My Darling Caroline by Adele Ashworth

Caroline Grayson, a third of five beautiful daughters of Baron Sytheford, who is noticeably plain, short and dark as compared to her tall, blonde and beautiful sisters. There is also another problem she is intelligent! And not just intelligent in the feminine, scheming, manipulating way but she possesses real scientific intelligence, the kind which can do complex mathematical equations in her head, and has a profound love for botany. She sends her findings to Oxford university in hopes of getting recognition and a chance to further her quest for knowledge but she receives a reply, which asks her to get married and grow plants to please her husband, and now it seems that is what she must do!

Brent Ravenscroft, the Earl of Weymerth, wants his prized Arabian horses back. The horses that his cousin sold to Baron Sytheford, and the price he must pay for them is outrageous! He must marry the baron’s plain and saucy daughter Caroline. Brent is furious to have to marry a plain spinster in her mid twenties, but all he wants to do after the horrors of war is to start a new life again. A life in which he wants to breed horses, have a home, a wife and a heir and on contemplation he finds that this bargain suits him just fine!

After the rejection from Oxford, Caroline has applied to the University of Columbia, America and this time as a man. She has all her plans in place, when she learns of the deal her father has struck with Lord Weymerth. Initially she is enraged but later she realizes that she could marry the earl and later asks for an annulment and thus she could be free to pursue her dreams.

Thus begins a relationship between Brent and Caroline. Or let us say thus begins a conflict, a brilliant scientist unable to achieve her goals because of her gender wanting to avoid marriage, proud aristocrat furious at the circumstances that have saddled him with an unwanted wife. Are they attracted to each other? They long, they burn, they abstain and thus they create one of the best stories I have read in a long time.

Caroline, is baffled by her husband. The man who on one hand adores her so and entrusts her with his finances of all things. A man who admires her skills with the garden and yet has never told her about his green house. Oh and incidentally the man has also forgotten to tell her that he has a sister and also an illegitimate daughter! A man who is full of surprises and yet who is also full of gentle consideration and may be love. A man whom she could fall in love with, or rather a man for whose love she might give up her love for botany.

Brent, has married Caroline just to get a wife and a heir. But as he comes to know her better he realizes he has also found a companion, a friend, a partner, who meets him on all planes physical, mental and emotional. A woman he could begin to love. If only she didn’t love botany more than him.


The strength of the book is the strength of character of Brent and Caroline, their gradual understanding of each other and their acceptance of each other. Even their arguments, conflicts and misunderstandings are so passionate that it makes a wonderful read. It is the kind of book where you sympathize with every one’s point of view, you cannot squarely lay the blame on any one of them and you as a reader long for them to make up and live happily ever after. A wonderful wonderful book with a wonderful little secret bundled up in the epilogue which come as a surprise.

A definite 9.5/10