Book picks similar to
A Houseful of Girls by Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
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Belinda
Maria Edgeworth - 1801
Contending with the perils and the varied cast of characters of the marriage market, Belinda strides resolutely toward independence. Admired by her contemporary, Jane Austen, and later by Thackeray and Turgenev, Edgeworth tackles issues of gender and race in a manner at once comic and thought-provoking. The 1802 text used in this edition also confronts the difficult and fascinating issues of racism and mixed marriage, which Edgeworth toned down in later editions.
Wait For Me
Barb A. Hart - 2016
She prefers breeches to dresses, and spends her time riding horses, fishing, and climbing trees. When Emily is fourteen, she meets Cameron, the Duke of Templeton’s grandson. Their friendship deepens over the years, until Cameron is called to fight against Napoleon. They express their devotion to each other and make love for the first time before Cameron heads off to war. When Emily’s father discovers she’s pregnant, he’s livid. He had no idea his tomboy daughter has fallen in love, and her predicament threatens to destroy their family’s honor. He sends Emily to live with Cameron's eccentric great aunt, and, to avoid shame, insists that she claims she is married. Upon return from the battlefield, Cameron hears that Emily has wed and was pregnant. She writes him to explain the situation, but the letters never arrive, and the misunderstanding sends Cameron into a spiral of rage and despair. Their paths will cross again, but will their love be enough to overcome the fates at work to keep them apart?
Song of Alaska Pack
Tracie Peterson - 2010
A collection of three dramatic stories of love and difficult choices set in the Alaskan frontier from bestselling author Tracie Peterson.
The Female Quixote
Charlotte Lennox - 1752
Both Joseph Fielding and Samuel Johnson greatly admired Lennox, and this novel established her as one of the most successful practitioners of the Novel of Sentiment.
Emma: An Audible Original Drama
Anna Lea - 2018
Before she began writing, Jane Austen wrote, 'I am going to take a heroine whom no-one but myself will much like' and thus introduces the handsome, clever, rich - and flawed - Emma Woodhouse. Emma is perfectly content with her life and sees no need for either love or marriage; nothing, however, delights her more than matchmaking her fellow residents of Highbury. But when she ignores the warnings of her good friend Mr Knightley and attempts to arrange a suitable match for her protegee Harriet Smith, her carefully laid plans soon unravel and have consequences that she never expected. This lively comedy of manners, with its witty and subtle exploration of relationships, is often seen as Jane Austen's masterpiece.Public Domain (P)2018 Audible, Ltd.
Marriage
Susan Ferrier - 1818
Like her contemporaries, Maria Edgeworth and Jane Austen, Susan Ferrier adopts an ideal of rational domesticity, illustrating the virtues of a reasonable heroine who learns to act for herself. This new edition features an introduction incorporating recent critical work on national identity and gender, and firmly situating the novel within the context of both Scottish literature and women's writing.
The Granville Sisters
Una-Mary Parker - 2005
When war is declared, the love lives of the Granville girls suffer. Rosie's husband is killed during the Blitz. Then Lousie falls in love with Jack, a sixteen-year-old evacuee from the slums of London. When she falls pregnant, she is sent to Wales in disgrace. The girls? mother, Liza, can only pin her hopes on Charlotte now . . .
Maida's Little Shop
Inez Haynes Irwin - 1909
Inez Haynes Irwin used the pseudonym Inez Haynes Gilmore. She was a feminist writer and was a member of the National Women's Party. Maida is a sweet little girl whose father is one of the richest men in America. She is pale, listless and lame. Her father buys her a small shop in Charlestown, Massachusetts in the hope that this will give her an interest and help restore her health. His only requirement is that she not tell anyone who she is or who her father is. Maida makes friends for the first time in her life who see her as an ordinary girl.
