Anthony, the eldest son of the late viscount Bridgerton, and current holder of the title, knows he will die young. His father died only thirty-eight years old, so why should Anthony be any different. Which mean he only has eight, nine tops, years to live, and it's about time he did his duty to the title. Marry and produce an heir. Oh, and don't fall in love with wife.

He already has a perfect candidate for his viscountess. Beautiful, delicate, fair-colored, reasonably intelligent Edwina Sheffield. She will do nicely. She'll look good on his arm, bear him children, but most importantly...He won't fall in love with her, because the spark just isn't there. Perfect indeed. Pity, she has a big flaw. In the form of older sister, Katharina "Kate" Sheffield. She's tall, dark-haired, opinionated, and she hates his guts.

At least the feeling's mutual...Or is it?


Ooh, the sparkage. You could see it coming off the pages whenever Kate and Anthony shared a scene. They argued, they bantered, they traded barbs, they wanted to kill each other...And yet...Sparkage. Where there was none with Kate's younger step-sister, Edwina, there was plenty with Kate. And I relished the sparkage as much as these two would-be adversaries did.
And once more what started as animosity, slowly grew into an unlikely friendship that slowly transformed into something more (something that was there from the beginning, but they were too stubborn to see it. I just love romance novels where the main relationship has a foot to stand on in friendship and camaraderie.

I loved the whole phobia subplot that resulted in the two finding themselves in a position that neither was prepared to admit they secretly wanted. When I first read this book, I was convinced the compromising would stem from Kate's fear of thunderstorms (what with them huddling under a desk in the middle of the night with her only in her nightgown), so it was a double pleasure to read it was once again the man's fault. Namely, Anthony exaggerating over an unsuspecting (and in the end, unfortunate) little bee.

From then on it was just a matter of time when Anthony would forgo his stubborn refusal to fall in love with his wife, the problem was him getting to admit it, which ended up being the catalyst for the last hiccup in this relationship, which also (when you'll read the last chapter, you'll understand why) ended up being quite useful in Anthony yet once more playing the hero.


I missed the Bridgerton banter and meddling that was so present in the previous book, but since the hero was the head of the Bridgerton family (and a male) that was to be expected. Still, we got a nice little showing of the eldest siblings rivalry in a lawn game.

Another quick and (very) fun and witty read with a great main couple and supporting cast. It offered plenty of laughs, a tear or two, and just the right amount of drama to keep it interesting.

Daphne Bridgerton is a woman on a mission. Find a suitable match that actually sees her more than just a friend, while also pleasing her matchmaking mama.

Needless to say she's not really succeeding.

All the suitable men find her pleasant and "normal", while pursuing the belles of the ton blessed with "the right" coloring (blond and blue-eyed), relegating her into the wallflower territory.

Until her oldest brother's best friend, newly minted Duke of Hastings, recently returned to England, concocts a fool-proof plan to make Daphne insanely desirable and himself safe from other matchmaking mamas.

They'll pretend to develop a tendre, until Daphne finds a suitable match after which she'd jilt him...Unfortunately, the prospect of jilting the handsome duke becomes every day more unpalatable.


I read this book a long, long, long time ago, but decided to do it again, after the Netflix series dropped, to refresh my memory.

It was a very good decision, I've forgotten how much fun the Bridgetown brood can be. And maybe this time I'll actually read all the books in the series.

Daphne, the fourth child (and oldest girl) of the Bridgerton family and Simon Basset, the new Duke of Hastings, might come off as an odd couple at the beginning, but as the story progresses, and they develop an easy friendship that slowly evolves into something stronger and lasting, end up as a perfect match. Two completely opposites that somehow, also with plenty of help from her family, find a middle ground where they can both be themselves with each other.

It was nice reading about a regency-era relationship that stemmed from friendship and camaraderie instead of just two characters thrown together by happenstance, intrigue or whiff of scandal.
Their relationship was still rocky, especially thanks to Simon's demons and his stupid vow to a dead man (we cannot have a romance book without conflict and the big rift, now can we), and granted, the whole thing was rather quickly resolved (even that highly questionable act on Daphne's part), but the initial friendship and ease between them made it more believable and easier for the reader to accept the swift resolution.

