Gerald Harcourt was a distant figure in their lives and he is easily forgotten. The loss of the family’s income, however, is not something so easily overcome. When their mother Anna discovers that they have been left penniless, she decides to move them out of London and back her hometown in Scotland. Helen, the demanding and selfish eldest sister, decamps almost immediately to Edinburgh in search of the excitement and refinement Ryddelton cannot offer but the others remain and begin to make very happy lives for themselves. Rosalie, having always lived in her more beautiful eldest sister’s shadow, begins to come into her own. Anna, freed of the formalities of her London life, is happier and more relaxed than her daughters have ever known her. And Jane, our narrator, finds an education she could never have gotten at Oxford in her work as a secretary for Mrs Millard, an eccentric biographer currently residing in the village. Her daughters seem to be settling down to their new life too, until Jane meets Ronnie. Ronnie appears to find ail the Harcourts attractive — but he can only marry one...

    Intelligent and independent, her future seems safe and predictable. Lovely Venetia despairs of ever meeting the handsome hero of her romantic dreams but is nearly resigned to spinsterhood, thanks to the enormous amount of responsibility she inherited with a Yorkshire estate and an invalid but precocious brother, Aubrey. She lives in comfortable seclusion in rural Yorkshire, she has never been further than Harrogate, nor enjoyed the lackluster attentions of any but her two wearisomely persistent suitors. She can not accept to marry the respectable but dull Edward Yardley - she will only marry for love.Then her long-absent neighbor, thirty-eight-year-old Lord Jasper Damerel, returns home to Yorkshire. In one extraordinary encounter, she meets the infamous neighbor, who she knows only by reputation - a gamester, a shocking rake, and a man of sadly unsteady character - and before she knows better, she finds friendship with a libertine whose way of life has scandalised the North Riding for years. Lord Damerel finds Venetia to be the most truly engaging and wittily perverse female he has encountered in all his life and determined to woo and win her, he pursues her with a passionate abandon that is soon the talk of the ton. And after her encounter with the dashing, dangerous rake, Venetia's well-ordered life is turned upside down, and she embarks upon a courtship with him that scandalises and horrifies the whole community.But Venetia has no intention of losing her heart to the rakish lord until she is sure that beneath his swashbuckling ways and shocking manners lies a tender heart belonging to her. And Lord Damerel would marry her in a heartbeat if he did not think it would ruin her. Then she discovers a shocking family secret that changes everything ... It was therefore particularly provoking to find that occasion, Lord Damerel could make up his mind to be idiotically noble....

    When lovely Linda Martin first arrives at Château Valmy as an English governess to the nine-year-old Count Philippe de Valmy, the opulence and history surrounding her seems like a wondrous, ecstatic dream. But a palpable terror is crouching in the shadows. Philippe's uncle, Léon de Valmy, is the epitome of charm, yet dynamic and arrogant, his paralysis little hindrance as he moves noiselessly in his wheelchair from room to room. Only his son Raoul, a handsome, sardonic man who drives himself and his car with equally reckless abandon, seems able to stand up to him. To Linda, Raoul is an enigma, though irresistibly attracted to him, she senses some dark twist in his nature. When an accident deep in the woods nearly kills Linda's innocent charge, she begins to wonder if someone has deadly plans for the young count.

    And they were right. If he brought the graceful Calcutta Eagle into Boston from Melbourne ahead of Mayo Keys' Emperor, he would win a half ownership of the Eagle. He would also prove his right to the name of "Prince of Sea Captains" and be acknowledged the most skillful and luckiest clipper-ship captain of his day.For Jenny Broadwinder, aboard her husband's ship, the race had special significance. Red-haired but cool-headed, always astute where her husband was rash and flamboyant, knowledgeable of ships and sailing, she sensed that the race against the Emperor somehow would be the supreme challenge of hers and Philip's lives. Yet not even Jenny knew just how supreme a challenge the race was to be for also aboard was George Cartwright, owner of the Indian Commercial Line, keeping an eye on his ship, his captain -- and his captain's wife.

    But her friend, Emma Fitzjames, led a totally different life. Emma's destiny was controlled by an all-powerful and distant guardian whom no one had ever seen.In a way, their friendship was the undoing of them all - or the secret of Emma's guardian would still be hidden. But Sally's father, with schemes of his own, used Emma's plight to his own advantage. And as for Edward Martin, he chose Emma over Sally, and then went in search of the guardian for permission to marry....