Series: The Bareknuckle Bastards, #1
Traits & Tropes: class difference; wallflower heroine; damaged hero; heroine needs to marry for money; revenge plot
Publication Date: 06.19.18
Genre/Setting: Historical; Victorian; London, England, 1837
Heat Level: 2
Rating: 4/5
Narration Rating: 4/5
When a mysterious stranger finds Lady Felicity Faircloth on the balcony outside a crowded ball and offers to help her snare a duke for a husband, she agrees. But Felicity doesn’t want just a convenient arrangement, she wants to learn how to inspire passion.
An illegitimate son of a duke turned king of Covent Garden, Devil has built up power and a dangerous reputation since he was a child. This wallflower spinster is exactly the piece he needs to set into motion a revenge plan he’s been entertaining for years. He just has to make a rather plain debutante into a seductress to lure in his enemy.
Devil finds Felicity to be far from plain and she soon realizes she prefers Devil over anyone else. The plans Devil so precisely devised are soon in tatters and he has to choose between the revenge that has obsessed him and his own desires and chance at happiness.
It took me a while to get into this book and listening to it on audio I found myself rather easily distracted. Some sections, particularly some of Felicity and Devil’s conversations about darkness and flame, grew a little repetitive and stalled the flow for me a bit. Felicity also frustrated me at times with her disregard for Devil’s wishes but by the latter half of the book I was all for her challenging him and it was definitely something he needed, as he otherwise took his belief that he could never be good enough for her too far. I think my change of heart with regards to Felicity really came when she stopped being so fixated on being accepted back into the ranks of her former friends amongst the Ton. Once she got her priorities straight, she became a character I could root for and I wound up loving her refusal to let Devil push her away. Though parts of the book were a bit sluggish and too long, I absolutely became engrossed in the story with the uptick in action in the latter quarter or so. The declaration of feelings scene between Devin and Felicity is now one of my favorites that I’ve ever read. I read this series completely out of order, but I’m okay with that and happy to have now filled in the gaps for myself.
https://www.bookbub.com/reviews/282528024
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2468700339
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