrepreneur. Gabriel only wanted to watch fireworks and his chivalry lands him in this predicament. He has avoided marriage thus far, being well used to the match making mamas trying to land a future duke. Yet there’s something about Pandora that isn’t making him run for the hills. He’s hesitantly...curious.

The families get together at a house party in the country to allow the two some time to get to know each other. This was my favorite part of the book. It allowed some sharing of vulnerabilities and those first intimacies to take place.

Pandora came off to me as rather immature and selfish in the beginning of the book. She’s very lucky her family and sister are so supportive of what she wants and her happiness. In some scenes she comes off as extremely ungrateful and insecure. Yet, when she shares some of her secrets with Gabriel my heart just aches for her. Especially the reason for her vertigo. It made me realize the strength that was behind some of that sass and the responses that annoyed me earlier in the book.

Gabriel is just so wonderful. He is one of those completely steadfast heroes. Once you are on his radar, he is not wavering. He is so respectful and gentle with Pandora, who honestly is kind of a spaz lol. He’s just so sweet and wonderful with her. He’s an amazing hero. I loved him. But I felt like Pandora stoke a lot of the limelight in this book.

I felt like Lisa did a good job of totally immersing me in this story. The descriptions of the clothing, the bathing costumes and machines, the food, I felt like I could really picture it all without it being overly descriptive. It was interesting. Overall I’m liking the bit of time change from my usual hr books (these take place around the 1870s.

So, overall I thought it was a pleasant read. I have no urge to reread this. Thus I give 3 stars 😉 I’m working my way towards Devils Daughter.