Review: Only Beloved by Mary Balogh

George Crabbe, The Duke of Stanbrook, has been a fixture in all 6 of the prior Survivor’s Club books. He’s been the wise counsel, father figure, and dear friend to all of the other Survivors when they have needed him. In Only Beloved, George gets to be the focus of the story.

George’s story picks up shortly after the wedding of Imogen, the one female member of the club, when he figures out that he is lonely and would like to be married again. He immediately focuses on and decides to pursue Dora who is the sister-in-law of another Survivor.

The story that follows is sweet. Dora is a spinster and well beyond the age where a woman of the time would expect to marry. It also turns out that she developed a bit of a crush on George when they had their previous meeting. I got the sense that both George and Dora went into the courtship/marriage hoping for one thing and then were pleasantly surprised when more romantic feelings developed.

Only Beloved is well written and the characters are entertaining. The interactions/romance are typical of books written about the period (post-Napoleonic war England). It was interesting to learn more of George’s history, especially since the truth of it was somewhat different than expected. Technically, this book is a stand-alone. But, as the conclusion of the Survivor’s Club series, there is more inter-mingling of characters from other books than happens in the prior books and this makes it a little harder to keep track of who’s who is you haven’t read at least some of the prior stories.