Miss Billings Treads the Boards

By Carla Kelly

Book Overview

Cynical, lazy Lord Grayson is coerced into delivering a message to lovely Katherine Billings, whose late father frittered away a fortune on artwork. All his purchases were forgeries, save one, which-if sold-would offer Kate a modest living. Meanwhile, Kate has bowed to necessity and set off for Wakefield to become a governess. Gently reared, she has no plans to become a scandalous actress, but Things Happen. Injured by a highwayman hired by his greedy nephew, Lord Grayson staggers to a barn where a play is in progress. There he sees Kate, playing a small role. Through a mishap, she has ended up in Wickfield, not Wakefield, and is performing with the Bladesworth Traveling Company, an acting troupe. What's a lazy and cynical marquis to do? Lord Grayson-using his everyday name of Hal Hampton-joins the troupe, partly to protect himself from his nephew, but mostly to get to know Kate better. They both fall under the spell of the impecunious but talented Bladesworths. A charming French migr , a single-minded Bow Street Runner, and love round out a summer where the repertory includes deception, faux marriage, the law, and enough unsavory characters to suit any would-be Shakespeare. After all, the play's the thing.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1603819150
• ISBN13: 9781603819152
• Release Date: September 2013
• Publisher: Camel Press
• Length: 266 Pages
• Weight: 0.76 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.0" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Carla Kelly's Happiest Book ?

I had a different take on this than previous reviewers. I am currently reading older Carla Kelly novels as I came to this author late. This novel is the happiest Kelly novel I've read so far, with nice people and no real villains. I liked the hero, and felt he was giving Kate Billings a chance to gain self confidence, to learn that she was a capable and competent woman who didn't need him to rescue her, just as her experience with the Bladesworth troupe of actors allowed her to shed some of her own prejudices about class. Miss Billings Treads the Boards is a fun read, well worth tracking down.

Not Carla Kelly's best...

I have mixed feelings about any Carla Kelly book that I do not quite like. While the heroine Miss Katherine Billings and her predicament are delightfully and sympathetically portrayed, and the acting troupe and family that Miss Billings falls in with are believable and all-too-human secondary characters, the hero a Marquess is a real disappointment. Warning - spoilers ahead.The problem I have with this book is that the hero acts selfishly throughout the book, and justifies his actions late into the story by claiming that he wants to test her mettle before marrying her. At that point, I could have slapped him cheerfully, and wished that Katherine Billings had up-ended him (again) for another suitor. Alas, unlike in LIBBY'S LONDON MERCHANT there was no other suitor in the offing, not for Miss Billings anyway.The book starts out with a bored and overweight Marquess escaping town to avoid criticism by his sister and others (including his valet who irritates him, and me as the reader). Ah yes, the Marquess also has his sister's son as the heir [note to author: Dear Miss Kelly, this rather spoils your plot, even worse than in MISS MILTON SPEAKS HER MIND]. Since his journey up North and the exact route he takes is supposedly a secret, it is a shock to him (and to me) when he is attacked by pretend-highwaymen who are in reality his disinherited sister's son (aforesaid nephew who is heir to the Marquessate and the fortune) and his dismissed valet. Now you would think that the reasons for this attack are quite reasonable, wouldn't you? But no, the nephew and the valet want the Marquess to be grateful to them and by staging a mock-attack, they hope to win back his favor. Duh! And they leave said Marquess bleeding to death (or nearly so) in a country lane, while they get hopelessly lost looking for a doctor.The Marquess then staggers into a barn, where it turns out that the lady he is looking for, Miss Katherine Billings has been pressed into service with an acting troupe. [To cut a long story short, she got off at the wrong stop and mistook the waiting carriage for that of her lecherous would-be employer; the actor waiting at that stop mistook her for an actress. She prefers to remain with the troupe temporarily rather than go to her employers, since she has been warned on the stagecoach trip that the husband is a notorious lecher. Miss Billings, you see, is penniless and homeless]. I won't tell you why the Marquess would be looking for Miss Billings, but that is clear from the first chapter.Ah well. The Marquess's identity is revealed to the troupe, although he will go by the name of Hal Hampton. He pretends to be in fear of his life, from his villainous nephew and ex-valet; they undertake to care for him and to restore him to health, and carry him off up North. In the meantime, a hue-and-cry has been raised for the missing Marquess. The Marquess, now Hal Hampton, is pretending to be the husband of Miss Billings (now temporarily Miss Hampt