Lady Annabelle is back for another season and since she was labeled a “plain, bluestocking with a medium dowry” she seems to be only attracting the widowers and people old enough to have been her father.  This will not do as she is determined to marry for love.  She thinks she might just be on the right track when Ian MacKay, the Earl of Graenfrae, starts to show interest in her.  But when he proposes marriage she asks him why, and is stunned to find out he has a list of what he is looking for and that she meets all of the items.  None of the items include love, and focus on her age and her ‘plain’ looks.

She decides that while she is attracted to the earl she is not going to accept his offer and will continue on with her ‘secret’ works.  She is supporting a grass roots effort to get women more rights in England, once they are married.  It is a controversial subject and one that almost gets her hurt, at one lecture.

Ian may have had a list but he suddenly decides that no matter what is on the list he is going to have Annabelle, but love is off the table, in his mind.  Suddenly someone seems to be willing to steel Annabelle from him and no way is he going to lose the thing that he is coming to treasure more than anything else.

Annabelle’s Courtship is a genre that I am not used to seeing Lucy Monroe write in but, I should have not been worried.  As usual I was pulled in to the book and cheered for some characters and mentally boo’d others.  I thoroughly enjoyed how she wove the fact that appearances are not everything into the story, as we find Annabelle is anything but plain and ordinary.  I am a huge fan of both this genre and Ms. Monroe’s writing and Annabelle’s Courtship only helps to further cement this feeling.