The Marquis of Milverton strides into White’s Club in a high state of irritation as he is being pestered by his family to take a ‘suitable’ girl for his wife. He is not surprised to find that his aristocratic friends are suffering the same pressure and they gather together to complain about their plight.

They are all having affaires-de-coeurs with seductive married ladies and the Marquis himself is very much involved with a glamorous Countess. However they all recognise that they will have to marry eventually to carry on their ancestral titles and family legacy. Listening to their grumbling is the Duke of Sandelford and he challenges them to go out into the countryside in disguise and find a beautiful girl to be their dream wife.

If after three months, they failed they were to admit failure and accept their family’s suggestions. He also offers a one thousand pounds prize to those who succeed. He left them feeling it was at least a sporting chance and the Marquis was the first to accept the Duke’s challenge.

Disguising himself as John Milton he sets out alone on his horse and has a number of unlikely adventures with people he would normally have never encountered. He helps some of them to happiness, then becomes bored and decides to return home, but will give one more village a last chance. How the Marquis becomes involved with a ruthless gang of horse thieves and then unexpectedly finds all he is seeking and can claim the Duke’s prize is told in this exciting and different tale by BARBARA CARTLAND.

Barbara Cartland was the world’s most prolific novelist who wrote an amazing 723 books in her lifetime, of which no less than 644 were romantic novels with worldwide sales of over 1 billion copies and her books were translated into 36 different languages. As well as romantic novels, she wrote historical biographies, 6 autobiographies, theatrical plays and books of advice on life, love, vitamins and cookery. She wrote her first book at the age of 21 and it was called Jigsaw. It became an immediate bestseller and sold 100,000 copies in hardback in England and all over Europe in translation. Between the ages of 77 and 97 she increased her output and wrote an incredible 400 romances as the demand for her romances was so strong all over the world. She wrote her last book at the age of 97 and it was entitled perhaps prophetically The Way to Heaven. Her books have always been immensely popular in the United States where in 1976 her current books were at numbers 1 & 2 in the B. Dalton bestsellers list, a feat never achieved before or since by any author. Barbara Cartland became a legend in her own lifetime and will be best remembered for her wonderful romantic novels so loved by her millions of readers throughout the world, who have always collected her books to read again and again, especially when they feel miserable or depressed. Her books will always be treasured for their moral message, her pure and innocent heroines, her handsome and dashing heroes, her blissful happy endings and above all for her belief that the power of love is more important than anything else in everyone’s life."

© 2019 SAGA Egmont (Audiobook): 9788711925614

Release date

Audiobook: 21 January 2019