Silent Melody

by Mary Balogh Narrated by Rosalyn Landor

Overview

From the legendary New York Times bestselling author of Heartless comes an exquisite Georgian romance of a transcendent love, "without doubt, one of the most romantic novels ever written."* Lady Emily Marlowe is beautiful, independent, and unspoiled. Deaf since childhood, she appreciates her family's efforts to nurture her spirit, but the man they've chosen for her betrothal can never fulfill her. The only one Emily has ever desired is bold and reckless Lord Ashley Kendrick. Her childhood amour inspired her fantasies and vowed never to forget her-even as he left her for a new life in India and a new love. Seven years and countless dreams later, Ashley has returned a desolate widower to Bowden Abbey and, true to his promise, to Emily. Yet his heedless proposal of marriage has left her unexpectedly conflicted. Though the heat of passion still burns, Emily fears that it's only a sense of duty-not love-that has brought him to bended knee. And what is she to make of those seven lost years clouded in secrets too dark for Ashley to share? For Emily, her greatest and only love now becomes one worth fighting for, one of startling revelations and second chances, and one, like a melody, too beautiful for words....

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Balogh (Heartless) brings a twist to her Georgian romance by making the heroine a deaf woman struggling to fit into the rigid English society; but, unfortunately, this intriguing premise is undermined by contrived plotting. As a teenager, Lady Emily Marlowe had fallen in love with Lord Ashley Kendrick, the one man who really understands her. Seven years later, he has returned from India, wealthy but widowed under suspicious circumstances. Beautiful Emily's fierce independence and Ashley's unresolved feelings about his marriage keep them apart, even as the same evil that destroyed his wife and child reemerges. Though Balogh offers a wonderfully sensitive treatment of Emily's silent world, it doesn't compensate for the hero's obtuseness and the heroine's incomprehensible refusal to confide in him as the clues mount to a rather predictable conclusion. (Aug.)

From the Publisher

Praise for Silent Melody

“Don’t miss Silent Melody.”—Jo Beverley

“If you can read only one book this year, Silent Melody should be that one.” —*Romance Forever

“Intensely emotional…[a] stunning book from an author who consistently sets new standards in the genre.”—Old Book Barn Gazette

“Truly an enjoyable work.”—RegencyRomanceReviews.com

“Balogh brings a twist to her Georgian romance...wonderfully sensitive.”—Publishers Weekly

Further praise for Mary Balogh and her novels:

"Once you start a Mary Balogh book, you won’t be able to stop reading.” —New York Times Bestselling Author Susan Elizabeth Phillips

“A romance writer of mesmerizing intensity.”—New York Times bestselling author Mary Jo Putney

“Fulfilled all of my romantic fantasies.”—New York Times bestselling author Teresa Medeiros

“A superb author...reminiscent of Jane Austen.”—Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“One of the best!”—New York Times bestselling author Julia Quinn

"Mary Balogh sets the gold standard in historical romance."—New York Times bestselling author Jayne Ann Krentz

"When it comes to historical romance, Mary Balogh is one of my favorites!"—New York Times bestselling author Eloisa James

Product Details

BN ID:	2940170732326
Publisher:	Recorded Books, LLC
Publication date:	08/04/2015
Series:	Georgian , #2
Edition description:	Unabridged
Sales rank:	811,839

Read an Excerpt

May I see the painting?" Ashley asked.

Emmy bit her lip and flushed.

He could see her hesitation. She looked downright embarrassed.

"I'll not insist," he said, "or keep you from your solitude, Emmy. I'll take myself off back to the house."

But she relented then and shook her head and bounded to her feet to move lightly past him and down the rocks to lead the way to her easel. She turned to watch with wide and wary eyes as he approached.

It was not anything he might have expected. Indeed, it was difficult to know what it was she had painted. There were greens and browns and blues, all bright. Her colors appeared to have been thrown at the canvas rather than smoothed on. He could see bold brush strokes moving up through the paint in wild swirls that drew the eye upward to where they all almost converged. Whatever it was she had painted, she had done it with passionate conviction. It was a painting that pulsed with feeling. It spoke -- though he could not understand the language.

