TAMING AN IMPOSSIBLE ROGUE – Suzanne Enoch
The Scandalous Brides , Book 2
St. Martin's Paperbacks
ISBN:  978-0-312-53452-3
April 2012
Historical Romance

London, England – 1800's

Keating Blackwood is ignominiously awakened with a banging hangover by Stephen Fenton, a cousin he has successfully avoided for the past six years.  Why would Fenton want the notorious “Bloody Blackwood,” a man who slept with a married woman and was caught by her husband, who then followed him home and whom Keating had to shoot and kill?  Try living with that reputation among the ton.  Keating has spent the past years at his farm in Shropshire trying to eke out a living and keeping as drunk as possible.   But the lure of ten thousand pounds immediately arouses Keating's interest.  Last year the woman Fenton was promised to since her birth took one look at him in the church and ran away.  Fenton is sure Keating's glib tongue, and the promise of money, will enable him to talk to the woman in question and persuade her to change her mind and marry him.  Fenton can't live with the disgrace and laughter of his friends any more.  Keating is up for the job and moves in with his friend Andrew Baswich, the Duke of Greaves, and sets out making the acquaintance of Camille Pryce, the runaway bride.

Camille Pryce now works at the Tantalus Club, and its owner, Diane Haybury, saved her life.  Disowned by her family and kicked out of their house the night of the spoiled wedding, Camille was a servant for her mother's sister before she saw an ad for a hostess at the Tantalus.  A year later, Camille is still stared at and whispered about whenever she's in public, so she prefers to stay at the club.  The girls live in the club where there is a kitchen and outside gardens.  Why would anyone want to leave and risk being made an object of laughter?  When Keating attracts her attention, Camille is surprised that there is someone with a worse reputation than her own.  As Keating talks to her, he makes her feel like an attractive woman, though he soon tells her he is Fenton's cousin and asks her if maybe she wouldn't like to redeem her reputation and marry him now.  The idea is tempting, but is that what Camille wants, and can Keating give up the first woman whom he actually likes, respects, and draws strength and courage from?

Suzanne Enoch has excelled herself in the second book of The Scandalous Brides series.  Keating is a serious reprobate; he killed a man and has had a reputation for sleeping with any woman who will lift her skirts.  He has spent the last years living up to his reputation and trying to ignore the feelings of dishonor.  Camille is a young woman who was hoping for some sort of connection with her would-be husband, but Fenton's stiffness and disregard of her, never even meeting her before the wedding day, broke something inside her.  She has embraced life at the Tantalus Club and the safety and security it provides her.  But is acceptance back into society and her friends worth marriage to a man whom she clearly will live a life separate from?

Secondary characters are each unique.  Camille's best friend and roommate, Sophie, is her one true friend.  Lord and Lady Haybury are the owners of the Tantalus Club and hire only beautiful women, many of whom come from less than ideal circumstances, as Camille did.  Lord Greaves appears to be Keating's only friend and a major part of the culmination of their relationship.  Fenton is the wanna-be groom, a man totally without romance or compassion, only interested in his reputation.

TAMING AN IMPOSSIBLE ROGUE totally delighted me with its very special premise and intriguing characters, and especially the Tantalus Club and its employees and the men who frequent it.  Following this novel and a BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO RAKES (October 2011), we will next learn the secrets of Lord Greaves in RULES TO CATCH A DEVILISH DUKE (Fall 2012).  This is a very fascinating and exciting series that I totally love.  There are two more stories in the series coming up, and I can't wait to read them, too, and you'll feel the same.

Carolyn Crisher