Review: A Winter’s Scandal – Candace Camp

A Winter’s Scandal by Candace Camp
Series:  Legend of St. Dwywnen #1
Release Date:  October 25, 2011
Publisher:   Pocket Star
Page Count:  384
Source:  Night Owl Reviews

The first in New York Times bestselling author Candace Camp’s new Regency trilogy is a Christmas love story featuring a couple who find an abandoned baby in a manger—who may lead them to the truth in their own hearts. 

Thea is a vicar’s daughter, dutiful to a fault—even if sometimes she tires of caring for everyone around her. One snowy day in December, Thea goes to church to check on the nativity scene—and finds a crying baby nestled in the manger! The babe has no identification other than a signet ring belonging to Gabriel, the local lord. Before Thea can think twice, she snatches up the child and marches off to give the earl a piece of her mind.

Gabriel at first thinks the windblown, furious woman who appears in his hall is accusing him of fathering her child—but it soon becomes clear that the baby is not his. Then how did the child come to have Gabriel’s ring wrapped in its swaddling? Gabriel, a bachelor, has no notion of how to care for an infant and begs Thea for her continued help. As the two work together to search for his rightful parents, they are powerfully drawn to one another. Gabriel can’t help but admire Thea’s fresh, striking beauty and her tender heart, while Thea daydreams about more than a friendship with the bold but honorable lord. But someone is determined to keep them from finding the truth about this wayward baby—even if it means silencing one or both of them for good.

A NIGHT OWL REVIEWS BOOK REVIEW

Reviewed by: Shannschoice

When you’re the previous vicar’s daughter and the current vicar’s sister, you tend to live your life as dictated by the church and the parishioners. One would expect the vicar’s relative to live above reproach and set an example. That is what Thea Bainbridge did for most of her 27 years. She would help when needed or else blend in. But when she finds a baby in the manger she had set out to use while decorating the church, Thea stops doing what everyone expects and instead what she wants. The first thing she’s going to do is confront Lord Gabriel Morecomb, who she assumes is the baby’s father (based on a broach found within the baby’s clothing).

Gabriel Morecomb is in the country to celebrate the holidays with his friends. Those plans are turned upside down when Miss Bainbridge bursts into his house, with a baby in her arms, demanding to know what he is going to do with this baby left at the church. After trading insults back and forth, he demands to know why she thinks the baby is his. When she produces the broach, he’s nearly brought to his knees. The broach was a gift he had given his younger sister, Jocelyn, who has been missing for the past year. It’s with this discovery that we are taken on a journey as Thea and Gabriel search for who left the baby at the church and if that person was Gabriel’s missing sister.

I enjoyed both main characters in this story. Thea, who always thought of herself as plain and resigned herself to remaining a spinster and alone, came into her own as soon as she held that baby in her arms. She suddenly realized that she deserved the happiness she saw everyone having. With the added attraction to Gabriel, she soon learned that she wasn’t as plain and forgettable as she always thought.

Gabriel was the type of hero I’d love to see more of. Instead of fighting his attraction to Thea almost every moment, he acknowledged it and went with it. He knew that he missed her when he wasn’t with her and didn’t hide the fact that he needed to see her every day. It was refreshing.

This was an enjoyable story that has a few twists and turns in the storyline to keep you riveted until the last page.

Oct 04, 2011 | 9781451639506

Original review was posted on Night Owl Review and can be accessed via the link above.