"Emmy?" He looked at her curiously. "Explain, if you will. I can feel the painting, if that makes sense, but I cannot understand it."

Oh, she told him with eyes and hands, and he knew that she was spilling over with eagerness to tell him what the painting was all about. She showed him the trees around them and the sky above and stretched her arms and her hands and her fingers upward. Her head tipped back and her eyes closed. There was a look of near agony, near ecstasy, on her face. Her arms moved in small spirals.

He looked back at the canvas. Yes. Ah, yes, he could see it now, though it was unlike any other painting he had ever seen. It was like music. Wild, passionate music that exalted the spirit. He could imagine himself lying on the forest floor and gazing heavenward to that point where tree trunks and branches reached up and met the sky and merged with it. Emmy had seen that in her mind? And somehow reproduced it on canvas? She had been that close to -- to what? To understanding the meaning of it all? He look back at her, intrigued, almost awed. The wary look had intensified in her eyes.

"You see life spiraling through everything," Ashley said. "It comes through the soil and bursts upward, through everything and on out into the whole universe. Life is too powerful to be contained in one living thing but must be joined to all other living things. Life is a passionate celebration -- a dance, perhaps. Is that what you saw this morning, Emmy? What you painted?"

Her eyes were bright with tears then and she closed her right hand into a loose fist and pulsed it against her heart. Ah yes. He remembered immediately. I feel it deeply. She bent to gather up her paints and brushes.

He felt somewhat awed, somewhat humbled. He had always known that there were depths to Emmy that all but a few of those who loved her had never even suspected. He had experienced her sympathy, her happiness, her peace. He had devised a very rudimentary language of signs with her so that they had some form of two-way communication. But for the first time he had glimpsed something of the complex depths of her vision. He felt . . . privileged.

"Emmy, my dear," he said, sensing that he had entered one of those rare moments of insight in his life. "If you could but speak." But she could not, and she would not be the person she was if she could, he realized. Besides, she was not even looking at him to know that he had spoken. Or to know that bitter despair had welled up suddenly inside him.

When she did look up, the rush of tears had gone and she raised her eyebrows and gestured toward the house. Was he ready to return with her?

"Go," he told her. "Leave me here. I am not good company for you this morning. Or for anyone else, either. You must guard your innocence and your happiness and your inner peace from such as me, Emmy. I could only destroy them."

She did not look startled or hurt, as he had half expected she might, though he knew she had seen his words. She looked calmly at him, but the sadness in her eyes almost had him grabbing for her. He had spoken the truth, though: If he once gave in to the lure of confiding completely in Emmy, unburdening himself to her, as he had used to do, he would destroy her. He would pull her into his own darkness and never let her go free.

It terrified him that he was tempted.

"Go," he told her again, and heard with surprise the harshness in his voice. He wondered if it showed in his face.

She went, taking her easel and her painting with her.

She was in communion with all that was light and joy and life-giving, he thought, or so it seemed to him. He had felt it in her painting, strange and wild as it was. He had seen it in her silent explanation.

And he was all darkness. The very antithesis of what she had found.

Emmy had grown up, he realized. And grown beyond him in the process. She had taken the limited opportunities that life had offered her as a woman, and a handicapped woman at that, and had used them to make herself into a mature and interesting person -- he was sure she would be fascinating to know. He longed to know her as he had once longed for her to know him.

He was suddenly appalled by the selfishness of that former self of his. And by something else too: He had taken the limitless opportunities that life had offered him and used them to discover -- hell.

He must stay away from Emmy, he knew. If there was something good he could still do in life, he must do that. He must stay away from her.

She was a woman now -- beautiful, fascinating, alluring. Oh yes. He closed his eyes and smiled twistedly. Even that demon had found him out. There was no point in denying it. She was alluring.

This excerpt from SILENT MELODY © 1997 by Mary Balogh is published by arrangement with The Berkley Publishing Group and the author. All rights reserved.

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