She’s not who she seems…
On her 25th birthday, Charlotte Appleby receives an unusual gift from the Faerie godmother she never knew she had: the ability to change shape.
Penniless and orphaned, she sets off for London to make her fortune as a man. But a position as secretary to Lord Cosgrove proves unexpectedly challenging. Someone is trying to destroy Cosgrove and his life is increasingly in jeopardy.
As Charlotte plunges into London’s backstreets and brothels at Cosgrove’s side, hunting his persecutor, she finds herself fighting for her life—and falling in love…
Umasking Miss Appleby, by Emily Larkin
Take Regency England. Make magic real, but so rare as to be secret from the majority of the population. Add one young woman, desperate to escape her fate as an unpaid half-maid in her aunt and uncle’s house, who is granted one gift of magic from the Faerie godmother she didn’t know she had. With some quick thinking and advertisements for paid positions in hand, Charlotte chooses shapeshifting and promptly becomes Christian, a young man who applies to be Lord Cosgrove’s secretary.
Lord Cosgrove needs a secretary, of course, because his last one was injured in an attack aimed at him. He suspects it is because he is a fervent abolitionist, working in the House of Lords to encourage the end of the slave trade. His work has been made more difficult by the death of his wife, shortly after he discovered she had slept with his best friend. Rather than let him divorce her, she attempted to manipulate him with threats of suicide — and accidentally succeeded.
The physical attack is not the only challenge he’s facing; someone has been breaking windows at his London residence and leaving nightsoil on his doorstep. Lately the attacks have been increasing in frequency and finding the perpetrator consumes much of his attention. As his secretary, Charlotte is invited along to observe and give her opinion afterwards. This leads to some awkward situations for her, as she has no idea how to act in a brothel or any of the physical aspects of being a man. I really enjoyed some of these, as they seemed completely in character for a young woman of quality who all of a sudden had to figure out how to deal with having a penis.
Her ability to change shapes is also put to good use throughout the story. Cosgrove is happy to provide his somewhat hapless secretary with advice and Charlotte takes it on more than one occasion — particularly when it comes to scratching a physical itch in order to get over it. The scene where Cosgrove finally discovers Charlotte’s gift plays out in a completely understandable way, both for the time period and for what one might still understand happening today. Magic might have been real, but the reactions were all human.
In the end, I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading the next in this series. The writing was solid, the characters interesting enough to hold my interest, and there were a few twists I didn’t see coming. I certainly recommend it if you don’t mind a spot of fantasy in your Regency romance.