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The Duke and I – Julia Quinn
The Bridgerton Family
Book One
AVON,
January 2000
ISBN-13: 978-0380800827
ISBN-10: 0380800829
Reviewed by Amanda
January 2006
THE DUKE AND I is the first of Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton series, and the first Quinn book that I have ever read. I have heard wonderful things about the novels of Julia Quinn, and looked forward to giving this author a try. The wildly popular Bridgerton series seemed like a good place to start, and I was very pleased with what I found.
Daphne Bridgerton is the oldest of the Bridgerton daughters, although not the oldest Bridgerton child. There are eight Bridgerton children, and they are named in alphabetical order: Anthony, Benedict, Colin, Daphne, Eloise, Francesca, Gregory, and Hyacinth. This is Daphne’s second season on the marriage mart, and the widowed Violet Bridgerton is desperate to see her daughter make a good match. After all, while a man may play the rakish bachelor for a while, it is terrible for a woman to become a spinster. Violet is a good and loving mother that runs a tight ship. Daphne is tired of being trotted from one event to another and meeting dreadfully boring old men. If only people didn’t see her as one of the Bridgerton eight…
Simon Bassett, the Duke of Hastings has had a hard life. His father, the former Duke, was a terrible man, pressing his unwell wife to bear him a son even though it ended up costing her her life, and then disowning his son because he wasn’t perfect. Because of speech problems that Simon had in childhood, his father couldn’t love him, wouldn’t acknowledge him, and crippled Simon’s self-esteem. Simon overcame his speech impediment, but remains the scarred, unloved child inside. Simon has no plans to marry or have children as a result of his unhappy upbringing.
It is by chance that he and Daphne meet at a society ball, and soon realize that they have much in common. They decide to hatch a plan…they will pretend to court one another and be each other’s companion at social events. The benefit for Simon is that the mothers looking to marry off their daughters will leave him alone, and for Daphne, she might just catch the eye of some young men. Especially since the Lady Whistledown Society Papers, a local anonymous gossip column, reports on all of society’s doings, especially those of a Duke. Who wouldn’t be interested in the young lady that caught the eye of the hottest new bachelor in town?
Everything goes according to plan, until the false courtship starts to turn into something more. Can a man with a hardened heart let go of his past for a chance at a future?
I enjoyed reading about the Bridgerton clan and the overall lightness of this book. At times, it became surprisingly serious, particularly towards the end, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Each chapter was preceded by a snippet from Lady Whistledown’s Society column, which was a cute little teaser, and at times the narrative was quite whimsical. Julia Quinn definitely has an original voice, and her characters are memorable and distinctive.
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