Author Note

During the Regency period a governess wasn’t regarded as an equal by employers, but she didn’t belong in the servants’ hall either. She had to earn the respect of her pupils and employers and teach young ladies all the accomplishments that would fit them for high society, but not to turn them into bluestockings. Then she must hand them over to a suitable chaperone and find a new position where she could do it all again with another set of strangers, if she was lucky.

The moment I began to wonder if any of them enjoyed taking on such a challenge Eleanor Hancourt turned up as if she’d been waiting for a chance to have her say. With enough secrets in her traveling box to keep a novelist happy for months and a hero who tells almost as many lies as she does, she has been a joy to write about. So this is Nell’s story. And anyone who read The Winterley Scandal, where Nell’s brother, Colm, meets the love of his life, will recognize some characters in this one, but The Governess Heiress is also intended to stand alone, just as bright, determined and ever-so-slightly bossy Nell Hancourt had to when her wicked uncle turned her out into the world to earn her own bread.