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Why waste romance on a love that would never be returned? Better to save the ept-ht actually have a future together

And if there was one thing Penelope knew, even then, at the age of sixteen years minus two days, it was that her future did not feature Colin Bridgerton in the role of husband

She siirl who attracted a man like him, and she feared that she never would be

On the tenth of April, in the year 1813--precisely two days after her seventeenth birthday--Penelope Featherington made her debut into London society She hadn't wanted to do it She begged her mother to let her wait a year She was at least two stone heavier than she ought to be, and her facestillhad an awful tendency to develop spots whenever she was nervous, whichin the world could make her as nervous as a London ball

She tried to remind herself that beauty was only skin deep, but that didn't offer any helpful excuses when she was berating herself for never knohat to say to people There was nothing irl with no personality And in that first year on the irl with no--oh, very well, she had to give herself some credit--with very little personality

Deep inside, she kneho she was, and that person was smart and kind and often even funny, but soot lost somewhere between her heart and heror,at all

To make matters even less attractive, Penelope's , and when she wasn't in the requisite white thatladies wore (and which of course didn't flatter her complexion one bit), she was forced to wear yellow and red and orange, all of which made her look perfectly wretched The one titon had planted her hands on her reen was too ton declared, was a happy color and a happy girl would snare a husband

Penelope decided then and there that it was best not to try to understand the workings of her mother's mind

So Penelope found herself outfitted in yellow and orange and the occasional red, even though such colors hastly with her brown eyes and red-tinged hair There was nothing she could do about it, though, so she decided to grin and bear it, and if she couldn't rin, at least she wouldn't cry in public

Which, she took soh, 1813 was the year that theher thrice-weekly Society Papers The single-sheet newspaper became an instant sensation No one kneho Lady Whistledown really was, but everyone seemed to have a theory For weeks--no,else The paper had been delivered for free for teeks--just long enough to addict the ton --and then suddenly there was no delivery, just paperboys charging the outrageous price of five pennies a paper

But by then, no one could live without the alossip, and everyone paid their pennies