TEST
Despite the fact that none of the books in Lenora Bell’s The Disgraceful Dukes trilogy had earned better than a D from the team here at All About Romance, I nonetheless decided to give her new series a try. New year, fresh start and all that. Unfortunately, What a Difference a Duke Makes, is – if at all possible – worse than the previous three books. From its odd Mary-Poppins-meets-Jane-Eyre premise (that doesn’t even make any sense; and there’s absolutely nothing subtle about it), to its heroine – improbably named Mari (rhymes with ‘starry’ – as if that helps understand it’s presence in a 19th CENTURY HISTORICAL) and complete break with anything resembling period appropriate behavior/customs or norms, the only difference What a Difference a Duke Makes is that it earns an F instead of a D. Once again, Ms. Bell plays fast and loose with the time period, makes caricatures of principal and secondary characters alike, and writes stories so ridiculously over-the-top implausible for the era and setting (well, that’s being generous – they’re implausible in any circumstance) that I’m surprised my eyes haven’t popped out of my poor head. People. This is not historical romance. This is simply bad romance.
When Miss Mari Perkins arrives fifteen minutes late for her interview at Mrs. Trilby’s Agency for Superior Governesses, she’s flustered and apologetic. But Mrs. Trilby is annoyed and doesn’t soften even after Mari explains why she’s late:
“I’m dreadfully sorry, truly I am. There was a lame girl trying to cross a crowded avenue and I was afraid she’d be crushed. I sprang to her assistance, but while I was helping her several children made off with my trunk. Little ruffians.”
Little ruffians? Mrs. Trilby, evil incarnate (or so Ms. Bell insinuates), is unsympathetic and orders her to leave. But fortunately for Mari, Mrs. Trilby is willing to listen and empathize when an employee loudly disparages a valued client and his children – Edgar Rochester, Duke of Banksford. Sensing an opportunity, Mari quickly rips the ribbon from her hat, asks the maid for a needle and thread , and eavesdrops at the door while Mrs. Trilby soothes her angry employee. Mari leaves the agency and heads to the Duke of Banksford’s home to presents herself as the new governess.
Banksford is at his wit’s end caring for nine-year old twins Michel and Adele. He only discovered their existence after their mother – a poetess twice his age with whom he had a youthful affair – passed away, and their nanny wrote asking for help. The twins have chased away their fourth governess, and Banksford despairs of who Mrs. Trilby will send next. He’s spent the morning with his sister, India (an intrepid archaeologist who dresses in masculine clothing and carries a knife) discussing the children and the poor timing of their arrival. He owns the Vulcan Foundry and is so, so, so close to producing a steam powered fire engine… if only his actual life wouldn’t get in the way. India urges him to marry and to wager which of them will marry first, when they’re interrupted by his butler who informs him the new governess has arrived. Surprised, he asks that she be brought to his study so he can test her mettle. As if.
I won’t insult your intelligence by pretending you don’t already know where this is going. Mari browbeats the duke into giving her the job (yep, that’s normal), insisting he give her a week to prove herself, whilst India gets a twinkle in her eye (she can already sense something between them) and the pair immediately start thinking lustful thoughts about each other. Everything about this first meeting is ridiculous – the insta-lust, Mari’s impertinence, Lady India’s interest in the spunky governess and tacit approval of her as marriage material, and Ms. Bell’s seeming inability to understand that governesses don’t smart-mouth and verbally second-guess dukes and dukes don’t tolerate flippant/smartass governesses simply because they’re pretty. Nor does anyone (duke or not) accept at face value someone dressed in dripping clothes and lacking any references or introduction, as an appropriate caretaker for their children. Oh, and the duke also makes wildly inappropriate comments about her attractiveness. The whole first meeting is so bizarrely implausible, I had to put the book down, bang my head against the wall and walk away from it.
The story unfolds as the capable and oddly wise (though COMPLETELY UNPROVEN AND INEXPERIENCED) Mary Poppins – oh, sorry, Mari – meets the twins and immediately intuits exactly what they need. She quotes poetry at odd moments, soothes their anxieties with magical (fake) elixirs, and solves every problem that comes her way. India stops by and gives her all the beautiful clothing her mother tries to finagle her into wearing (totally normal), and donates the services of her maid to dress Mari’s hair. Because she’s a governess with no references and no experience and that’s how you treat a household employee you hope will marry your duke/blue-collar-ish brother. Ahem. That’s not actually a thing, Ms. Bell.
