I should say at the outset
that I’m a huge fan of Karen Robards historical romances and many of them grace
my best lists. Note: She will be a guest
on my blog tomorrow so do come back for that interview.
Dark of the Moon is another great romance and different because of its plot detour in
the middle.
It begins in Ireland in 1784
and tells of Caitlyn O’Malley who, at 15, has lived on the streets of Dublin
disguised as a lad for so long, she no longer sees herself as a girl. When she
tries to pick the pocket of Connor d’Arcy, Earl of Iveagh, an Irish nobleman, believing
him to be English, she is caught.
Connor, having great sympathy
for homeless lads, offers “the boy” a job on his farm with “three square meals
a day.” Hungry, she accepts, traveling with him to Donoughmore Castle where Connor
and his younger brothers farm sheep in the shadow of the burned out castle that
was once their home. Caitlyn never considers her feminine gender will be
discovered. She is, of course, wrong.
Connor, whose family has
suffered under the dreaded Protestant Ascendency (“the colonizers of a
once-free land”), takes on another persona at night—the Dark Horseman. Riding
with his brothers, all dressed in black, Connor robs from the rich Ascendency
to give to Ireland’s poor. He’s a very worthy hero and, of course, Caitlyn falls
in love with him. But there is a local landowner, an evil man, who covets what
is Connor’s.
This is very well written with
great characters and had me on the edge of my seat wondering what the feisty
Caitlyn would do next. But there’s a turn in the middle that takes Caitlyn to
London. You’ll want to read it all.
Buy on Amazon.
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