Wealthy young widow Frances Wynn, the American-born Countess of Harleigh, spent the obligatory year in mourning for her philandering husband. With her young daughter in tow, Frances moves from the English countryside and her money-grubbing in-laws to Victorian London, and welcomes her sister, Lily, arriving from New York for her first London social season. When mysterious burglaries start plaguing London's elite, an anonymous tip to the police implicates...

Planning a school or amateur Shakespeare production? The best way to experience the plays is to perform them, but getting started can be a challenge: The complete plays are too long and complex, while scene selections or simplified language are too limited. "The 30-Minute Shakespeare" is a new series of abridgements that tell the "story" of each play from start to finish while keeping the beauty of Shakespeare's language intact. Specific stage directions...

On a splendid August afternoon Susanna Osbourne is introduced to the most handsome man she has ever seen . . . and instantly feels the icy chill of recognition. Peter Edgeworth, Viscount Whitleaf, is utterly charming-and seemingly unaware that they have met before. With his knowing smile and seductive gaze, Peter acts the rake; but he stirs something in Susanna she has never felt before, a yearning that both frightens and dazzles her. Instantly she...

"1899. Risings, George Hazleton's family estate in Hampshire, is a perfect choice for the wedding of Lily, sister of Frances, the widowed Countess of Harleigh. But the bucolic setting harbors a menace. Above and below stairs, mysterious accidents befall guests and staff alike. Before long, Frances suspects these 'accidents' are deliberate, and fears that the intended victim is Lily's fiancé, Leo. As Frances and George search for the culprit, more...

"On the eve of her marriage to George Hazelton, Frances has a great deal more on her mind than flowers and seating arrangements. The Connors and the Bainbridges, two families of American robber barons, have taken up residence in London, and their bitter rivalry is spilling over into the highest social circles. At the request of her brother, Alonzo, who is quite taken with Miss Madeline Connor, Frances has invited the Connor family to her wedding....

The Queen of England has concocted a plan in which Lady Georgie is to entertain a Bavarian princess and conveniently place her in the playboy Prince's path, in the hopes that he might finally marry. But queens never take money into account. Georgie has very little, which is why she moonlights as a maid-in-disguise. She must draw up plans: clean house to make it look like a palace; have Granddad and her neighbor pretend to be the domestic staff; un-teach...

"A timeless murder mystery with the fascinating, glamorous Mitford sisters at its heart, The Mitford Trial is the fourth installment in the Mitford Murders series from Jessica Fellowes, inspired by a real-life murder in a story full of intrigue, affairs and betrayal.."-- Summer, 1933. On lady's maid Louisa Cannon's wedding day, she is approached by a secretive man asking her to spy on Unity Mitford and her sister Diana, who is having an affair with...

By all accounts, Simon Basset is on the verge of proposing to his best friend's sister -- the lovely and almost-on-the-shelf -- Daphne Bridgerton. But the two of the know the truth -- it's all an elaborate ruse to keep Simon free from marriage-minded society mothers. And as for Daphne, surely she will attract some worthy suitors now that it seems a duke has declared her desirable ...

"Nothing is simple when you're thirty-fifth in line for the British crown, least of all marriage. But with love on their side, and plans to elope, Lady Georgiana Rannoch and her beau Darcy O'Mara hope to bypass a few royal rules ... With Darcy driving me out of London in a borrowed motor car, I soon discover that he isn't planning to introduce me to the pleasures of sinning in secret -- as I had hoped -- but to make me his wife! Of course, there are...

"Todos parec̕an divertirse en aquel baile que reun̕a a lo m̀s selecto de la sociedad londinense. Todos, excepto ellos dos. Daphne, una hermosa joven agobiada por su madre, y Simon, el hurąo nuevo duque de Hastings, ten̕an el mismo problema: la continua presi̤n para que encontraran pareja. Al conocerse, se les ocurri̤ el plan perfecto: fingir un compromiso que los liberara de m̀s agobios. Pero no ser̕a sencillo, ya que el hermano de Daphne,...