Say No to the Duke
The Wildes of Lindow Castle
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4.3 • 40 Ratings
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Could she possibly refuse a duke’s hand—in favor of a sardonic, sinful rake?
Lady Betsy Wilde’s first season was triumphant by any measure, and a duke has proposed—but before marriage, she longs for one last adventure.
No gentleman would agree to her scandalous plan—but Lord Jeremy Roden is no gentleman. He offers a wager. If she wins a billiards game, he’ll provide the breeches.
If he wins…she is his, for one wild night.
But what happens when Jeremy realizes that one night will never be enough? In the most important battle of his life, he’ll have to convince Betsy to say no to the duke.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
James's fourth visit to the Wildes of Lindow Castle (after Born to be Wilde) struggles to incorporate mental illness, social stigma, and trauma into a fluffy Regency romance. Lady Boadicea "Betsy" Wilde's reputation is tainted through no fault of her own: she's believed to have inherited her mother's debauched and licentious nature. To compensate, Betsy transforms herself into a model of propriety. An engagement to the future Duke of Eversley should be the culmination of her efforts until her brother's best friend, Lord Jeremy Roden, interrupts her conquest. Jeremy, devastated by his wartime service, endured a stint in Bedlam that only made things worse. Little alleviates his depression until Betsy proposes a bet over a game of billiards: if she wins, Jeremy will escort her on a daring, disguised journey around London; if he wins, he gets one night in bed with her. Even after their tryst turns into love, the demons of the past make a happy future seem impossible. James creates blistering chemistry between her protagonists, but her light tone betrays the deeper, complex issues of trauma and shame that her characters are forced to face. By not integrating the romantic plot line and the journey of psychological recovery, this story falls short of its ambitions.
Customer Reviews
Delightful Story
I received an ARC of this book to read through Edelweiss+ in exchange for a fair review. Say No to the Duke by Eloisa James is the fourth book in her delightful Wildes of Lindow Castle series. I’m going to use the word delightful twice or more in the same review because that’s what this book is, an absolute delight so much so that I devoured the entire book in a day and may have to go back and read it once more. It could perhaps be read as a stand-alone but I really enjoyed the series and I think you should read them all because the characters in this book are in the previous books and you watch them grow and change over the series. Lady Boadicea (Betsy) Wilde is a most excellent heroine, she is bold, very intelligent, and strong. I was about to describe her as fearless but she is not, she does have her fears as we all do but she seeks to find ways to overcome them not letting them paralyse her and if that means putting on the mask of the perfect debutante she will do that and excel, gathering proposals of marriage like daisy’s on a chain. Lord Jeremy Roden is her equal as a hero, damaged by war and suffering from PTSD he is recovering at Lindow Castle and has taken up occupancy of the billiards room drinking whiskey like it’s water and struggling through the hellish nightmares that war has left him with.He too is finding ways to overcome his fears. Thanks to a little matchmaking by Aunt Knowe, Betsy and Jeremy gradually come to know each other without their masks and it is a lovely slow burn of a romance full of moments that make you pause to read them again because … delight, one of which would be the moment where the title makes sense. Medium Steam. Publishing Date June 25, 2019 #Edelweissplus #SayNototheDuke #EloisaJames #AvonBooks #AvonRomance #HistoricalRomanceBooks