suzemo

As a note, I did read the first of the series, which I had totally forgotten about.   Here's my review of the Mistress of Trevelyan at Booklikes.

I (apparently) liked this book a whole lot more than I did the first book. 

Juliet Boucheron is a widowed (probably) woman in post-Civil-War New Orleans trying to keep her house and household together.   Her husband (probably) ran off with Rebel gold and abandoned her, and she has turned her formerly-glorious home into a boarding house to make ends meet.   

When the story starts, she is boarding a theatre troupe and has gotten an alarming warning from an investigator she has hired to find her husband.   A mysterious, and fabulously wealthy man shows up as a boarder right around the time that weird, and dangerous (deadly) things start happening, and we get to watch the mystery unravel.   Sure enough, sexy-times happen.   Mysteries are solved, and we get our happy ending.

There's a wee bit of paranormal to the story, not enough to classify it as paranormal, but it's there.  What I like best about the book (and how it got much better ratings than the preceding book in the series) is that the female lead is doing fine(ish) on her own.  She is not damaged, she is not raped, she is not some shrinking violet and while the man sort of saves the day, the relationship is not (I feel) predicated on his manly awesomeness.    

Basically, it's not a horribly sexist story beyond society being patriarchal in general.