Mari is devoted to the twins and Banksford from the moment they meet, and she can’t help but fall for him even though she senses he feels unworthy of her affections or the children’s love. She cajoles and coaxes his deepest darkest insecurities and worries, and tempts him to kiss her and more. She’s annoyed when he pushes her away and even when he insists he can’t give in to his lustful urges, she berates him for being a coward. A few reminders for you: she’s a virgin, she’s his employee, she’s lied her way into the position and they barely know each other. Oh, and the real reason she’s in London is to discover who her true parents are. She’s spent a lifetime at the awful orphanage where she was abandoned as an infant, and she has only a few clues to her true parentage.
Edgar tries to resist his infatuation with his children’s governess. His father was notorious for taking liberties with servants and it disgusted him. He’s estranged from his mother over something to do with dad… but it’s a BIG SECRET and all we know is that it damaged him. So Ms. Bell focuses instead on his feelings for the new governess he barely knows. Reader, he wants her. Desperately. And in Ms. Bell’s world, that’s enough to justify pretty much anything. Mari is wise, beautiful, capable, sensitive… we get it. And don’t forget the mutual lust. So faced with his frustrations over his foundry and failed attempts to create a steam something or other (it really doesn’t matter, it’s all simply to illustrate that Edgar isn’t your typical duke) and his physical frustration whenever he’s with Mari, he gives into temptation and he decides to give her pleasure while withholding his own. It’s not enough! Duh. And these two soon find themselves making love while the stars twinkle above.
Everything in this book is so obvious, ridiculous and over the top, and there aren’t enough words or reasons for me to tell you all of them. The characters are caricatures, the dialogue is wooden and silly, the internal PoVs are cringe-worthy, and everything you guess can or will happen – does. There’s nothing original or special about What a Difference a Duke Makes and it bears only a passing resemblance to an authentic 19th century historical romance.
Publisher’s note: There are two reviews of this book. The other one, by Shannon, gave What a Difference A Duke Makes a B.
Buy it at: Amazon/Barnes & Noble/iBooks/Kobo
Grade: F
Book Type: Historical Romance
Sensuality: Warm
Review Date: 17/04/18
Publication Date: 03/2018
Recent Comments …
Yep
This sounds delightful! I’m grabbing it, thanks
excellent book: interesting, funny dialogs, deep understanding of each character, interesting secondary characters, and also sexy.
I don’t think anyone expects you to post UK prices – it’s just a shame that such a great sale…
I’m sorry about that. We don’t have any way to post British prices as an American based site.
I have several of her books on my TBR and after reading this am moving them up the pile.
I love romance novels - all kinds.
I love music - some kinds.
I have strong opinions about both and I like to share them.
Related Reviews
Is it terrible that every time a Bell book comes out, I wait with bated breath to find out what we’re gonna give it this time? This was so much fun to read, Em!
Caz & I are of similar minds about Ms. Bell. Y’ll would have loved to see our long running email exchange on this book :)
I didn’t love the story – but my (sorry, one of my) biggest issues with Ms. Bell’s books are that they purport to be Regency historical’s. I love romance for romance, and I read in lots of diverse genres to get my “fix.”. However, if you are going to disregard/ignore period appropriate details – names, relationships, professions, class distinctions, etc. – then call it what it is: historical fantasy or history-esque or in this particular case, call it a fairy tale. (FTR, my grade would be the same anyway you shape it).
I read and review a lot of historical romance and I love it – even sometimes when I think the plot is implausible. [the duke ‘situation’ leads to many of these]. However, this book and this author do a disservice to other regency/historical authors who do the research and get the details right. It doesn’t belong in the same category.
At the end of the day, if you dislike a book intensely, you get to. I have my bookclub reading Next Year in Havana and my friend told me she could barely get through all the veiled looks and glancing touches. And that’s cool. Although now I am kinda afraid to go to bookclub….
I loved this review and have enjoyed reading the comments. It is far harder to write an F than an A review and make the reader clearly understand the issues. I always make a point to read them and 1* reviews on Amazon. Well done, Emm Whittmann!
THANK YOU!
EM
I loved this book and everything written by Lenora Bell. I started reading historical romances after exclusively reading paranormal romances, urban fantasy and high fantasy. With no great knowledge of history, I just read historical romances as if they were another type of fantasy. I just immerse myself in the story and if I like the characters and the plot, it won’t bother me if it’s not historically accurate. I read to escape from the real world, so I’m just not bothered by over the top stories.
