Subject
Love-letters -- Fiction Books
Best books
Edith Wharton
The Touchstone
"The Touchstone" by Edith Wharton is a novella published in 1900. Stephen Glennard faces financial ruin and cannot afford to marry the woman he loves. In desperation, he sells intimate letters written to him by Margaret Aubyn, a now-deceased famous author who once pursued him. The sale brings wealth and marriage, but mounting guilt over his betrayal threatens to destroy everything he has gained through this act of treachery.
Berta Ruck
The wooing of Rosamond Fayre
"The wooing of Rosamond Fayre" by Berta Ruck is a novel written in the early 20th century. It’s a light, witty romance about love set in motion by misdirected letters and mistaken identity, moving from an English country house to a French seaside village on the eve of war. The story centers on capable, charming Rosamond Fayre, dutiful philanthropist Eleanor Urquhart, and Eleanor’s adventurous cousin and fiancé, Ted Urquhart, whose courtship-by-post takes an unexpected turn. At the start of the story, Rosamond, hired as Eleanor’s secretary at Urquhart’s Court, is asked to write Eleanor’s weekly letters to Ted abroad—and even to sign them—despite her misgivings. Her first carefully neutral note, scented by slipped-in rose petals, prompts Ted’s intrigued reply and, soon after, an impulsive, unannounced return to England. Finding Eleanor away at a French Holiday Hostel for working girls (with Rosamond temporarily in charge), he travels there incognito, rescues two of the girls from a cliff mishap with Rosamond’s help, and—mistaking Rosamond for his fiancée—becomes instantly fascinated. Invited to tea at the Hostel, he withholds his name while Pansy, a flamboyant “Principal Boy,” leads the chatter; the scene ends with Ted plotting to continue his anonymous wooing of the woman he believes is Eleanor.
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