Blog Tour: The Likelihood of Lucy by Jenny Holiday

The Likelihood of Lucy

 Jenny Holiday 

 

London, 1815 
 Trevor Bailey is on the cusp of opening the greatest hotel in London. His days as a gutter snipe are behind him, as he enjoys a life of wealth, society, and clandestine assignments as a spy in the service of His Majesty. Until one tumultuous night churns up the past he'd long left behind...   

 Turned out by her employer for her radical beliefs, Lucy Greenleaf reaches out to the man who was once her most beloved friend. She never expected that the once-mischievous Trevor would be so handsome and gentleman-like and neither can deny the instant attraction. 

 But Lucy's reformer ways pose a threat to the hotel's future and his duties as a spy. Now Trevor must choose between his new life and the woman he's always loved… 

 Buy Links: Amazon * Barnes&Noble * iTunes * Kobo 

EXCERPT:

“Stop cleaning,” Trevor said.

Lucy turned. “And a good morning to you, too.” Another precept she’d always tried to instill in her pupils—a false show of confidence could sometimes lead to the real thing. Not that she was preaching affectation. Never that. Mrs. Wollstonecraft—her guiding light in all things—would not

approve.

He did not stop scowling. “You are a guest here. Guests don’t clean.”

“Well somebody has to. Beds don’t make themselves.”

“Why make them at all?”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t make mine. Why bother? You’re just going to get into it again later.”

She would have laughed, but he seemed perfectly in earnest. And she had to admit there was some logic to his position. Still, she felt compelled to defend herself. “A servant worth his or her salt would not be able to look at an unmade bed and not remedy it. You have no servants at all?”

“I’ll have an army of them when the hotel opens—a hiring spree is my next major task, in fact, and not one I’m looking forward to. For now, I have a woman who comes in for half days and cooks. But no one enters my private apartments. Ever.”

“I did.”

“Yes.” He moved to the bed and threw the counterpane back, undoing her work. “And you’re not a servant.”

She had to cover her shock at his deliberate mussing of the bed. “That’s debatable. The fate of the governess is to be forever lodged in the limbo between the household and its staff. She is not quite a servant, not quite a member of the family. Mary Wollstonecraft once wrote, ‘A teacher at a school is only a kind of upper servant, who has more work than the menial ones. A governess to young ladies is equally disagreeable.’” Clamping her mouth shut, she checked herself. There

was no need to start up with Mary. That was exactly what had landed her in this mess to begin with. It’s just that Mary’s words were always so close to Lucy’s heart. It was difficult to censor herself sometimes. But that’s exactly what she had to learn to do if she was lucky enough to secure another position.

“Be that as it may, at the Jade, you are a guest.” He set a package on the unmade bed. “Put this on, and then we’re going out. I’ll meet you in the kitchen.”

He was gone before she could answer.

MY REVIEW:
Trevor and Lucy were both children of the Seven Dial slums. As a child of Seven Dials, you learned to steal and do whatever you could to survive on the streets. Trevor has taken it on himself to become Lucy's protector and keep her from harm so when Lucy runs to Trevor to tell him that her mother has tried to sell her in order to support her drug addiction, Trevor does his best to save Lucy, even if it means separating and send Lucy to live with a rich woman of society and receive the education that Lucy deserves.

Years later, Trevor is a very successful man and Lucy is a desperate woman who needs help. The only one she can turn to is Trevor in hopes that he will help her instead of once again forcing her out of his life. 

Trevor still feels responsible for Lucy and from the very moment he answers her knock, Trevor is a goner.

The Likelihood of Lucy is fun and romantic while also being quite thrilling (murder and spies!). The book is an easy to read Regency and although it's a second in the series, I was easily able to read it as a stand alone book. Holiday's characters are very likable and engaging. The mystery, action, and drama that takes place makes the book even more fun and adventurous. 

The Likelihood of Lucy is a very good book especially for those who love historical books from the Regency era.

★★★★



About the Author: Jenny Holiday started writing in fourth grade, when her awesome hippie teacher, between sessions of Pete Seeger singing and anti-nuclear power plant letter writing, gave the kids notebooks and told them to write stories. Most of Jenny's featured poltergeist, alien invasions, or serial killers who managed to murder everyone except her and her mom. She showed early promise as a romance writer, though, because nearly every story had a happy ending: fictional Jenny woke up to find that the story had been a dream, and that her best friend, father, and sister had not, in fact, been axe-murdered. From then on, she was always writing, often in her diary, where she liked to decorate her declarations of existential angst with nail polish teardrops. Eventually she channelled her penchant for scribbling into a more useful format. After picking up a PhD in urban geography, she became a professional writer, and has spent many years promoting research at a major university, which allows her to become an armchair astronomer/historian/particle physicist, depending on the day. Eventually, she decided to try her hand again at happy endings--minus the bloodbaths. You can follow her twitter accounts @jennyholi and @TropeHeroine or visit her on the web at jennyholiday.com.