My Last Duchess
Cora Cash, possibly the wealthiest heiress in 1890s America, has been raised to believe that money will open every door to her. But when her mother whisks Cora to England to secure her an aristocratic match, Cora is dismayed by the welcome she at first receives. The great English houses in which she is entertained are frosty and forbidding, dogged by intrigue above stairs, and gossip below. And it is only when she loses her heart – to a man she barely knows – that Cora realises the game she is playing is one she does not full understand, and that her own future happiness could be the prize.
‘Anyone suffering Downton Abbey withdrawal symptoms (who isn’t?) will find an instant tonic in Daisy Goodwin’s My Last Duchess … this is a deliciously evocative first novel that lingers in the mind. Henry James with belles on.’–Allison Pearson, Telegraph, Books of the Year for Christmas
‘Intelligent exploration of the gulf between the New World and the old – and one woman’s spirited attempt to bridge it’–Guardian
PUBLISHER: Headline Review
PUBLICATION DATE: 6th January 2011