The Vanishing Bride by Mimi Gunn

Published on June 23^rd, 2026 by Petite Press

394 pages

I read the digital version

Back Cover

Charlotte Townsend had tasted love before.
The price had been too high to bear.

A scandalous secret drove her into hiding on a remote family estate. True safety lay in being forgotten. When a gravely wounded man arrives on horseback, her peace is shattered. She must decide if the one who once held her heart can keep her secret safe.

Lord Peregrine Spencer never expected the woman from his fevered dreams to appear before him. Sent by his brother to expose nefarious dealings at the Spencer estate, his investigation ends with a bullet to the chest. A love-scorned widower, his horse leads him to a place from his past. Is he seeing a ghost—or the woman once thought lost? Could this tragedy reunite him with his heart’s desire?

When long hidden secrets necessitate a marriage of convenience, Charlotte must choose between guarding her heart or trusting her new husband. To secure their happiness, Peregrine must unmask his would-be killer before losing his love forever.

My review

It’s the first novel I read from this author and since I enjoy historical romance, I believed I should give it a chance, and I just learned that we were from the same regional, so it’s always a plus to support a fellow Canadian writer.

The blurb resumes perfectly the book. Since it’s a romance, you can say it’s predictable, but it has a good twist. Honestly, initially, I found that  Charlotte fairly annoying because she doubted Perry when he did everything he could to make sure that she could trust him. At the same time, people believed she was dead for years because of her secret, and I can understand that, under the circumstances, she thought it was the only way to get a better life.

Perry is a great character, but I also found him annoying sometimes because he was so in love with Charlotte. I’m not saying that he should be toxic, but I noticed that he was addicted to her and I wondered if he had his own identity, just like most women in that era, that all they could dream of a good marriage.

The reader can experience the Victorian period because of how the characters talk and how they think. There are also a few intimate scenes that could make the reader imagine it’s contemporary from Perry’s point of view. If you don’t like too many historical details, I recommend this one for you. History is important in the background, but I didn’t feel I followed a university class. It was just the characters that made me think that the story was happening a few centuries ago.