The Glass Virgin — Catherine Cookson

Annabella Lagrange had the kind of childhood that most can only dream about. The only child of an aristocratic couple, raised on their magnificent estate in the English countryside, she was loved by her parents and coddled by servants who acquiesced to her every whim. She was allowed to do anything she wanted, except, of course, to stray too far from her wing of the house. But her seclusion didn't concern her too much, because when she grew up, she planned to marry her handsome cousin Stephen and live happily ever after. However, on the morning of her tenth birthday, Annabella ventured farther than she'd ever gone before. Overcome with curiosity, she opened a forbidden door that led into her father's private quarters, and what she found there showed her with shocking clarity that her father was not the man she thought he was. And though she couldn't know it at the time, the events of that day set in motion the uncovering of a secret that had been kept for many years. So begins the remarkable story of Annabella Lagrange, a sensitive, beautiful young woman who was raised as a lady. But when she turns eighteen, she learns the surprising circumstances of her birth, and her entire world quietly crashes around her. Suddenly she's forced from the genteel surroundings of her youth into the rough, lower-class society of Victorian England, where only her quick wit and determination can save her from starvation. Catherine Cookson was one of the world's most beloved writers, and in The Glass Virgin her powers are at their height. Rarely has a heroine been portrayed more sensitively or a situation more compellingly. Filled with passion and drama, The Glass Virgin is a rare treat for lovers of romantic fiction.

Redford Hall

In its solitary splendor, it was really two houses. In the Old Hall, Edmund Lagrange, a man of infinite, brooding evil, lived in dissolute glory, drinking and gambling away his wife's fortune. On the other side of this massive oak door which she was forbidden to open was his daughter Annabella. A beautiful girl, she was raised in genteel seclusion to become the most fragile of Victorian creations, a lady. But at the age of seventeen Annabella learned the shameful secret of her birth and descended into a world of degradation and suffering. The only one to remain faithful to her in her new life was the handsome and mysterious man who defied all convention to save her.