The Ellsworth Assortment

Florence Ellsworth reluctantly lives in the shadow of her family’s notoriety. Mortified that her widower father is on the hunt for his fourth wife, she accepts an engagement to a staid clergyman in the desperate hope for propriety. But she’s unprepared when her sire’s newly hired attorney proves to be young, sincere, and handsome.

Out of all the swains she collected, Miss Lily Ellsworth knew Mr. Gilbert Wright was the one she would choose in the end. Rich, well-connected, dashing, daring, he was exactly the sort of man to turn heads, even if he hadn’t much of one himself. Lily didn’t mind—a dim husband would be more easily controlled than a clever one. And after seeing how her father chose his several wives, Lily sometimes doubted clever men even existed.

Tomboy Miss Araminta Ellsworth and her dearest friend Aggie were the most backward graduates Mrs. Turcotte’s Seminary for Young Ladies ever produced, more interested in batting and bowling than sewing and simpering. How then could Araminta ever have predicted Aggie’s unprecedented passion for the reprobate Mr. Francis Taplin? If Minta is going to keep her friend’s person and fortune out of Taplin’s dangerous hands, she’ll need to think of something—fast.

Tyrone Ellsworth’s career as a literary lover-in-lieu began at university, where he found amusement and steady spending-silver in writing poetry, love letters, and offers of marriage for fellow Oxonians. So when schoolmate Gareth Boulton purchases his pen in order to win the wealthy Miss Agatha Weeks, what could be the harm? The task will be all the easier, in fact, because Tyrone has known her for years as his sister’s dearest friend.

Winchester, England, 1812. Unexpected widowhood leaves Miranda Ellsworth a wealthy woman in the prime of life, but she is too busy with her son and stepdaughter and too leery of fortune hunters to marry again. So when her boy’s schoolmate entangles her with his charmer of a father, she is determined to keep her distance, no matter the unfamiliar emotions which assail her.

England, 1814. Coaxed by family members to the seaside, Beatrice Ellsworth nearly loses her life in a bathing-machine mishap, only to be rescued by a quick-thinking young man. The grateful Ellsworths embrace him, and he soon steals Beatrice’s heart, despite him being engaged to another. If these are the consequences of Beatrice’s first pleasure trip, will she ever be persuaded to make another?