The Duke's Privateer by Amy JareckiMy rating: 2 of 5 stars
I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
When she became a debutante, Eleanor discovered that her family was in financial ruin. Her father is a viscount but when he came back from the war, he sunk into a depression that left him uncommunicative for a decade. The Baroness of Derby took Eleanor under her wing and from there Eleanor manages to build a smuggling empire. The Prince of Wales may be on her side but when Sherborn Price, the Duke of Danby is given the role to oversee the task of clearing England's shores of smugglers, Eleanor knows she's in trouble.
She was Eleanor Kent, a woman with nerves of steel, who needed no man, especially a man who stood to ruin the empire she had spent years building.
This is third in a series but I had no problems starting here; there is clearly characters from previous books but they weren't intrusive. What I did have some problem with was how little Eleanor's privateer aspect played a part. The beginning explains the hows and whys of Eleanor becoming a privateer, even mentions how she went on some runs and brings in the Prince of Wales for some real historical figure addition as he knows and helps her avoid authorities, but by the time the reader comes into the story, Eleanor is more of an interior designer. The style of chinoiserie is said to be popular at this time (you will read this word over and over) and Eleanor is supposedly the authority on it. Sherborn comes into the story as he meets Eleanor and the Prince leads him to think Eleanor could be smuggling items into England, ending smuggling is a new task he has been charged with. His curiosity and attraction have him inviting Eleanor to his home under the guise that his mother wants to redo a salon in the chinoiserie style.
He was as beautiful as nightshade and the jumping in the pit of her stomach was nothing but a warning.
I'm not sure if, because of the title, I was looking for more action, maybe even some high seas, that this story ended up feeling a little dull and meandering. As the attraction grows between Eleanor and Sherborn, she gets angsty over thinking Sherborn is just faking it so he can get close to her and get evidence of her smuggling. Sherborn isn't the greatest detective and for the most part overhears some things and then hires a Bow Street Runner to do the investigating for him and then his focus is him liking Eleanor.
The middle gives us a baby found in a park that Eleanor decides she must keep, her father talking for the first time in ten years because Sherborn reads to him from a dirty book, and then Sherborn deciding that he must marry Eleanor to protect her when/if she gets in trouble for smuggling. Feeling put out about the lack of any high seas action or smuggling danger action, I turned to the romance but while there were some felt hints of attraction between the two, their physicality scenes were uncomfortable to read. Their first kiss scene reads as dubious consent as Eleanor kept telling Sherborn “No.” and trying to refuse his kisses, which he just kept ignoring. I could see some calling it weaker dubious consent but it was still dubious consent. The last 20% has Sherborn working to court his wife but Eleanor dealing with the housekeeper and maids butts in at times and takes away from the romance. The last 10% has their first sex scene and starts off with a little of the dubious consent again, has a sick baby interruption, and then Eleanor finally getting into it. There's one more ending sex scene that felt out of place before Eleanor and Sherborn get their happily ever after. If you don't go in expecting some privateer action like I did and have enjoyed previous books in the series, you'd probably enjoy this more gradual paced story.
