Beautiful, wealthy, and titled, the Lady Evangelina Brenthaven, much-indulged only child of the Marquis of Tesborough, had received and rejected no less than eighteen offers of marriage. Convinced that none of her eminently eligible suitors valued her for herself, the not-so-angelic Angel decided that what she needed was to get away, to go somewhere people would be unaware of her fortune, her noble connections, and her many (in)famous escapades. When her vicar uncle invited her to join his family in the Lake Country for the summer, Angel jumped at the opportunity, transforming herself into the plain Miss Evelyn Brand. But Lady or Miss, the irrepressible Angel had a knack for getting into scrapes, and she soon found herself mixed up - together with her bluestocking Cousin Catherine - in a tangled web of star-crossed lovers and disinherited sons.

Carola Dunn - whose prolific output between 1981 and 1998 included thirty-two Regency novels - seems to be a bit of a hit-or-miss experience for me, with some titles - Lavender Lady, or Smuggler's Summer - proving to be vastly entertaining, and others - such as Lord Iverbrook's Heir - falling short of the mark. Unfortunately, it looks like Angel falls into this latter category, despite a premise that appealed to me, characters that seemed promising, and a wealth of dramatic adventure to keep me entertained. Somehow these elements just didn't come together, and the end-product was a novel I raced through, never really absorbed in the characters or their various quandaries. Perhaps Dunn was simply trying too hard with this, her third novel: cramming too many scrapes, too many stock character types, and too many startling developments, into too short a narrative? Angel had no sooner discovered a hidden priest hole, and two bags of Tudor treasure, than that episode was over! All done! Angel had no sooner told irascible old Lord Grisedale what was what, then he mellowed and (mostly) reformed! All done! Everything felt too easy, as if Dunn were skimming along the surface of her story, never really delving into any kind of detail.

This was definitely a disappointment, especially as the last Regency I read - Sheila Simonson's The Bar Sinister - also did not live up to expectations. Still, I have enjoyed some of Dunn's work, so I won't rule out reading more of her books. We're at 50/50 right now, so the next can be the tie-breaker... ( )