The Fortune Hunter

May 5, 2014
Goodwin’s second novel (after The American Heiress) travels the difficult protocols of Victorian-era fox hunting, as well as the even more complicated protocols of love and marriage in the era, especially for an intelligent young woman with a fortune. England, 1875: Charlotte Baird is the eligible heiress to “the Lennox Fortune.” Her lovely, reckless mother was her father’s second wife, and she died young in a hunting accident, leaving her fortune to Charlotte. Charlotte’s brother, Fred, is engaged to Augusta Crewe, an ambitious woman from a good family who’d rather settle for Fred than stay unmarried (and she covets the Lennox diamonds). Charlotte is more interested in photography—especially composing unusual portraits and developing the plates and prints herself. When Bay Middleton, an expert horseman and friend of Fred, arrives for hunting season at Melton, Augusta’s family home, he and Charlotte form an unlikely alliance that turns into love. Fred and Augusta believe Charlotte can do better. Further confusing matters is the arrival of the Empress of Austria, who comes to a nearby estate and appoints Bay as her “pilot” for the hunts; she later decides that Bay can provide her happiness beyond horseback. Charlotte and Bay are faced with listening to their hearts, or falling victim to the machinations and customs surrounding them. Goodwin manages to take the reader deep inside the characters’ longings and flaws in a way that makes the reader root for them. An enchanting, beautifully written page-turner. First printing of 150,000 copies.