Series: N/A
Traits & Tropes: hidden identity; hero returning to society; titled hero; class difference
Publication Date: 02.27.23
Genre/Setting: Historical; Victorian; Hertfordshire/London, England, April, 1884
Heat Level: 4
Rating: 4.5/5
James Winters, the Duke of Wulverton, has been presumed dead for the past ten years, only to have survived the frigid Yukon wilderness and been returned to a world he hardly recognizes. After such a long time in peaceful silence, James is quickly overwhelmed by a family he’s tried to avoid thinking about and a noisy, artificial world that makes little sense to him. He has just three weeks to learn to present himself as a gentlemanly duke to the Queen or risk further scandal for his family and potential asylum for himself.
Up and coming psychologist Jules Southby is an expert at disguises, having lived as a boy since her birth. She’s taken full advantage of the freedoms offered to young men and has no idea how to be a lady, but when she meets the duke she’s thoroughly shocked by her visceral reaction to him, and by the fact that he seems to have immediately seen what she really is.
Jules doesn’t have much time to turn the duke into a proper aristocrat and it doesn’t help that his presence discomposes her. The attraction between them is undeniable but hopeless because loving the duke would mean giving up the life she’s known and the freedom it has allowed her to enjoy.
This book is nothing like anything I’ve ever read. The plot is completely bonkers, very old school, and definitely requires quite a bit of suspension of disbelief, but if you go in prepared for all that it’s totally worth it. I thoroughly enjoyed this respite from the usual ballroom formula for Regency/Victorian romance employed here. I’m sure we’ve all read a forbidden romance and one with a hidden identity, but I’ve certainly never read those elements in this combination before. Giving us this set up meant that James and Jules got much more alone time than couples usually do since Jules was believed to be a man and never needed a chaperone. The interactions between James and Jules were very well done and I loved the fact that they both saw through one another’s façade and became the safe space where they could be themselves.
Beneath the veneer of professionalism, Jules just wanted to belong and be accepted for the person she was, not who she’d been forced to pretend to be. Though she loved the freedom of life as a man, she wanted to have the chance to find love and that was being stolen from her within the confines of the life she’d been pushed into. For his outward stoicism and ferocity, James felt very deeply and was struggling mightily to cope with a return to his former life after ten years with no human contact whatsoever. Given how she’d had to limit human contact as well, this was something Jules was able to relate to on some level and once it was clear that James immediately saw exactly what she was, all bets were off. I loved that instantaneous connection and James’ devotion to Jules was like catnip to me. What I could’ve done without, however, was the brothel scene with the marquess. Yes, it served to show Jules’ and James’ devotion to one another, but it just felt creepy and the marquess came off as sleazy.
My only real complaint here is that the ending was a bit hasty. I was completely fine with how James and Jules came together and appreciative that it happened with fairly low angst. However, it did leave rather a lot implied off page when it came to their respective families and I really just wanted to see the duke put his family in their places one good time. His sister was the only one who made any sort of effort to understand him. Though it was clear that his mother loved him and wanted what she believed best for him, she wasn’t understanding at all of what he’d been through or the effect it had on him. She just expected him to go right back to the callow youth he’d been before he was lost and that just seemed crazy to me that she’d expect that. The rest of his family was even worse in their unrealistic expectations and demands on James and whilst staying, overstaying really, at his house. I just wanted him to assert himself as the duke a bit more, though I’m sure they would’ve found a way to make such behavior reflect poorly and perhaps James was aware of this and thus held his peace. Jules’ mother was just as bad. She was incredibly selfish and asked entirely too much of Jules because of her own fears, not giving any thought to the fact that it was Jules’ happiness at stake. Jules did at least stand up to her a bit, but not nearly as much as I wanted her to.
Overall, this book could’ve done with a more thorough epilogue to tidy things up, but I thoroughly enjoyed how unique and different this plot was with the Tarzan vibes, instant connection and hidden identity. It was a bit of old school craziness that I think I need more of in the future and just what I needed to read as a fun palate cleanse now.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
https://www.bookbub.com/reviews/4265162130
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5319827144
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