Elizabeth Conway's greatest ambition is to discover a comet. Unfortunately, she is the eldest of eight daughters of an earl, so her relative expect her to take her rightful place in Society. The heavenly bodies she views through her telescope hold far more fascination for Elizabeth than any mere male, although her perpetual beau, dashing Lord Bevis, would change that if he could. When Tom Conroy, a distant cousin and the new Earl of Clanross, appears after a year's delay, Elizabeth offers him a cool welcome. He is a dull stick and ill-mannered to boot. Yet he is the only man who has shown respect for her astronomical work, and his concern for her younger sisters' welfare reveals a different side to him. Then his heir, Elizabeth's cousin Willoughby, appears with the obvious intent of making a match between his lovely but silly sister and Clanross--and with making as much mischief as he can. Lord Bevis presses his suit with Lady Elizabeth, until she agrees, at long last, to marry him.

Simonson is one of the best of the current Regency novelists. Here her heroine, Emily, having lost both husband and baby daughter, offers to take in other children to raise with her own son, Matt. Captain Richard Falk deposits his infant son and young daughter with her before returning to fight Napoleon. Emily falls in love with his children and, during their correspondence, with him. However, Falk, illegitimate son of a duchess, is in danger from his mother's family, who see him as a threat to the dukedom. With a little help from friends, all ends well. The characters are well drawn and appealing, and if the plot seems a bit preposterous, the reader is having too much fun to worry about it.Marylaine Block, St. Ambrose Coll. Lib., Davenport, Ia.