You did it! We figured this one out! It is a truth universally acknowledged (by me for certain) that the Bitchery pretty much knows everything, and really, it's true. Scroll down to see the solution for this HaBO - and many thanks!
This HaBO comes from Katelyn, who is looking for a book that is at least a decade old:
I am trying to remember I book I read prior to 2009.
The book was about a nobleman that was raising 10-14 children he claimed were his but were actually left on his property by a village woman and he wants a homely, unattractive wife to help raise them.
His butler finds the “perfect” woman, however looks were misleading because she was picking apples and had them in the pockets of her apron/skirt which made her appear larger.
Is this…a romance?
I can’t remember the apple parts (it’s been a while) but the general premise sounds a lot like Teresa Medeiros’s CHARMING THE PRINCE.
He never lost a battle until he met the woman who won his heart
My enemies know me as Lord Bannor the Bold, Pride of the English and Terror of the French. Never in my life have I backed down from any challenge or betrayed so much as a hint of fear—until the war ended and I found myself a reluctant papa to a dozen unruly children.
Realizing that I couldn’t lop their little heads off or throw them in the dungeon, I sent my steward out to find them a mother and me a bride—an attractive, meek, maternal creature too plain to tempt me to get her with child. You can imagine my horror when he returned with Lady Willow of Bedlington, a spirited beauty who made me think of nothing else!
With her cloud of dark curls and the sparkle of passion in her eyes, Willow was everything I’d sworn to resist. I never dreamed she would join forces with those mischievous imps of mine to teach this cynical warrior just how sweet surrender can be.
The Trouble with Harry by Katie MacAlister has a similar-ish plot, except I think the children are all Harry’s from his first marriage.
It’s charming the prince. Just happened to read it not that long ago!
Well, I am reminded of a Georgette Heyer where the heroine almost doesn’t marry the hero because she mistakenly thinks the 50 children he supports are his by blows when she realizes they are orphans. The Non-Pareil is not the book.
OTOH, the one requested sounds like fun.
Also, there’s one of Eloisa James’ Desperate Duchesses books where the hero ends up raising all his illegitimate children. There were quite a few with different mothers, iirc.
I recall a book where women brought the hero children they claimed were his–but they weren’t really–and he took them in so they weren’t abandoned. I don’t remember much more, and it was more recent than 2009
I’m thinking The Hellion Bride by Catherine Coulter. There are consent issues and very dated themes. Ryder Sherbrooke and his quarterly “bastards” meetings were a part of the first book in the series, The Sherbrooke Bride.
@Sandra that James one was A Duke of Her Own – but Villiers only had mostly his own children – one extra had been laid at his… feet? And he didn’t mind.
The one HBO I actually know and Meljean was a lot faster: It’s definitely “Charming the Prince” – the opening scene with the apples was memorable. The book is also a loose retelling of SnowWhite, with the children standing in die dwarfes, a few animals (including a crow, IIRC) aus well as the repurposed apples.
This sounds a lot like “Charming the Prince” by Theresa Medeiros to me (published 1999).