A society lady
…with a secret!
Determined to help people, Letty Barton has a double life
-- she's a trained doctor! No one must know “Dr. Hatfield” is actually a woman.
Called to an emergency, she comes face-to-face with her patient's brother, Lord
Anthony Ashcroft… They'd once shared a spark-filled flirtation -- now he's a
brooding, scarred war hero. But how long will it be before he recognizes her
beneath her disguise and the sparks begin to fly once more?
Good book with an unusual theme. Letty Barton was
fascinated by the world of medicine from the time she was a child, but as a
woman becoming a doctor was impossible. Not one to back down from a challenge,
Letty found a way. Now she leads a double life - society miss, with a secret
identity as Dr. Hatfield, and lives in constant fear of discovery. While helping a pregnant woman, Letty encounters
her brother, a man she had met briefly several years earlier.
I liked both Letty and Tony. Letty is a misfit. She has
no social skills and really doesn't care, which irritates her matchmaking
mother to no end. Letty would much rather be reading a medical journal than
attending a society event. She is methodical and scientific in her thoughts and
actions, reluctant to believe in anything that doesn't fit. I loved her
determination and how she found a way to get her medical training. Her
satisfaction at helping people far outweighs any thought of marriage. Though
ill at ease in social situations, Letty is confident in her abilities as a
doctor and willing to stand up for those abilities. Tony is no longer the
cheerful and charming man he used to be. He is scarred and haunted by his
losses and the things he saw on the battlefield and suffers from nightmares and
flashbacks. He feels numb to everything around him.
I liked the development of the relationship between Letty
and Tony. I liked their first meeting at a ball before the war. Letty pulled
her usual disappearing act, hiding out in the library and reading. Tony, the
object of several determined young women's pursuit, also ended up in the
library. He was intrigued by the young woman who didn't try to flirt and was
more interested in the article about cowpox than in him. She was surprised to
find a man who honestly seemed interested in what she had to say. But this was
only a brief encounter and their lives took different paths, though each
remembered the other.
Letty encounters Tony several times, both as Dr. Hatfield
and as herself. Tony is still intrigued by Letty, who reacts to his scars far
differently than anyone else. Her forthright attitude stirs feelings in him
that have been missing for a long time. Letty is wary around Tony, and fears
that he will discover her secret. In an emotional scene, Letty intervenes during
one of his nightmares. The sparks between them flared into an unexpected
passion, which then sent them both running for cover. Neither feels that being
together is a good idea. A man in her life would end her work as a doctor, and
he feels too broken to be good for anyone. Things become more complicated when
Tony discovers Letty's deception in a painful confrontation. I ached for Letty
as she faced the loss of the work she loves and the man she has come to love. I
hurt, too, for Tony whose battlefield memories got tangled up with Letty's work,
causing his over-the-top reaction. The ending was complex, with Letty's passion
for her calling helping Tony come to terms with his past and his future, and
his honest interest in her work giving her a feeling of validation she'd never
had before. But there was still the issue of feeling that they couldn't be
together to overcome. I loved their big moment at the end when they realized
that their love for each other was more important than society's opinions.
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