Review: Not That Duke

Not That Duke by Eloisa James
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

3.5 stars 

I received this book for free, this does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review 

“I will never marry Lady Stella.” 

Divided into two parts, you'll notice if you read the second in the Would-Be Wallflowers series, that the first of this is happening concurrently with that one. I haven't read the second and didn't have a problem following along here but there was some displacement that I felt might not have happened if I'd had the other part of the story. Basically, Stella has a crush/feelings for Silvester but as a short, freckled, wearing spectacles, bluestocking, she doesn't get the attention of the beautiful en vogue Yasmin. Yasmin has caught the attention of the ton men and has Silvester thinking he could be in love with her as he's dazzled by her smile and how well they seem to get along. Silvester's friend Giles, seems like he'd be a good match for Stella but Stella has caught the looks between Giles and Yasmin and, rightly, thinks they'll be married by seasons end. This first part takes up the first half of the book, there's some time jumps as they just seem to go from party to event, Yasmin getting the attention, some mean girlness from the chorus, and Stella enjoying the friendship she has developed with Silvester but trying to not fall in love with him as the rumors are that he's going to propose to Yasmin at any moment. 

The very sad, very secret, truth was that she was captivated by a frivolous aristocrat. 

Like I said, I didn't feel lost in the first half but while I was getting to know Lady Stella, orphaned at eight and sent to live with her aunt and uncle, who while distantly caring never quite meshed with Stella, causing her to feel somewhat unlovable for who she is, Silvester, the Duke of Huntington, who never felt cardboard but also felt like a distant character, I felt I couldn't quite sink into his distant emotions. After the dolloped here and then there with some time jumps first half, the second half settled down and focused on Stella and Silvester. While we got some telling of Silvester visiting Stella a lot, Stella and her aunt felt it was in friendship, even brotherly, there's enough to allude to the reader that he is genuinely starting to develop feelings for Stella, though. It did still feel a little abrupt when he asks her to marry him (reading the second book could have helped here with more context) and we get a little time devoted to Stella not believing in any feelings he may have for her, allowing that he may feel lust for her, and then getting strong armed into accepting his proposal. 

For the rest of his life, Silvester never forgot the experience of desiring his new wife so desperately that his hands shook as he removed garment, after garment, after garment. 

From there, we get sexcapades for a while, which were satisfyingly steamy but even though we were 65% into the story, I still felt new to this couple because of how the first half went. Then the latter second half gave us different povs from a chorus character named Blanche and Silvester's mother. Both felt out of place and gave a disjointed feel to the story. Blanche's felt like a jammed in pov to make readers anticipate her book and while I, for the most part, liked Silvester's mother, the placement of her pov didn't quite fit right, especially since goodwill feelings for her started to whither with how self-assured she was with saying Silvester still loved Yasmin and the like, creating more problems for our couple where they weren't needed. 

“We can make this marriage work,” she whispered. 

Since I didn't read the second book, I didn't have any feelings toward Yasmin or Giles, one way or the other but oh boy is Yasmin discussed in this one; I wonder if her name appears more times than Stella's. While that couple is featured, you don't get to know them, thoughts or feelings, so by the last twenty percent, I was done with hearing about Yasmin. It came off a little forced with Stella still thinking so surely that Silvester still had feelings for Yasmin and the last dark moment felt more annoying with, aforementioned mom, and Stella blowing out of proportion how Silvester acted at a party that Yasmin showed up to. I know I'm reading outside and not “in it” as the characters and Thee Emotion and Drama plus Stella's insecurities and all, but Silvester was pretty clearly head-over-heels for his wife, so yeah, some annoying forced in for drama ending. 

He seemed to...to care too much for his wife. 

There were also a good amount of little historical additives that helped to, outwardly anyway, to give this a feeling of time and place. Overall, I did enjoy this one, there was something about the chemistry between Stella and Silvester that couldn't be denied. There was a quick ending speech, I think readers would have loved a more immediate public showing/grovel, from Silvester to finally convince Stella his love was true and we got our happily ever after with an epilogue to expand on it. If you read the second, you'd definitely have to continue with this one but don't be afraid to jump in here either as I did, Stella and Silvester were at turns friendship and bedroom goals.

View all my reviews