I, too, am like that with historicals. If they teach me history–thank you Meredith Duran and Sherry Thomas–I’m thrilled. But I don’t care whether the minutia of the leads lives in portrayed accurately. I’m just here for the story.
Of course there’s historical accuracy and there’s historical accuracy. All these rakish heroes would probably have been dead of the pox by the age of thirty, have rotten teeth and be fat and bow-legged in actuality, so of course the young, handsome, rich, titled gentleman with the fit body is a fantasy. No problem with that. It’s also not about the minutiae of their lives being portrayed accurately – it’s a far wider issue than that. In a fantasy novel, for instance, the author will go to a lot of trouble with the world-building and along the way will probably set out certain rules or hierarchies or whatever. In British historicals, those rules and hierarchies already exist in a certain strata of society (the one most often written about – the ton). A fantasy author isn’t going to set up their scene and then purposely ignore it. But this author (and she’s not the only one by a long chalk) does exactly that. The real challenge of writing a good historical is to find a way to get your H/h together by taking account of those rules and conventions and still making it work in a believable manner.
I meant to tag my last comment under this thread – but Caz sums it up quite well for me too!
The name Mairi is pronounced ‘starry’ and is Gaelic, so maybe it’s a spelling error?
Great review of a simply awful book! Please someone explain how an author like this gets published!
The Duke thing in romance is annoying, but what’s worse is that most of the “new” historical writers don’t have a clue how to portray a Duke with any quality of skill which drives me crazy! I think publishers equate Duke with billionaire as far as eliteness in status.
Oh Gigi the issue of proper address is my biggest pet peeve in historical romances. I want to jump up and down while shouting my annoyance to lazy authors and editors who can’t be bothered to take five minutes to google “peerage address” in order to get it right. I just read a Candace Camp book where she repeatedly made the same mistake you are talking about and she has been writing for at least twenty years! .
I’m glad I’m not the only one who gets so aggravated with this :) I blame the popularity and the influx of historical “lite” authors like this one for the lack of quality. I honestly think that authors and editors know the people who read and enjoy these atrocious books aren’t reading for accuracy so they just let it slide. It irks me to no end.
Wasn’t this author nominated for a RITA? This is why I don’t take those things seriously. I have never read this author but the review reminds me of a Christi Caldwell book where the hero, an Earl, referred to the heroine as both Lady Anne and Lady Adamson in one sentence (she was the daughter of an Earl). Later within the same chapter, he started calling her Lady Anne Adamson. I just couldn’t with that book and DNF’d even though it came highly praised ugh!
Yes – and those are my thoughts exactly. The crop of nominations in the historical categories this year are – with a couple of exceptions – atrocious.
Yes. 100% agreed. The selections this year are insane. I was disappointed in many of the nominees – especially this one.
There was a Regency book that I liked well enough, except that everyone referred to the Duchess as “Duchess”. As in, “I’ll prove to you how it works, Duchess” and “There’s a world out there for me, Duchess” and did the same with the Duke, like these were nicknames instead of titles. If the speaker had been an American, and this was a saucy Americanism that shocked everybody, well, that would have been one thing. But it wasn’t, and it was absolutely maddening. It would not have been acceptable in fanfic, much less published works.
Is that Eloisa James’ Four Nights with a Duke?
Wasn’t it Mark Twain who said that the difference between fact and fiction is that fiction has to make sense?
Yes!! :)
I’m having more and more difficulty with the whole world of historical romance (at least pretty much anything set in England) and the emphasis on Dukes as protagonists. They’re everywhere (the Dukes) and their romantic pairings are becoming increasingly hard to swallow – even from authors who write exceedingly well and are on my auto-read lists. Recently I’ve read an historical with a Duke whose relationship is with a social secretary (who also happens to be the daughter of thieves), a Duke whose relationship is with a woman who is the abandoned bastard child of an aristocrat who grew up in the slums and runs a tavern, a Duke whose relationship is with the daughter of a writer of gothic tales, and there are more. All of these are by authors I love to read and are generally solidly written, but good lord the suspension of disbelief is getting harder and harder.
I do understand that the press for the Ducal hero is probably coming from the publishers, but I don’t know how much more I can take.
