More than a Mistress
Mary BaloghPublished2001
Pages384
Formatpaperback
PublisherRandom House Publishing Group
Synopsis
In this captivating novel, Mary Balogh, the premier writer of Regency romance, invites you into a world of scandal and seduction, of glittering high society and intrigue, as an arrogant duke does the unthinkable—he falls in love with his mistress.
She races onto the green, desperate to stop a duel. In the melée, Jocelyn Dudley, Duke of Tresham, is shot. To his astonishment, Tresham finds himself hiring the servant as his nurse. Jane Ingleby is far too bold for her own good. Her blue eyes are the sort a man could drown in—were it not for her impudence. She questions his every move, breaches his secrets, touches his soul. When he offers to set her up in his London town house, love is the last thing on his mind.
Jane tries to pretend it’s strictly business, an arrangement she’s been forced to accept in order to conceal a dangerous secret. Surely there is nothing more perilous than being the lover of such a man. Yet as she gets past his devilish façade and sees the noble heart within, she knows the greatest jeopardy of all, a passion that drives her to risk everything on one perfect month with the improper gentleman who thinks that love is for fools.
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Like Balogh, Thorne builds romantic tension through sharp verbal sparring and the slow revelation of vulnerability beneath a prickly exterior. Both heroines are intelligent enough to challenge their love interests rather than simply admire them, and both authors understand that the best seductions happen when someone's defenses crack just enough to let another person in.
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The Night Circus
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Here's your genre surprise: while this is fantasy rather than historical romance, Morgenstern creates the same intoxicating atmosphere of two people drawn together despite external circumstances designed to keep them apart. The sensory richness—the way she describes the circus mirrors how Balogh makes you *feel* the tension in a drawing room—and the slow-burn romance will satisfy that craving for elegance and inevitability.
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A Knight in Shining Armor
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Published in 1989, this gives you that earlier decade perspective while maintaining the same lush historical romance sensibility. Deveraux, like Balogh, excels at creating a hero with genuine depth beneath his swagger, and she shares Balogh's gift for making you believe that two people from different worlds can genuinely transform each other through love and understanding.
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The Duke and I
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Quinn writes Regency romance with a lighter touch than Balogh, but she shares that same understanding of how wit and genuine affection build between two people who initially seem mismatched. Where Balogh goes deeper into the emotional complexity, Quinn keeps things sparkling—if you loved the banter and the social intrigue in *More than a Mistress*, this will feel like visiting the same world with a different temperament.
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Between the Shadows
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A darker, more morally ambiguous take on seduction and power dynamics: a young woman deliberately sets out to seduce a shadow king, but finds herself genuinely entangled with him instead. Like Jane in *More than a Mistress*, your protagonist discovers that the person she thought she was manipulating has become someone she can't help but care for—and Levenseller explores that dangerous territory with the same understanding that love and strategy don't always coexist peacefully.
View bookAbout Mary Balogh
M
Mary Balogh
Born 1944
Mary Jenkins was born on 1944 in Swansea, Wales, UK. After graduating from university, moved to Saskatchewan, Canada, to teach high-school English, on a two-year teaching contract in 1967. She married her Canadian husband, Robert Balogh, and had three children, Jacqueline, Christopher and Sian. When she's not writing, she enjoys reading, music and knitting. She also enjoys watching tennis and curling. Mary Balogh started writing in the evenings as a hobby. Her first book, a Regency love story, was published in 1985 as A Masked Deception under her married name. In 1988, she retired from teaching after 20 years to pursue her dream to write full-time. She has written more than seventy novels and almost thirty novellas since then, including the New York Times bestselling Slightly sextet and Simply quartet. She has won numerous awards, including Bestselling Historical of the Year from the Borders Group, and her novel Simply Magic was a finalist in the Quill Awards.
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