2024 Victorian romance. Anne Deveril has been letting herself fade into
obscurity looking after her widowed mother. Mr Felix Hartford is
apparently a feckless man-about-town. They were almost married six
years ago, and they've spend the intervening time despising each
other…
There are many side matters going on in Felix's life, and to go
into detail would be spoilerish, but several secrets that seem as
though they would lead to severe embarrassment are eventually made
public and the consequences don't seem too terrible—which didn't
entirely convince me. This is the Victorian age shortly after the
death of Albert, after all, where the veneer of correct behaviour can
be so thin that any reminder of the true state of affairs is a grave
offence.
Meanwhile Anne's situation is precarious, as her cousin the actual
heir reaches his majority and threatens to displace Anne and her
mother from the family house in Mayfair—hence the title.
There's more linking between books of a series that I usually expect
in romance, and it's rather pleasing: not only is Anne's reason for
contacting Felix again related to the dash to rescue her friend Julia
from her potential ogre of a husband in The Belle of Belgrave
Square, but several characters return from Matthews' earlier Parish
Orphans of Devon series, including the love interest for the fourth
of this quartet of friends (though of course that won't be resolved
until the final book in this set).
There isn't perhaps the usual driving force of a specific goal to be
attained by a particular point or All Will Be Lost; rather, much of
what's going on is Anne gradually emerging from her grief for her
father.
But mostly this follows the standard second-chance pattern, with the
usual good writing from Matthews as the protagonists annoy each other
even when they sometimes weren't intending to, and they each have to
consider changes to their way of life in order to accommodate the
other. The course of events is broadly predictable from the first
chapter, but I don't read a romance for surprises; rather, I'm here
for the interesting detail that makes this specific second-chance
story for these particular people distinct from any other.