Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Casablanca for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Della Danby is determined to prove herself as co-owner of London’s first (and only) gambling club for ladies. Nothing will stop Della from achieving financial success, especially not a grumpy viscount-turned-writer who thinks he’s too good to include her business in his precious guidebook. But when Della sets out to write her own guidebook to London geared towards the ladies of the ton, she finds herself closer to Viscount Ashton than ever.

A Lady’s Guide to London is Faye Delacour’s second installment in The Lucky Ladies of London series. I enjoyed the push and pull of their relationship throughout the book, drawn apart by their fears and insecurities and forced back together by their shared project (and undeniable chemistry). I love when two characters think they’ve got their feelings under control and don’t realize they’re doomed until it’s already too late.

Some Miscellaneous Positives

♣️ Something I love about reading historical romances is all the tiny details you learn about life at the time that you’d never encounter otherwise. I’d never heard of chocolate houses before this book, and I definitely thought that “gambling hell” was an ironically apt spelling error.

♣️ I related to Della’s struggle with her newfound responsibility at the club, even if I got a lot of secondhand anxiety from her procrastination.

♣️ The spice was well balanced, not so much that it distracted from the plot and not so little that we lost the tension. The dialogue really shines in these scenes as well, especially from our hero.

♣️ There was a very transparent conversation about contraceptives in this book that I appreciated. I think a lot of romances skip these discussions because they don’t want to lose the scene’s momentum, but here it felt organic and realistic.

As for the negatives, I’d say that this book handles the pacing much better than the first, but it still feels like too many subplots for my personal preference. As a standalone, I think Delacour did a great job creating a believable and engaging relationship, but I don’t think I’ll continue on with the series just because I’ve ran into that issue in both her books. I also wish that I connected with the side characters more, but I found a lot of them either unlikeable or unremarkable. Lastly, I really felt like this book needed an epilogue. It’s not that the conclusion is unsatisfying, but I expected one last moment to truly bookend the story and was surprised we didn’t get one.

Overall, this book tackles a lot and succeeds in crafting a compelling connection between the main characters. I said it with the first book too, but I would really recommend this series to readers that are trying to get into historical romance. I think the fast pace and the number of subplots would appeal to readers that normally find historical romance slow or boring. Ultimately, I didn’t fall in love with their love enough to get to 5-stars, but I appreciate the ways it improved on the first book and enjoyed myself a lot.

This is the second book I have read in the series. It started with so much promise and I truly enjoyed the building of the romance but somewhere along the way it fell flat for me. Della and Ashton seemed to have a great understanding of each other but at time it also seemed as though they didn’t really like each other. I disliked how Della was portrayed during some of the book. I really wanted to enjoy all this book but it felt flat.

I did really enjoy this (though not nearly as much as the first book) but there were some things that I really disliked about it, and had it not been the second book in a series I'd like to enjoy, I think I'd have felt differently about the book overall.

The time period, setting, and world building are really well done here. It's familiar, but different (in a more modern way - you can tell these are written in the 2020's) to other late regency/early Victorian romances.

Now for my complaints

I absolutely knocked a whole star off for how this ends - there's so little resolution that it feels like there is at least a chapter missing at the end. It cuts of so suddenly, following on from Delia's change of heart about Bishops that I struggle to even buy a HFN for these two, which is not something I say lightly.

I didn't realise until after I finished that this was billed as enemies to lovers - at best it is a very mild rivals to lovers & it just annoyed me to try and frame the book like that because that's not the case at all.

The motivations for Delia in this book just... didn't quite gel with who she was in the first book (and the same with Jane & Eli etc). I know there's a decent time jump, but even so, it's fairly jarring.

Anyway, definitely still enjoy Delacour as an author, and I'm excited to see where else this series goes, even if this book didn't quite work for me.

Thanks to @sourcebookscasa I was able to read an eARC of @fayedelacour upcoming book, A Lady’s Guide to London, pubbing April 15, 2025

It’s the second in the Lucky Ladies of London series, and focuses on Della, who owns and operates a gambling hell for ladies with her bestie, Jane, the FMC in The Lady He Lost.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and loved how unexpected it was wrt having a MMC who is married - but long separated - and is definitely on the fringes of “polite” society, as well as a FMC who has her own business, and seeks to live life on her own terms.

The I bring was, IMO, perfect for the two MCs. It’s a messy conclusion but one that makes sense for them.

There’s some side characters we spend time with and whom I hope get their own stories! I will definitely be reading more books by Faye as she continues her publishing career!

If you like the vibes of Lindsay Lovise’s Never Gamble Your Heart, Laura Lee Guhrke’s Lady Scandal or Amalie Howard’s The Worst Duke in London, then I suggest you add A Lady’s Guide to your TBR.

The writing was great and I’d definitely read more from the author, but I felt like the whole “rivalry to lovers” thing lasted 3 pages and then it was just insta lust.

There was times that the main couples relationship took a backseat and the main focus was on Dellas sister or other couples or characters which I usually don’t mind because I love having actual plots that don’t pertain to just the romance but in this instance I just didn’t gel with it?

There was something about the fmc I just wasn’t clicking with either.

thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc!

I appreciate this series so much for just having a different setting and not adhering to some of the more standard rules of Regency historical romance. This is about women who run a gaming hell for women in Regency era London. (I’m not certain of the exact date, but we are post Napoleon because English people are traveling to Paris.)

The main character, Della, is taking on more responsibilities at the club because the main character from the first book in the series has just had a baby with Eli, her husband and the MMC from that book at the same time, Della is trying to write a lady’s guide to London. Lord Ashton is her writing mentor because he has written similar books. As you can expect, the two grow close. Ashton‘s background is extremely messy and is a significant barrier to them being together.

This book explores arranged marriages, separation, and divorce in the Regency era, but also gambling addiction and the expected role of women at the time. This is done in a very neat package, but in a way that is still insightful.

It’s also interesting that the conclusion of the story is unusual. It’s not exactly a happily ever after. So perhaps a bit closer to a “happy for now” with the promise of more. I expect that we will hear about Della and Ashton in future box as they communicate with secondary characters who will move into lead roles. Della sister, Annabelle, definitely seems poised to be a main character in a book to come.

Sparkling with wit and undeniable charm, this book is pure delight. Their push-and-pull crackles with energy, wrapped in a story that is both lighthearted and emotionally rich. The writing is crisp, the humor perfectly timed, and the romance slow-burning in the most delicious way. Overall, it’s swoon-worthy and simply irresistible.

This story was so charming and fun! It’s got such a unique concept I haven’t seen before, especially in historical stories. Della was so fun and sweet and determined and I really connected with her character. Seeing her and Lyman connect and then fell in love was stressful but lovely at the same time. I adored this one!

Until I got to the end of the book, I didn’t realize this was book two in a series. That being said, it certainly can be read as a stand alone, but this story causes me to want to read book one to get to know the characters more.
The female protagonist is a breath of fresh air with her adventurous spirit and her joyful outlook on life.
I enjoyed the characters, I enjoyed the romance, I enjoyed the storyline and I enjoyed reading about the process of writing a guidebook from that period.

this was absolute perfection!!! i am not a connoisseur of historical romances but i feel that this was objectively a solid romance!!! the setting was so immersive and threw me in without a hitch (i also need to get more into delacour’s wriitng is what this experience has taught me).