The Duke and I

Recently, I came across “Bridgerton” on Netflix and - much to the dismay of my family - I really enjoyed it. Now, what would be more sensible than to look for the “source material”?So I did and was somewhat mystified why, at the time of writing this, “The Duke and I” only features an average score of 3.87. Looking into this made it obvious that one scene from the Netflix series was based on something many reviewers considered a “rape scene”.Fully expecting this to be exaggerated, I started reading - and found myself enjoying things very much: The chemistry between Daphne and Simon that permeates the entire book and that has been transformed so nicely to the TV screen, the bantering, the family - everything was pretty much great.If you like romance (I certainly do! :) ), tinged with fictitious history (I do enjoy a good historical novel at times as well), you can hardly go wrong. Then came that scene...I don't want to dive into it in any detail or argue in any direction but, yes, that scene left a bitter taste. Especially since Daphne fluctuates between regret and justification of what she did.It did mar my enjoyment of this otherwise very amusing, quick and easy read to some extent.Everything that came after was slightly tainted even though Quinn makes things work between Daphne and Simon and at least this reader. Your mileage may vary.A slightly guilty-feeling four stars out of five. Blog Facebook Twitter Instagram