Love Alters Not
"... you are a dishonourable, conscienceless, money-grubbing scoundrel!"Foreign Titles: Der verschlungenen Pfade der Liebe German
Synopsis:
Impetuous Dimity Cranford bravely sets out to rescue her wounded friend by delivering a crucial cypher to his fellow Jacobite sympathizers. But her midnight coach is overturned and she is forced into a bold deception to avoid questioning. Masquerading as Mrs. Catherine Deene, the guardian of a young boy orphaned by the accident, she plots to complete her mission.
When she arrives at the lavish estate of her new charge, however, she comes face to face with the infamous Lord Anthony Farrar, the knave who deserted her very own brother's troops in the midst of battle! Unfortunately, the cowardly yellow dog is extremely good to look at. Soon Dimity finds herself torn in a most daring test of courage--and of love ....
Foreign Synopses:
German
Main Characters:
Dimity Cranford
Anthony Farrar
Duke of Marbury
Roland Mathieson
Piers and Peregrine Cranford
Rafe Green
Horatio, Viscount Glendenning
Rating: (out of 5)
Reviews:
"High adventure and rosy romance." Publisher's Weekly
"Crammed with crises, fast-paced action, romance and period detail." Kirkus
Quotes:
"What name, sir?"
"Horatio."
"Ho-ray-sho," muttered the sergeant, writing laboriously.
"Clement."
"Horayshow Cle-ment. Thankee, sir, I--"
"Laindon."
"Lane-done," he muttered.
"Now then, Mr. Laindon," began the captain.
"My name is Glendenning," said his lordship, sweetly.
Chandler continued. "But I take leave to tell you that you are a dishonourable, conscienceless, money-grubbing scoundrel!"
Otton dabbed a handkerchief at his mouth. "A fair summation," he drawled.
Title Significance:
"Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved."
Trivia:
- This is Roland Otton's fourth direct appearance and his character undergoes another vital change in his continuing transformation. He was a friend of hero Anthony Farrar until the unfortunate incident with Quentin Chandler. In this novel, Otton continues to follow the cypher but makes a promise to Dimity Cranford that basically screws up his efforts in later novels. This novel also features a hilarious duel between Anthony Farrar and villain Rafe Green (with respective seconds Peregrine Cranford and Gordon Chandler and Ellsworth and Otton). What begins as a normal duel, ends with the seconds getting into fights and Otton changing sides, temporarily.
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