WOMS: A Governess’s Guide to Passion and Peril

How is it that Manda Collins never ceases to delight me?

Her latest installment (and maybe final?) in her Ladies Most Scandalous series, A Governess’s Guide to Passion and Peril, is no exception to the reputation she’s established as a charming author of historical romances, even when there’s a murder to be solved.

With all the chaos my life has been over the last four years, I’ve never been able to review one of her books, which is a shame because they’re so deserving of all the attention. Let’s just quickly revisit each book then, shall we?

In the first entry to this rambunctious series, there’s A Lady’s Guide to Mischief and Mayhem, which introduces us to Lady Katherine and Inspector Eversham. They are caught up in a series of dastardly murders where the killer uses passages of Scripture as a calling card left with the bodies of his victims. It’s quite a delicious introduction to our scandalous ladies, and some moments definitely caught me by surprise, which makes it all the more thrilling! I knew I was hooked and would need to read whatever adventures came next for our heroines.

With the second book, An Heiress’s Guide to Deception and Desire, I knew what I was getting myself into, so I started ready to be enthralled with Collins’s equally saucy and adventurous tale of Caroline Hardcastle and Lord Valentine’s tenuous love. When one of Caro’s friends disappears, it’s up to them to find the missing woman, which only brings up their rather awkward and painful past together. This fresh take on the enemy-to-lovers trope was heated with more than just shared furtive glances. Katherine and Eversham’s appearances helped tie in the events of book one as well.

It’s with A Spinster’s Guide to Danger and Dukes, though, we have another daring murder to solve, this time with Katherine’s secretary, Poppy Delamare, known to her employer as Flora Deaver, and Lord Valentine’s friend Joshua Fielding, the Duke of Langham. When Poppy’s sister is accused of murder, the ruse is up and her new identity threatened. She must travel home to acquit her sister of the false accusation, but not before the dashing Duke of Langham interrupts her plans with a scheme of his own, to have her pose as his fiancé to avoid the matchmaking efforts of his grandmother, the Dowager. Juggling her two identities becomes quite perilous, and soon both Poppy and Langham finds themselves questioning their mock engagement. An excellent marriage-of-convenience tale if there ever was one, which I think I preferred!

This leaves the fourth, and probably final, installment in Collins’s series, A Governess’s Guide to Passion and Peril.

What I appreciated most about this book was the mystery itself spanned at least five years, which began with the supposed downfall of Jane Halliwell from society’s good graces with the scandal of her father’s unexpected death. What begins as a usual tale of woman trying to survive, and how her path intersects once again with the crush of her youth, the intrepid Adrian Fielding, the younger brother of our own Duke of Langham—it soon turns into the uncovering of a dark and sinister plot of vengeance which redeems Miss Halliwell from the ghosts of her past.

Collins’s heroines are both parts soft and fierce, carrying with them the contradictions we women have tried to communicate to the world for millennia. They do not quell at the sign of blood or danger, but they swoon at one dark look from the man who captivates their minds as much as their hearts. Their love interests, too, are equally formidable in their fields, but tender to recognise the needs of the woman who bewitches them as they become entangled in a web of passion and intrigue with the threat of death lurking around every dark corner.

In a similar vein as Evie Dunmore’s League of Extraordinary Women series—just with more murder—the Scandalous Ladies are sure to entertain you again and again as they seek to rid themselves of the constraints of their positions within a society not inclined to allow women any ounce of independence, and the men they meet along the way who find themselves equal to the task of helping them secure their place in such a world.

If you enjoy daring heroines, passionate lovers, and a heavy dose of murder, then add it to your TBR pile today!

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