The Hostage Bride »

Dear Reader,

Here is the first of my new "Brides" trilogy, in which three unconventional young women vow they will never marry—only to be overtaken by destiny.  Bride #1 is the outspoken Portia....

It's bad enough that seventeen-year-old Portia Worth is taken in by her uncle, the marquis of Granville, after her father dies.  As the bastard niece, Portia knows she can expect little beyond a roof over her head and a place at the table.

But it truly adds insult to injury when the Granvilles' archenemy, the outlaw Rufus Decatur, hatches a scheme to abduct the marquis's daughter—only to kidnap Portia by accident.

Portia, who possesses more than a streak of independence as well as a talent for resistance, does not take kindly to being abducted—mistakenly or otherwise.

Decatur will soon find himself facing the challenge of his life, both on the battlefield and in the bedroom, as he contends with this misfit of a girl who has the audacity to believe herself the equal of any man....

Warmest wishes,

Jane Feather

P.S.  Phoebe, the "awkward" one, will be next, in The Accidental Bride.  Watch for it in early 1999.

Publishers Weekly

Feather, whose latest series were the V series (Vanity, Vice, Violet, etc.) and the Charm Bracelet trilogy (The Emerald Swan, The Silver Rose, etc.), sets her new Brides trilogy during the English Civil War. Each installment will focus on one of three young women joined by friendship and fate. Portia Worth's uncle, Cato Granville, is a Roundhead and mortal enemy of Rufus Decatur, a nobleman who has sworn fealty to King Charles in hopes of winning back his family's property and honor. Rufus's men mistakenly kidnap Portia, but when no money is forthcoming, the two outsidersan unwanted hostage and a dispossessed noblefind a common bond. It's a fine romantic convention though rather marred by Portia's unduly prickly and bellicose nature. The author does a good job of capturing the periodthe class differences; life in a military encampment and during a siege; and the fickle loyalties of the day. But Feather can also stumble into breathless melodrama in dialogue and description: "He'd nurtured his anger with a fierce flame, but now as he tried with his own breath to return the living warmth to her face, to her eyes, that anger was as if it had never been." (June)