A Foolish Flirtation by Alice Coldbreath

A Foolish Flirtation by Alice Coldbreath
on November 7, 2024
Genres: Fiction / Romance / Historical / Regency, Fiction / Romance / Historical / Victorian
Pages: 424
Goodreads

At eighteen, Emmeline Ballentine's father splashed out on one London season to introduce his daughter to polite society. Sadly, for Emmeline, polite society was not terribly receptive to a city trader's daughter.
She only ever caught one gentleman's fancy, the dishonorable Jeremy Vance who made her head spin as he singled her out for attention at the balls and assemblies. Her worldly chaperone warned her he was making a May game of her, but Emmeline had not heeded her warning. Consequently, her dreams were dashed, when at the close of the season, Jeremy announced his engagement to another.
Ten years later, their paths cross again in Bath. Emmeline is older and wiser, and a good deal poorer, and Jeremy is divorced. There is absolutely no chance of him making a fool of her again with his shocking offer of marriage. Is there?

A Foolish Flirtation is a stand alone romance set in Victorian England. It is over 130,000 words long. Please do not purchase if you are offended by strong language and or sex scenes.

A Foolish Flirtation is book one in the Reversal of Fortune series by Alice Coldbreath. To be completely honest, I struggled through this book. I had never read this author’s work before, so I was excited to discover someone new to me. A Foolish Flirtation is touted as a standalone; however, this book is apparently a spin-off of A Bride for the Prizefighter. Jeremy Vance was a memorable side character in that book, and he is now the hero. Coldbreath includes characters from previous stories without much explanation or background. I felt like a hungry waif pressing my nose against a bakery window, looking for an unattainable hot bun. I was missing something vital. But more than that problem, at its core, the storyline is based on a painful shared history between Jeremy Vance and Emmeline Ballentine. Unfortunately, the execution left me confused instead of engaged. I found the dialogue to be too vague at times and the banter between the hero and heroine difficult to follow. It was also too long, with wordy passages about redecorating and wordy dialogue with Jeremy Vance’s son. I also missed having a steady villain. I really can not recommend this book.