Duke and I

What worked for me in this book:- I thought Lady Whistledown's Society Papers were a great little treat. Like an early Gossip Girl, if you will.- I read this book at the same time as reading Julia Quinn's latest work [b:Because of Miss Bridgerton 25657772 Because of Miss Bridgerton (Rokesbys #1) Julia Quinn https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1458871065s/25657772.jpg 45479802] and I found this one a lot more structured with better flow.- I am absolutely in love with Violet Bridgerton (the mother) and the badass way she keeps her grown-up sons in order. Reminded me of Molly Weasley.What didn't work for me in this book:- I felt that Daphne and Simon's chemistry was rushed and I didn't quite understand why they would either of them fall in love with the other.- Some scenes felt a little forced and contrived, and such scenes increased in frequency as the book progressed.- That non-consensual scene when Daphne pretty much forced Simon to finish inside her, and then being almost completely non-repentent about it, and the whole thing being swept under the plot carpet like it was no big deal. That was really disturbing.

I wanted to like this, but I overall found it pretty slow going - neither of the leads really came alive for me, and I found the other Bridgertons more interesting. I usually love the fake-relationship trope, but again, this didn't take off in the way they normally do. Things seemed to pick up, and then That Sex Scene. I don't care whether it's a man or a woman, refusing to let someone pull out or stop having sex with you (even if you believe they consented at first, which is gonna be ambiguous at best if they were drunk and/or sleeping), in the hopes of conceiving a child with them, is reproductive coercion at best and flat-out sexual assault at worst. And Daphne didn't seem to think she'd done anything wrong, and Simon's inner monologue when he's thinking about it is just about the most victim-blaming stuff I've read in a romance novel. I know it's never as easy as just switching the genders, but seriously, if it were a man insisting on coming inside a woman who doesn't want to conceive, we call that sexual assault, Julian Assange. The book somewhat recovered from that, but not enough for me to recommend this book, which is a bummer, since I've heard so much good about this series. Hopefully the next one is better.

Content Warning: Bullying. Skip the prologue if you can't stand scenes of bullying. You won't miss anything vital, as everything it contains is referenced when pertinent.

Content Warning: Sexual assault. And we're supposed to forgive it.

The story starts as a “pretend we're dating” scheme as the blurb describes, but quickly switches to “he's damaged but I can fix him with love.” As Daphne repeatedly points out, she has three older brothers so she's used to the rough ways of men. Aka she's “not like other girls.” Simon doesn't talk much due to a stutter he's mostly conquered, but otherwise he's pretty standard. Daphne's mother is the best character. I'd enjoy a book from her perspective, manipulating her children into marriage.

Oh and the sex scenes are super vanilla.

I've enjoyed the Bridgerton show, so when I was in a reading slump I thought “why not?” This was entertaining for what it is. It's not my usual cup of tea, but romances and suspense/thrillers are good to get out of a slump. Everyone is a little bit awful and a little sweet. It's all ridiculous (always with these virgins being amazing in bed too...) but fun. I'll probably continue the series when I need out of a slump again.

Besides a plethora of scenes that needed a quick skip, I really enjoyed the overall vision and whit of the Netflix mini-series. Honestly, I had a bit of an ugh factor getting into the book. Truly, I enjoy reading the likes of [a:Jen Turano 5765468 Jen Turano https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1352299813p2/5765468.jpg] so much more, her books are wholesome and hilarious and fill the same time era and genre.

utterly disappointed, but perhaps i had held my hopes out too high for this.

there was a lot of promise initially, but this book eventually evolved into two tropes (neither of which i'm a fan of) and got into some pretty sketchy situations. the characters felt erratic and inconsistent, and i hated literally everyone but the third brother.

i think i'd actually put myself through the pain of re-reading pride & prejudice before re-reading this

I'm not that big a fan of romance novels, so the romance-y bits took away some of my enjoyment for me at reading this book. But if you like romance novels, you will probably give this five stars. I find it feels very like the show, so if you enjoy watching Bridgerton, you will enjoy this book. I very much like the characters and the base story, but would have personally enjoyed a more trimmed down novel more.

So this is my second Julia Quinn book and I decided to read it because of the hype of the new Netflix show of course. I'm so beyond disappointed. I was actually really enjoying this book, I thought the couple was cute and it was a decent lighthearted read to listen to on my drive to work. But then then the author ruined it. I could look past Daphne getting suddenly ridiculously naive about sex despite being portrayed as more knowledgeable than most women due to her brothers throughout the book. But I can't get past the scene where she doesn't let Simon pull out. At this point they've been fighting about having children or not and so when he's drunk Daphne decides to take advantage of Simon. Already a red flag that had me cringing, but he seems to get into it, and I get it lots of people do enjoy having sex while drunk, fine... but then she knowingly stops him from pulling out and tries to force having a baby on him. This is in no way okay. I can't believe how many reviewers below are justifying this action and saying it's fine because they are married. I know marriage was treated differently in history than modern times, but I'm personally not interested in reading about toxic abuse portrayed as a romance. I've also since seen that the Netflix adaptation has kept this scene in so I will be skipping that as well sadly.

I was curious to read this book because of the Netflix series. I haven't watched the show but I've heard some blurbs about it. And, I had fun reading it, for the most part. I thought the build-up romance was well done in the beginning. I enjoyed the funny dialogues between the two main protagonists. But there was something weird about the female main character. Daphne was portrayed as being smart for the local regency standards. We hear her saying that she was raised with 4 brothers, so she knew everything about rakes and swear words. She's in her 20's, and then we find out that she didn't know how babies are made? And she didn't have a clue what happens to “consummate a marriage”? That threw me off a little bit, suddenly she wasn't as smart as I'd thought.
And the conundrum of the Duke, Simon, falling for her and not wanting to marry her because of his issues with siring heirs that was also related to his issues with his late father... anyway.
I prefer historical romance when the characters break with the status quo of the time. When they question cultural norms. And in this one the female character, Daphne, achieves her dream of marrying and having a family, changing the Duke's opinion about being father. They live happy ever after. The end.
So, I was enjyoing it in the beginning but then it turned to be bleh in the end.

Yeah this is going to be full of spoilers but I'm going to put my thoughts here, because why not.

I didn't identify with Daphne at all. She comes from a family that doesn't know want, need, or dysfunction that hurts you.

I identified with Simon, and I felt weird watching his problems get minimized(with author choice, because he wasn't actually raised by his father much) and then swept under the rug, there's very little focus on him healing so much as him sweeping aside his trauma to give Daphne what she wanted.

I'm not going to say the book is bad, I'm giving it a 5 star review because it's a cute romance book outside of the parts that triggered me deeply–I don't want children, and as a woman it would be horrifying to go through a situation like this–where I marry someone telling him I don't want to have kids, that I have really hard pregnancies, only for him to force me into having kids for him, despite how awful the pregnancies are. Starting the marriage knowing that I would struggle to parent knowing my father is much like Simon's Father, only he didn't send me away and I had to deal with him every day.

I don't think this is series is for me, I guess I am glad I read about it and wish it dealt more directly with Simon's trauma rather than narratively minimizing it.

Rating: 4.5/5
Rounded down to 4 stars

I was pleasantly surprised, I truly enjoyed this one. I looked forward to reading this and enjoyed it throughout the experience. I rated it 4.5 stars due to the fact that the switch from “fake courting” to actual feelings felt really quick. I would have liked to see more scenes of them talking, but that's just me personally.