Heiress to a wealthy Blackamoor textile maker, Ruth Wilky is still grappling with the death of her beloved husband, Adam. Four years ago they eloped to Gretna Green but were brutally attacked by his nefarious family. Ruth was abducted and had a harrowing journey back to her family, thinking she saw her husband brutally murdered. No one in her family believed she had been married, let alone that the son she had belonged to the mysterious Adam Wilky. After her attack, Ruth’s sight is beginning to fail, but she has one goal: to prove to everyone that Adam did exist, they were legally married, and her son, Christopher, is legitimate.

Adam survives the attack but is sold into impressment with the Navy before he knows  if Ruth survived. He returns home stronger than ever before after years of being beaten and broken, to learn that his father is dying and he will inherit the Wycliff Barony. When Ruth and her sister Ester show up on his doorstep searching for proof of Ruth’s marriage, Adam poses as a cousin. At first to protect Ruth from knowing his true identity and putting her harm’s way again, and then as a chance to understand the woman his once vivacious wife has become after her own trials in life, and to find a way to win her back.

Ruth is drawn to the man she knows as Adam’s cousin, with certain traits reminding her of her beloved husband, but also confusing her. Will she be able to accept who he truly is, and trust Adam after keeping this secret? Can Adam tell her the truth with the looming threat from their past still at large?

An emotional tale of hope, THE BEWILDERED BRIDE, is a well-written historical novel by Vanessa Riley. The fourth book in the Advertisements for Love series, it can be ready as a standalone, though characters and couples from previous books are present. Ruth is a resilient woman who has survived the unthinkable. She sees her husband all but killed in front of her, believes him dead, and then is saved from a brothel where she has endured the worst. Her traditional family doesn’t believe she was ever married, and aren’t convinced that her son was conceived in wedlock. So while she is back in her family’s care, Ruth spends four years essentially alone - feeling betrayed by the very people who should be supporting her. When word reachers her that a new Baron has taken over the Wycliff estate, Ruth is determined to find proof of her marriage and to give her son legitimacy. This determination and will to honor the husband she thinks she lost makes Ruth a character to root for, and the ways in which she has to navigate through the world after trauma while her sight is fading was fascinating and heartbreaking to read.

Adam is an interesting character as well, though his motivations of keeping his identity from Ruth were hard to grasp at first. Ultimately he does this to keep her safe, but for two people so in love and destined to be together, it was hard to believe he would play up the ruse as a cousin rather than Ruth’s true love for so long. That being said, Adam has to learn how to be a part of society again, and as a mulatto man passing for a white nobleman, he has his own demons to deal with throughout this novel. His family business - which is what put them in danger in the first place - did add another threat to this couple learning to love one another again, and the antagonists certainly get what they deserve. Some readers may take issue with the deception of Adam’s true identity, but the ending for this couple is deserved and completely lovely.

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