#Review: THE FORMIDABLE EARL by Sophie Barnes

2 of 5 stars

  

Simon Nugent, the Earl of Fielding, decides to throw off his prim and proper reputation and visits a brothel where he finds Ida Strong, the daughter of a traitor, hiding. Now that she's been discovered, Ida has to run, but as soon as she leaves there's an attack on her life. Simon follows her and stops the attack. He feels responsible for outing her and agrees to hide her while trying to uncover who set her father up to be accused as a spy. Ida doesn't trust Simon, but has little choice but to accept his help. The closer these two get to the truth, the more her life is in danger. Can they uncover the real criminal before Ida is killed?

 

I thought the premise of this book was good, but I felt like I'd been dropped into the middle of it. I've only read one other book in the series about Carlton Guthrie but it was more than a year ago and I don't remember if Ida was mentioned there or not. In any case, I thought Ida's character was strong especially with everything she'd been through. I wasn't a fan of Simon though. What really puzzled me was how did all of London hear about Ida the next day after Simon discovers her in the brothel. Who told the papers? Even though Simon was helping to uncover the real criminal, I didn't warm up to him. One minute he vowed to protect Ida and then the next he's sleeping with her. As they get closer to the truth, he decides to bring her to a ball. What? He's supposed to hiding her and then Ida accuses two men at the ball. This whole scene was just too silly for words. So much for sleuth. Unfortunately, this was not one of my favorites.

 

I voluntarily read the advanced reader copy and all opinions are my own.