I hear everything you are saying Jane…but I still love them!
I’ve been told by a few different authors that they have been told to make their heroes dukes (or noblemen at the very least) because “dukes sell”. Yet these men could just as easily be wealthy landed gentry or businessmen, which would make many of the cross-class romances a bit more credible.
I’m at the stage now where I read the stories and try to forget the hero is a duke. (I’m reading the duke/daughter of thieves one now, actually and am already rolling my eyes). Like you, Jane, I’m becoming increasingly weary of them.
I too can mostly sink into the story, when it’s written by an author I like, and forget that the heroes are dukes, but boy, oh boy. The contemporary version of this is the billionaire, but at least there they aren’t constrained by hundreds of years of societal norms. Sure the billionaire who has dated every supermodel on the planet but falls for the klutzy, PR wiz, is a bit much, but still in the realm.
I will say I’ve been reading a fair number of royal contemporary romances (a very mixed bag ranging from very bad to very good) and I’m fine with suspending all belief with those Princes and Princesses of imaginary kingdoms. Just read A PRINCESS IN THEORY and loved it. And lucked into the sequel as a galley a day later, A DUKE BY DEFAULT and oooh it’s soooo good.
I think the factor that makes these okay is that they’re set in imaginary places or have altered realities, i.e. a Scotland that has a King, or an England whose Queen is not Elizabeth, that’s all fine. It’s where the book is meant to actually be grounded in real history that it’s becoming a deal breaker. Some inconsistency on my part I know, but we all have our deal breakers. ;-)
I tried one of those contemporary royal stories – I think it was an Emma Chase – and it was just awful. It was like the author had decided to cut off a bit of Scotland and change the laws of the land for her storytelling purposes. I can deal when it’s an alternate reality (like Lilah Pace’s His Royal Secret/Favourite, or Laura Andersen’s Boleyn Trilogy – and in both cases, the alternate realities are quite plausible) – and all those HPs with princes and kings are set in fictional European principalities. But yes, the billionaire falling for the tea-lady, while unlikely, is still more plausible than the duke and the street urchin.
::laughing:: There seems to be an ongoing competition, who can come up with the most unbelievable pairing with a duke. Just because it could’ve happened in real life doesn’t mean it should in fiction.
I wrote a historical romance where the hero is not titled and works as an architect. Samhain acquired it but didn’t publish it before they went out of business, so I tried shopping the manuscript around. I can’t get anyone to look at it.
Now I see my mistake. Should have made the hero a duke.
Definitely. You could even make him a duke who’s an architect. But make sure that he’s been sufficiently tortured by life, dead mom, abusive/neglectful dad, suspected of murdering his first wife, and a scarred face from that time he was working as a spy during the war and was captured by the enemy. If you can throw in a collection of brothers/friends who are all also dukes, then you’re really cooking. Now you’ve got a series.
LOL!
This is a hilarious comment. I am laughing even as I know I will read those books if Marian writes them.
Oh my GOD I cackled!
I liked her first book….
It was my favorite of the ones I’ve read.
It was still a dud though – all the things you mention about highly implausible situations and ridiculous dialogue are present there, too. And these dukes who are arriving to make scientific discoveries, or in.the case of the first book, make cocoa affordable for all should instead have been working on changing the law and funding charitable institutions. I mean what good is affordable cocoa to someone starving in the gutter?!
Oh, and even in 2018, you wouldn’t entrust your kids to a complete stranger who arrived looking like a drowned rat.
I applaud your fortitude in sticking this out to the bitter end. After 3 D grades in a row, this author is on my ‘don’t touch with a bargepole’ list – good for you for at least giving her another try, and sorry you had to wade through such rubbish.
She got positive reviews from a few other blogs/journals I review. I struggle to understand a few things about those reviews: 1. How they can completely ignore basic behavior norms of the time period; 2. How they can accept all the implausible leaps of logic the story takes; and 3. The over the top dialogue and silly characterization of the principal characters. I do think – buried deep in Ms. Bell’s novels – all of her stories start from a compelling idea or premise. But the execution is poor.
This is my last Bell. There. I said it. I mean it.
As a Jane Eyre fan, this book would bother me because so much of the point of that book is that neither of them can talk openly about what is happening between them. A master can’t be interested in his servant without pressuring her, and a servant can’t be interested in the boss without opening herself to disaster. A book where everyone is fine with everything has no tension.
Great point!