And, because this is a series about a family, that family must not remain unmentioned, since it was a third main character in this story. The Bridgertons were a hoot to read about and they provided plenty of love and friendship, a touch of drama, and a whole lot of support for both Daphne and Simon (albeit in a more roundabout way).


Reading this story was like having a glass of refreshing lemonade and a perfect choice to break my reading fast. A fun, quick and easy read, that made it easy to empathize with and root for the characters; it made me laugh, it made me cry and it made me (once more) eager to read more. On to the next.

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Georgiana was kidnapped by a fortune hunter but even though she managed to save herself, her reputation is in tatters.
Nicholas is called down from medical school in Edinburgh by his father who orders him to marry their neighbor and Nicholas' childhood friend, Georgiana.
It's a marriage of convenience but a close quarters carriage ride with a grumpy cat might turn it into a marriage of love.

“There is only one thing to be done,” his father said. “You must marry her.”

First Comes a Scandal is fourth in the Rokebys series but I think you could jump into the series here, it would probably be even better to read the Bridgerton series before this. Rokebys is a prequel to Briderstons and heroes from the first couple books in the Bridgerton series make an almost center stage showing in this. As much as I enjoyed seeing the heroes as little kids, it was too much. Instead of focusing on the leads of this story, the little Bridgertons got too much of the spotlight; it started to feel like a cheap trick to get readers to like this book, trading on the Bridgerton love. If you haven't read the Bridgerton series, you'd probably be bored and think a good chunk of the first half was filler.

“She doesn’t need your time. She needs your name.”

I'm a sucker for little sister/big brother's friend trope but this was a little different with neither having a hidden or long standing crush on the other and we don't get much of Nicholas and Edmund (Georigana's brother) friendship. Not getting much, unfortunately, was a problem I had for the majority of the story. I had a problem with feeling Nicholas and Georgiana were strangers, to me and to each other. It wasn't until after the 50% mark that our two get married and then it is a carriage ride to Edinburgh. However, instead of scenes of these two bonding and dialogue to provide emotional and relationship building blocks, we get pointless cat drama, medical dramas needing Nicholas, and the story just seemed to want to focus on everything but Nicholas and Georgiana.

He’d been married a day and he’d barely even kissed her. He was going to have to do something about that.

The sentence structure had a tendency to veer to shorter and this made a good amount feel choppy but even though I didn't feel engaged with the story or characters, the pace did ping pong through pretty quickly. There was also a couple times where Nicholas or Georgiana expressed themselves a certain way that felt too casual of verbiage, not creating the historical feel I tend to look for when reading this sub-genre. This was also set in the late 1700s and besides some talk of hoop skirts to visit the Queen, it was indistinguishable from Regency set romances.

She liked being near him. She liked his quiet strength, his sense of purpose. And when his hands had been on her hips, even just to help her down from the saddle, she’d liked the way it had made her feel like she was his.

Georgiana and Nicholas felt like strangers to me and therefore, I wasn't invested or felt any emotional attachment to the conclusion of their romance. If you like some slapstick humor, there were a couple scenes when they take their carriage ride that might help drawn you into the story more than I. There were couple moments where I felt a hint of the chemistry between Georgiana and Nicholas but they were so buried in the numerous insignificant scenes the author decided to add, that it couldn't save the story for me. I went into this anticipating more of a focus on exploring their marriage of convenience and instead got a grumpy cat in a hammock.

I buddy read this, for more quotes and comments while I read: First Comes Scandal buddy read 

My buddy read for the month, discussing the new Rokesby over in The Hopeful Readers Group on GoodReads.
A grilled cheese and historical romance for this Tuesday

First Comes Scandal by Julia Quinn purchase link

Bacon, Brie, and Apricot Grilled Cheese w/ Balsamic Reduction recipe

I used turkey bacon, loved the Brie, basil, and Balsamic reduction combo

This stopped being quite so direct a Cinderella retelling at maybe page 85. It's been very enjoyable so far, and exactly the kind of reading I was in need of.

Okay, maybe I'll get my review of The Twisted Ones finished tomorrow. One more day off work, and then we go back...for who knows what. Still no word on whether the library is going to be open. We honestly don't need to be - half of the resources in our catalog are electronic and can be accessed by any students or faculty with internet and a computer (that might be an issue, but it's more a campus IT Services issue than a library one), and we could answer questions via email or chat.