The pace was a little bit slow in places. The characters were a little under developed. The story is interesting and kept me reading.

Behind the doors of the magnificent Ashmore Castle, secrets are waiting to be uncovered . . . What a gorgeous book! The author has a great gift for characterisation - nuanced, interesting, believable people but created with a charming lightness of touch.

The second book in the Ashmore Castle series.

Spoilers for the first book ...

Giles became the Earl of Stainton when his father suffered a fatal accident whilst hunting. He inherited an estate on the brink of bankruptcy, his father had refused to economise and had spent Giles' sisters' dowries and his widow's stipend. Forced to make an advantageous marriage, Giles married Kitty, a jam heiress, despite falling desperately in love with Kitty's best friend Nina.

Giles' mother Maud is a self-absorbed tartar, obsessed with her own status and achieving advantageous marriages for her daughters. Giles has three sisters and one brother. Louisa is the eldest, she made a poor marriage and has resorted to blagging stays with relatives and foisting her two children onto others whenever possible. Rachel is the second sister, on the brink of coming out (into society) and the conventionally pretty one, Maud is investing all her time and effort into achieving a brilliant match. The youngest daughter is Lily, more fond of hunting and horses than of people, she has made friends with Axe, the blacksmith's apprentice and escape to his cottage in the woods to talk whenever possible (think Dickon from The Secret Garden). Finally, Richard is Giles' younger brother who has fallen in love with his father's former mistress Molly, mother to a musical prodigy. To complete the Stainton family, Giles' uncle Sebastian lives at Ashmore Castle, a bachelor with a love for playing the piano and astute observations.

Nina is an orphan, brought up by her aunt, she faced a life as a teacher, until sharing Kitty's season opened her eyes to a different life. Unable to marry the man she truly loves (and would never hurt Kitty by stealing the man she loves), she marries an elderly, but fabulously wealthy, shoe and boot manufacturer called Joseph Cowley.

Below stairs things are just as tortuous. Secret babies, unrequited love, petty jealousies, and vaunting ambitions.

...

This book is more of the same, I was a tad flummoxed by the first book because it just ended mid-plot, as does this one, but now I just treat this as a bit like a TV series (very similar to Downtown Abbey) with multiple storylines criss-crossing each other, very little is resolved but everything is moved forwards. I have to say I was ambivalent about the first book but I am starting to get invested in the plot, even if it seems unlikely that Giles and Nina can get their HEA without something awful happening to Kitty and Mr Cowley, both of whom are lovely characters.

Looking forwards to the next instalment.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.