Miss Lacey's Last Fling

I'm a Candice Hern fan, but this is my first of her series Regencies. It clearly shows why she's moved into single titles. It's a familiar plot, but Hern gives it a unique twist. The characters are very well drawn, and the likeable ones are indeed likeable. Rosalind and Max are well suited and the tension is just right for this sort of book. I usually read one of these every now and again to break things up from my usual titles, but this was so good, it had me picking up another one immediately(by another author, and no where near as good). While not perfect (minor flaws only) -- thus probably a 4.9 rating really -- it's by far one of the best series Regencies I've read. I'll look for more by the talented Hern. Truly delightful.

What a charmingly delightful--or delightfully charming--book! It is just simply wonderful. Who among us has not longed to throw over the traces, so to speak, and just DO whatever we most wanted to do, regardless of consequences? Most of us are civilized enough that our list of things to do would be very like that of Miss Rosie Lacey, when she sets off on her first visit ever to London, where she will stay with her somewhat scandalous Aunt Fanny. For Rosie wants rather simple things: to see the Tower, and the Egyptian Hall, to ride in a sporting vehicle (or even drive one!), be kissed--thoroughly--by a rake, etc., etc. She is, after all, six-and-twenty, and does not really have to be so afraid of scandal as would a younger miss. For reasons of her own, Rosie wants to see, participate in, and enjoy life to the fullest before returning home to Devon once again. Her long hair is cut and discovered to be curly, and the vivid colors chosen for her by the modiste emphasize the fact that she is indeed, no milk-and-water miss. She rushes headlong into the ton.Her plans are abetted in some ways by Max Davenant, but stifled in others. Of course, with her joie de vivre, she has no trouble finding others to help her cross the items off her list, scandalizing matrons and the patronesses at Almacks as she goes. What fun! Rosie, or Rosalind as she is after her transformation, brings a smile to every page of this delightful book, as she flings herself into her adventures, full tilt. She is truly a heroine you won't soon forget. Max isn't so bad, either. He may well be a rake of the first magnitude, but underneath that hardened shell lies the heart and soul of a man who wants to love--and be loved in return---if only he could find the right woman. But when he does, she retreats to her country home once again. It takes the efforts of Rosie's father, Aunt Fanny and her new husband, plus a few others to bring the two lovers together again. Smiles all around, and most especially on the face of the reader. An absolute triumph!

This is a gloriously satisfying tale by an author who never fails to charm, in which a dutiful doormat of a young woman twists her life by its tail and transforms herself into one of the Regency period's most delightful and compelling heroines.Rosalind Lacey at 26 is a country mouse from Devonshire with a dry twig of a father, a life sacrificed to chores, and the sudden diagnosis that she's dying of epilepsy.Instead of shriveling up and blowing away, "Rosie" resolves to get a life (albeit short) that will finally be a merry one. She sets off for London with a list of objectives revolving around one, and only one, social Season in London, with all of the dizzying blandishments she has only fantacized. As her mentor, she chooses her sly, superbly-connected Auntie Mame--Lady Fanny Heatherington. Fanny treats Rosie to an historically-correct makeover (with an LOL French hairdresser) that turns the drab country mouse into a stunning fashionista, then introduces her docile neice to Society--the social whirl of balls, theater, and an army of rapacious rakes capable of filling her waning days with ardor and passion.Among the newly-dazzling Rosie's admirers, the most frustrating is Byronically handsome, jaded, and melancholy Max Devenant, so exquisitely bored with the ladies he's already sampled, life has lost all promise. Max becomes smitten with Rosie, who practically whoops with glee as she takes the reins in her own gloves and races her carraige through Mayfair, makes the crimson-faced bluenoses sniffing for scandal faint from her antics , samples champagne at Daffy's and does illicit gambing on Jermyn Street.Then Miss Lacey sees a London doctor to help with one of the "symptomatic" headaches of her fatal disease and discovers- with shock and a mounting horror- that it's nothing but a bloody great hangover. It seems that Miss Lacey has been misdiagnosed. She has a full life ahead to accept the consequences of her ribald life and her toying with the peripatetic Max...Ms. Hern is a delightful writer, socially perceptive and witty in the language of the era (e.g. "that fatuous tulip Oswald"). You will feel all the wrenching humor of Rosalind Lacey's metamorphosis and enjoy unexpected wrinkles in this clever story that manages to be completely beguiling to the last page and leaves you wanting more.Eagerly awaiting Ms. Hern's next fling!

Candace Hern's Regency novels have always charmed, but this one is special. It's an old plot -- rake reformed -- but Hern breathes new life into it with Rosalind and Max. Die-hard Regency readers require historical accuracy in their romances, and this one will meet their highest standards. Unfortunately, the genre seems to be a dying art. If more authors wrote at this level, perhaps that would not be the case. This one is delightfully romantic. A beautiful book.

Miss Rosalind Lacey, under the impression that she is dying of the same disease that killed her mother, decides to go to London for one last fling. Flings have been few and far between in her life, as she has spent the bulk of her youth looking after her family. If her life is to be cut short, she reasons, then why not flout society's strictures and have a good time, tasting all the things she's missed?Max Devenant is wealthy, aristocratic, rakish and bored. His life has been the same year in and year out since he was eighteen. When he meets Rosalind he is delighted by her lust for life. Before he realises it, he is seeking her out at balls, and missing her when she's not there. Ms Hern has created two characters who have a lot to offer each other - Max can give Rosalind the experience she craves, and she can give him a fresh perspective on life.The plot is fast-paced and well thought out. Ms Hern's style is nothing out of the ordinary, but is very smooth to read and is highly appropriate to the comedy of the book. Sexual tension between Max and Rosalind is quickly established and maintained throughout, and there are some very sexy scenes.The biggest achievement of "Miss Lacey's Last Fling" is in the appeal of Rosalind Lacey. Here we have a heroine who loves life and seeks excitement, but without coming across as silly or selfish. She deserves this fling, and we feel her desperation as she contemplates what she believes is her imminent demise. The secondary characters - Aunt Fanny and Rosalind's father - are also well drawn.Ms Hern has taken a very bleak premise and turned it into a lovely romp. A keeper.