{"id":2209,"date":"2019-09-19T21:01:10","date_gmt":"2019-09-19T21:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/?p=2209"},"modified":"2019-09-19T21:01:10","modified_gmt":"2019-09-19T21:01:10","slug":"review-playing-to-win-by-diane-farr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/2019\/09\/19\/review-playing-to-win-by-diane-farr\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Playing To Win by Diane Farr"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-2211\" src=\"http:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/playingtowin.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"317\" height=\"475\" srcset=\"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/playingtowin.jpg 317w, https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/playingtowin-200x300.jpg 200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 317px) 100vw, 317px\" \/>An interesting and unusual premise: Trevor Whitlatch is sent to recover a debt for a friend from a famous courtesan. She surprises him by offering him her own illegitimate daughter to settle the debt. As soon as he sees her, Whitlatch agrees to the deal. Why? Well, because she\u2019s beautiful, of course, and, given her heritage, she\u2019s destined to end up as a courtesan herself, so why shouldn\u2019t he be her patron? After all, he\u2019s a connoisseur, she\u2019s in no position to complain and he\u2019s very determined.<\/p>\n<p>Clarissa, however, is equally determined to avoid her mother\u2019s fate in life. She\u2019s been educated, so she feels that a life as a governess would suit her. She\u2019s not foolish enough to aspire to marriage to a respectable man, thanks to her mother, but she wants to earn her keep honestly. Whitlatch is quite happy to allow her the time to accept his new offer &#8211; after all, the chase makes the inevitable outcome all the more rewarding &#8211; but he finds himself flummoxed by his new charge at every turn. She is nothing like he\u2019d expected, even his servants treat her like a lady and gradually he finds himself falling under her spell.<\/p>\n<p>This book was previously published as \u2018Fair Game\u2019, and to be honest, I feel that was a better title for it. It captures perfectly the vulnerability of Clarissa &#8211; she\u2019s as defenceless as a deer in the hunter\u2019s sights, but her strength of character, and her essential innocence and goodness shine through. The ending isn\u2019t a surprise, naturally, but it\u2019s nicely done. A beautifully written book with two great characters at its heart, an interesting dilemma and a soupcon of humour. Five stars.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An interesting and unusual premise: Trevor Whitlatch is sent to recover a debt for a friend from a famous courtesan. She surprises him by offering him her own illegitimate daughter to settle the debt. As soon as he sees her, Whitlatch agrees to the deal. Why? Well, because she\u2019s beautiful, of course, and, given her [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[95],"class_list":["post-2209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-review","tag-farr"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2209"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2213,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2209\/revisions\/2213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}