Girl Meets Duke Book 3
Spoilers and trigger warnings:
- Childhood sexual abuse
I was so excited to read the story of Lady Penelope Campion, animal lover and creator if dreadful vegetarian food. In this one, the hero is called Gabriel Duke and is a self made man. As always it’s full of the usual humour of a Dare novel.
This started so well. It was just so comforting with the familiar characters, the humour, and the cute, if naughty, animals. The tension and heat between the characters topped off what I thought would be a five star read, but with only about a quarter of the story to go it turned sour for me. So much was crammed into that last quarter it just felt overdone. I was glad that Penny didn’t want Gabe to solve her problems for her and took action for herself, but everything else regarding the plot towards the end fell flat for me.
I was not completely convinced by the child sexual abuse twist. It felt tagged on as though the author suddenly thought Penny needed more depth. I was quite happy with Penny as the animal loving wallflower. I didn’t think she needed anything extra to have the reader feel empathy for her. There were only a few hints that she kept a hidden secret then she spurted it out towards the end, as though she needed to have an equally fraught past as Gabe to make them even.
The thing that tipped me against it was the lack of any suggestion that Penny had experienced these things. She did not hesitate to jump into a sexual relationship with Gabe, and I expected hesitation, especially after she claimed to be made to feel dirty, and had it drilled into her at school that sexual pleasure was bad, and made her feel soiled as she grew up. I felt this could have been handled better, with more depth instead of tagged on at the end.
I can’t say it was a dull read, far from it, but the pace was nice and smooth, then it became a huge rush to get all the extra threads added so late all tied up nicely for the HEA. So, while I say I enjoyed the book as a whole, I mean it, but I loved the first 75% while the rest left me feeling a bit meh.
Plot: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Feels: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Heat: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
