Review of The Harlot Countess by Joanna Shupe

On the night of Maggie's debut, a huge scandal had spread like wildfire, destroying her reputation and essentially shunning her from society. Simon Barrett, the Earl of Winchester, was the one person she had prayed would take her side or at least ask her what happened. Instead he shunned her like everyone else. Desperate, Maggie leaves society and marries a much older man. 10 years later, Maggie, now Lady Hawkins, is widowed and back in London. This time she's determined to live up to her reputation as the Half-Irish Harlot. There's now an artist that is releasing cartoons of Simon, ridiculing him and his youthful exploits. When he runs into Maggie for the first time since that awful night, he can't get her out of his mind. Now he just has to get her to talk to him. Decides to ask her to help him track down the artist. Unbeknownst to him, Maggie is the artist, using the drawings as a way to vent her betrayal by him all those years ago.
Many historical books tend to show the woman as the more emotionally vulnerable person or the understated wallflower. Not this story. Maggie is very much trying to live out loud in her reputation and enjoying freedom as best as a woman can in this time period. She still has a lot of anger and hurt from the past, but it was great watching her get through it. Right from the first re-meet, Simon is definitely the one that couldn't stay away from Maggie again. While his biggest faults are what he did (or didn't do when he was younger), his ultimate goal is to get Maggie to accept that they should be together, one way or another.
I really enjoyed reading this book. One of the biggest problems I have with books is when the forgiveness comes too quickly, but I thought this author did a great job in sticking true to Maggie's pain and anger with everything she's been through and with the way Simon just doesn't get it.