3.5/5.

The Vibes: brother's best friend, romcom, known each other since childhood

Heat Index: 6/10

The Basics:

Giles, the Duke of Blackwood, has long been in the orbit of his best friend's little sister, Alice Ancaster. And while neither of them really want to admit it, they've long had a thing for each other, too. Now Alice needs a husband ASAP, and deep down, Giles is who she wants. But he's reckless and unserious—he'll never step up. Will he?

The Review:

Hmm.... HMMMMM....

I was really looking forward to this book after reading the first two in this trilogy (about Giles's BFFs, including Alice's brother, the hero of my favorite installment A Duke in Shining Armor). You get this setup of Giles and Alice as a married couple who clearly have damage. So I went into this expecting one of my favorite tropes, marriage in trouble.

It is not, in fact, marriage in trouble.

Or it is—but these two really don't get married until two-thirds of the way into the novel, and then we have some friction. Which does put their marriage in trouble, yes. But it's not HUGELY in trouble. It's very "these are young people and they are having silly early marriage issues that they kind of blow out of proportion because perhaps they weren't quite ready for marriage even if they love each other".

That's not a bad thing at all. Sometimes, it can be refreshingly realistic. But! I really wouldn't call this a marriage in trouble book, ultimately. There just isn't much time spent on the marriage; it's a brother's best friend book. And that also isn't bad. If you go into this raw (which you can, though the other heroes are fairly heavily involved and this goes back in the series timeline, essentially) you may actually enjoy it more than people who were looking forward to a marriage in trouble novel.

And this has a lot of the hallmarks you expect from a Loretta Chase book—it's breezy, it's QUITE funny, it never takes itself too seriously. The prose is great. But I will say, I feel that some of the other books I've read by her (and I haven't read a TON) tend to be a little more romantic. They're often romcoms, yes, but they're heavier on the rom than they are on the com (lmao).

Here... I don't know. I enjoyed it. I read along briskly, I had fun with it. I enjoyed seeing the other characters from the trilogy. But I kind of felt like the friendship between The Boyz (The Disgraces) was more well-built than the romance?

And that can be a challenge when you jump into a romance where the characters have known each other for years. I personally love that shit. But in some cases, it can feel like the author sort of expects you to Get It, and maybe you don't, because you've never met these people before.

Here, I just felt like we didn't quite dig into the romance enough. And a lot of stuff happens before these two really dig into it themselves. A lot of subplots.

Honestly, if you're a Loretta die-hard, you're going to be into this. The writing remains great. But the romance factor? Could've been fleshed out more. At the same time, I'm not sure I would've felt that way if she'd stuck with the marriage in trouble plot I expected. And not everyone is going to expect that. The average reader won't expect it.

The Sex:

Pretty normal Loretta Chase sex scenes! Cute, sweet, explicit but not overly so, vanilla, tender. Don't really occur until later in the book, like I mentioned. I could've done with a bit more, personally, but that's me.

This was cute! I just kind of think it could've been on another level, y'know? Still worth reading if you love Chase. She's just set a high standard for herself. A double-edged sword indeed.

Thanks to NetGalley and Avon for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

We’re back to visit with the Dis-Graces in the third installment of Loretta Chase’s Difficult Dukes series. This is the story of Alice and Blackwood, who are married but estranged in the first two books.

I love Loretta Chase’s writing and the good stuff was present here: great dialogue, interesting characters, well-drawn settings. The problem for me was the plot that included All The Things: evil villain, criminal mastermind, disappearing (3 times!) street urchin, rejected suitors (Justice for Doveridge! Give me his book!), relations in mourning, misbehaving friends, childhood trauma…it goes on and on and distracts from the romance at the heart of the story. I really just wanted more time with Alice and Blackwood.

Thanks to NetGalley and Avon/Harper Voyager for an eARC. Opinions are my own.