Review: Lady In Disguise (The Langley Sisters, #1) by Wendy Vella

                                                                    

Print Length: 314 pages

Publisher: Vella Ink (December 1, 2022)

From Goodreads.com: 

Will her secret bring her ruin or love?

Desperate and penniless, Miss Olivia Langley is out of options. To ensure her family's survival she and her sister decide to take a drastic step - they don masks and take to the road as highwaymen. Disaster strikes when, inside the first carriage they rob, they find the one man Olivia had hoped never to see again. Five years ago Lord William Ryder had broken Livvy's heart. Now he has returned and she has a bad feeling that if anyone can succeed at unmasking her deepest secrets, it will be him.

Can a rake reform?

Will knew his return would be greeted with both joy and resentment, but after five years of hard living he was ready to come home and take his place in society. He had never forgotten Olivia no matter how hard he'd tried, and whilst he hadn't imagined she would welcome him with open arms, the hostility and anger she displays are at odds with the woman he once knew. Will is horrified to find she's living a dangerous lie and refuses his help. But now that he’s back, Will is determined to do whatever it takes to protect her, and finally claim her for his own.

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My Rating: 1 star out of 5

I really wanted to like this book. A penniless noblewoman posing as a highwayman who comes face to face with the rake that once broke her heart upon his return home? That is exactly the kind of premise that should have been impossible to mess up.

And yet… here we are.

To begin with, despite the circumstances surrounding her father’s death, I find it incredibly difficult to believe that he would have left absolutely nothing behind to ensure his daughters were cared for, especially when he knew exactly what kind of man would inherit his title. While this stretched credibility, I was initially willing to overlook it because Olivia’s decision to secretly rob members of the peerage in order to support her sisters; particularly Bella (who had been left with a debilitating leg injury after a carriage accident), was genuinely compelling. It showed strength, desperation, and a willingness to do whatever was necessary to protect her family that I thought I could admire.

Unfortunately, the deeper I got into the story, the more the little inconsistencies began to pile up. Olivia and Will are described as childhood friends who shared everything, yet somehow he never knew that his own parents had once rescued her when she became lost in the woods. To me, that's not exactly a small detail to overlook. Similarly, when Will’s sister describes the Langley sisters as having been “atrociously spoiled” and known as flirts, it feels completely disconnected from how they are actually portrayed. Phoebe is certainly flirtatious, but Bella is quiet and reserved, and Olivia is outspoken and impulsive, not flirtatious. It felt like the author was describing entirely different characters than the ones we were shown.

Bella’s injury was another point of confusion. At times, she is described as nearly helpless, with the sisters desperately trying to raise enough money to take her to Scotland for treatment. At other times, she is walking into town with a cane, and occasionally she seems to move about with very little difficulty at all. The inconsistency made it difficult to understand the severity of her condition, and the repeated use of the word “lame” only added to the vagueness rather than clarifying it.

Then there was Will himself, who became increasingly difficult to tolerate the more we got inside his head. This is a man who claims to love Olivia and has known her and her sisters since childhood, yet his thoughts about Phoebe were deeply uncomfortable. At one point, he muses that if she ever tired of being a lady, she could easily become a courtesan, and even reflects on how she had exuded “naughtiness” at the age of fifteen. Fifteen. He later describes her as a sultry woman whose eyes suggested she understood exactly what men thought when they looked at her. These are not the thoughts of a man who respects the family of the woman he supposedly loves, nor are they appropriate reflections on someone he watched grow up. It completely changed how I viewed him, and not for the better.

And remember that backbone Olivia seemed to possess at the beginning? Unfortunately, as the story progressed, it became clear that it was less strength and more stubbornness combined with an alarming lack of common sense. Whenever Will tried to have meaningful conversations with her, she avoided them. She deflected, changed the subject, or ignored him entirely. Yet in the very next breath, she would cling to him, accept his kisses, and eventually sleep with him.

What made this even more frustrating was how often intimacy was used as a substitute for actual emotional development. When Will noticed bruises on her breasts and was understandably concerned, instead of allowing that moment to deepen their connection, the tension was redirected into another sexual encounter. When he confronted her about robbing people, rather than forcing her to face the consequences of her actions or engage in an honest conversation, the pattern repeated itself. Sex became a distraction, not a meaningful step forward in their relationship. As a result, their romance never felt truly earned, only convenient.

By the end, I found myself far more frustrated than invested. While the premise had enormous potential, the inconsistent characterizations, questionable choices, and lack of meaningful emotional growth made it difficult to connect with either the characters or their relationship.

I have seen a few of this author’s other books on KU that sound intriguing, so I may give her another chance at some point. But for now, I think I need a break.