Helen's Babies
John Habberton - 1876
They enjoy a comfortable life with their parents Tom and Helen Lawrence. Helen's brother is Harry Burton, a wealthy bachelor who, although never having had one, is an expert on knowing how to raise children. When Tom and Helen receive a letter from Harry, in which he announces he will travel to them for a vacation, they see an opportunity to get a break from the kids. Knowing that Harry is an expert on children, they assume that he will appreciate the gesture and leave just after he arrives. Unbeknownst to them, Harry only wrote a book about raising children because his publisher told him to, and actually he isn't fond of children at all. He reluctantly takes the position as the babysitter of his nieces and is escorted by Alice Mayton, the Lawrence's attractive neighbor.From the Wikipedia summary of the plot of the film.The book is cited in George Orwell's 1945 essay "Good Bad Books" as an example of "the kind of book that has no literary pretensions but which remains readable when more serious productions have perished."
The Byram Succession: A Regency Romance
Mira Stables - 1978
Albertine 'Tina' Newton knows her worth. The most beautiful girl of the Season, she knew she was born to grace a nobler establishment. And she has her sights set on the perfect husband: Lord Skirlaugh, the heir to the Duke of Byram. Scarred, disillusioned, and cynical, Skirlaugh must nonetheless marry to ensure the succession. He neither expected nor desired love; just a well-bred conformable wife with a reasonable dowry. Tina is certain that there is no one to outshine her. But when her cousin Thea inherits a fortune, she also becomes a contender for Skirlaugh's attention. Then, after meeting on a roadside when both stopped to aid a young man with a badly injured horse, it seems that Thea and Skirlaugh have more potential than Tina thinks... But which aspiring débutante will please his critical taste? Mira Stables is the author of many historical fiction novels, including The Swynden Necklace and Golden Barrier.
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
R.A. Dick - 1945
Upon discovering the rumors to be true, the young widow ends up forming a special companionship with the ghost of handsome former sea captain Daniel Gregg. Through the struggles of supporting her children, seeking out romance from the wrong places, and working to publish the captain's story as a book, Blood and Swash, Lucy finds in her secret relationship with Captain Gregg a comfort and blossoming love she never could have predicted. Originally published in 1945, made into a movie in 1947, and later adapted into a television sitcom in 1968, this romantic tale explores how love can develop without boundaries, both in this life and beyond.
Zuleika Dobson
Max Beerbohm - 1911
Formerly a governess, she has landed on the occupation of prestidigitator, and thanks to her overwhelming beauty—and to a lesser extent her professional talents—she takes the town by storm, gaining admittance to her grandfather's college. It is there, at the institution inspired by Beerbohm's own alma mater, that she falls in love with the Duke of Dorset, who duly adores her in return. Ever aware of appearances, however, Zuleika breaks the Duke's heart when she decides that she must abandon the match. The epidemic of heartache that proceeds to overcome the academic town makes for some of the best comic writing in the history of English literature.
A Book of Nonsense
Edward Lear - 1846
The owls, hen, larks, and their nests in his beard, are among the fey fauna and peculiar persons inhabiting the uniquely inspired nonsense rhymes and drawings of Lear (20th child of a London stockbroker), whose Book of Nonsense, first published in 1846, stands alone as the ultimate and most loved expression in English of freewheeling, benign, and unconstricted merriment.
The Red House Mystery
A.A. Milne - 1922
A. Milne was also the author of numerous dramas, essays, and novels for adults — among them, this droll and finely crafted whodunit.In it, Milne takes readers to the Red House, a comfortable residence in the placid English countryside that is the bachelor home of Mr. Mark Ablett. While visiting this cozy retreat, amateur detective Anthony Gillingham and his chum, Bill Beverley, investigate their genial host's disappearance and its connection with a mysterious shooting. Was the victim, whose body was found after a heated exchange with the host, shot in an act of self-defense? If so, why did the host flee, and if not, what drove him to murder?Between games of billiards and bowls, the taking of tea, and other genteel pursuits, Gillingham and Beverley explore the possibilities in a light-hearted series of capers involving secret passageways, underwater evidence, and other atmospheric devices.Sparkling with witty dialogue, deft plotting, and an intriguing cast of characters, this rare gem will charm mystery lovers, Anglophiles, and general readers alike.
The Bartlett Mystery (A Mystery Classic)
Louis Tracy - 1919
You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.