Published in 2001, the regency romance One Good Turn is Carla Kelly’s sequel to the first novel to feature the same main character, Libby's London Merchant. The second novel picks up a year after the first, tracing the character evolution of its protagonist as he attempts to reform himself. Coming to terms with his broken heart, and with his newfound feelings of love and respect for a quiet woman whose story turns out to be quite shocking, the main character indeed finds the inner resources for a substantial personal transformation. The novel is narrated from several different points of view, allowing each of the main characters to speak in their own voice. Both novels are set in Kent, England, during the 1820s, a decade after the Peninsular War between Napoleon and Spain that took place in 1807–1814. At the end of Libby's London Merchant, protagonist Benedict Nesbitt (aka Nez), the Seventh Duke of Knaresborough, found himself jilted by Libby, the woman he had been madly in love with. Instead, she marries Tony, a “bumbling, overweight surgeon,” sending Nez reeling. One Good Turn opens a year later. Nez, who has only just emerged from a yearlong alcoholic stupor, has visited the ludicrously happy couple and has been told to stop pining for Libby and instead lead his own life. As he considers the truth about himself, he realizes that he has allowed himself to wallow in lazy failure and that he is tremendously shallow and obsessed with the surface value of people rather than their core. Nez and his young niece begin riding back home from the visit, and he tries his best to resign himself to a life of solitude and good works. At least at home, he can have the company of his butler Luster, who is more of a close friend than a servant. Along the way, the carriage stops to help a post-coach that has broken an axle in the rainy mud, stranding its passengers in a neighboring village. Going there, Nez finds Liria Valencia, a young Spanish woman, and her son, Juan. She is clearly poor, but something about her bearing strikes Nez with romantic hope. Offering them a ride in his own carriage, Nez tries his best to keep his distance, but the woman has a wonderfully kind manner. Nez’s niece, who has been complaining of vague physical discomfort, is quickly calmed by Liria. When they stop for the night, the niece has taken ill – and they quickly realize that she has smallpox, a dangerous infection that soon sickens Luster as well. It’s clear that they can’t continue the journey until both members of his household have recovered, but Nez is ill-equipped to nurse his faithful friend and his ward back to health. Reluctantly, he hires the mysterious Liria to tend to them. Liria at first seems to hesitate, but, when she realizes that the generous amount of money that Nez is prepared to pay her will go a long way to allay little Juan’s needs, she agrees. She ably cares for both sick people – so much so that Nez realizes that Liria has had to tend to the injured or the ill before. She confesses that she has spent some time as a camp follower for the Spanish army during the Peninsular Wars. For his part, Nez explains that he too has seen action in the Napoleonic campaign, most notably at the Battle of Waterloo. When they finally arrive at Nez’s manor, his sister is excited to hear that he has decided to commit to a program of self-improvement. But for her, what would indicate that he has turned over a new leaf best is setting aside his hobby of “meddling in his servants’ lives” and find himself a wife. Urged on by her, Nez starts courting his thirty-year-old aristocratic neighbor, a childhood friend who seems to be a perfect match on paper. However, when his sister also demands that Nez replace his former housekeeper, who retired, he announces that he has brought a new housekeeper with him – Liria. As Liria and Juan spend more and more time around Nez, he grows attached to the boy. He also tries to dig deeper into Liria’s mysterious back-story. Eventually, she tells him about her experiences in the war. It turns out that Liria comes by aristocratic bearing honestly: she was born the daughter of a Spanish Grand Duke. However, she lost her father, her husband, and her fortune during the War. Then, horrifically, during a battle at the city of Badajoz, Liria was gang-raped. Aghast, Nez realizes that the regiment that had attacked her town was his own. At this point, he opens up about his own wartime traumas, and the PTSD-like symptoms he has suffered as a result. Soon, Nez realizes that he could never marry his neighbor for social niceties when he wants to marry for love. For her part, Liria realizes that despite her emotional and psychological scars, she has still retained the capacity to love.

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Carla Kelly

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