The time setting of the story is Victorian England, wherein main character economist Reina Martin lives. She is done with not being able to do many things just because she is a woman, especially a single woman; she is not able to open her own bank account, which is her biggest irritation. She was born as the illegitimate daughter of her mother who was a Spanish immigrant and was called a bastard many times when she was little.
With the help of the rich banker William Farrow, Reina's goal is to open the first bank especially for women, to empower women to manage their own financial business and savings.
Reina runs her household with the help of her best friend June, who is a culinary chef. But they need more help to manage Reina's London estate, and therefore they recruit inmates who are recently paroled prisoners to become her team of domestic staff. And luckily, she finds the perfect people who truly can show their true good will and character out of the prison but all have their own problematic backstory that sometimes affects their work. But then police officer John Pembroke is assigned by his chef to go undercover as a paroled prisoner to investigate Reina and William about their plans to open a women's bank, because of the criminal rumours surrounding William that are so big they could destabilizie the British economy. John becomes her butler, but he also becomes someone who falls in love with her. Reina is shocked when she finds out about John's background, but she also has already fell in love with him. Should she betray her mentor William and does this bring her dream of the woman's bank in danger?
I truly liked most of The Queen of Lombard Street, which is a mix of a historical and a romance novel. What I really liked was the very diverse cast of characters; from main characters Reina and John and June to the paroled prisoners that become Reina's housekeeping staff who truly form a red line of the story, and the woman's bank becomes much of little less important sideline in it. When John becomes the butler, the household is a chaos and Reina who doesn't know well how to manage domestic staff. Their love story starts very slowly, but grows during the story untill there is no way back for John. Reina truly wants change in how women are treated in Victorian society, as servants to men and as some kind of second class human beings and truly fights to get her bank for women off the ground, but if she will succeed because of Williams dark criminal activities..?
Overall, The Queen of Lombard Street is a well written new novel by Lisa Kleypass, with a strong and very entertaining storyline and characters in Victorian London. If you like historical novels with also some romance in it, this is the right book to choose!
No comments:
Post a Comment
Leave a comment here, but keep it nice!