Title How to Love a Duke in Ten Days
Series: Devil You Know #1
Author: Kerrigan Byrne
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks
Number of pages: 448
Publication date: August 27th 2019
Series: Devil You Know #1
Author: Kerrigan Byrne
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks
Number of pages: 448
Publication date: August 27th 2019
Synopsis:
These men are dark, bold, and brave. And there is only one woman who can bring them to their knees...
Famed and brilliant, Lady Alexandra Lane has always known how to look out for to herself. But nobody would ever expect that she has darkness in her past—one that she pays a blackmailer to keep buried. Now, with her family nearing bankruptcy, Alexandra strikes upon a solution: Get married to one of the empire’s most wealthy eligible bachelors. Even if he does have the reputation of a devil.
Love Takes No Prisoners
Piers Gedrick Atherton, the Duke of Redmayne, is seeking revenge and the first step is securing a bride. Winning a lady’s hand is not so easy, however, for a man known as the Terror of Torcliff. Then, Alexandra enters his life like a bolt of lightning. When she proposes marriage, Piers knows that, like him, trouble haunts her footsteps. But her gentleness, sharp wit, independent nature, and incredible beauty awakens every fierce desire within him. He will do whatever it takes to keep her safe in his arms.
Review:
Trigger warning:
I think there are few HR authors (from time periods I like) out there whom I have not yet read, and Kerrigan Byrne was one of them. After hearing such high praise about this author, and having been given the opportunity to read How To Love A Duke In Ten Days, I couldn’t refuse. And at the end of this book, I said to myself: why did I wait this long?!
This book has such a strong friendship between the heroines of this series. I always love a book where female friendship - well, any friendship, really - is championed. They support each other, they are always there when needed, and they don’t judge. Isn’t that wonderful?
Alexandra had a traumatic event in her teenage years at school, and Francesca (Frank) and Cecelia (Cecil) - her friends, and fellow red-heads - helped her hide what happened, and at the same time supported her with her feelings and the fear she - rightfully - developed after such an event. Now that Alexandra had a secret that needed to be kept with their lives, Frank and Cecil wanted to assure her their loyalty, and so the three friends told each other powerful, damaging secrets, so that they would all be connected by something stronger their school years.
Alexandra became a doctor through the Sorbonne, an archaeologist, in reality. She buries herself in work, and her only true connections are with her school friends. One day, she received a note from Francesca, saying she was getting married, and she was needed. The cryptic note was especially odd since the three women had sworn never to get married.
Frank is supposed to marry Piers Gedrick Atherton, the Duke of Redmayne. When Alexandra gets reaches the station and awaits her friend Cecil, she meets a huge, strong horse - a man to, and the description fits just as well! - and she manages to calm the horse down, and the man, whom she believes to be a man that worked at the stables, is the first man to arouse her in a certain way.
Due to her past, she believes no man can ever be trusted, and they must be feared, but with this man she doesn’t really feel afraid. Even though he was a very large man that could pick her up easily, she feels he’s more of a protector than anything else.
Believing she won’t see him again, Alex and Cecil go to the castle of the Duke of Redmayne, and meet with Frank in their rooms. And out of the window, Alex sees the man from the station, and she assumes that he works at the castle. I’m sure you already know, dear reader, that he was indeed the Duke of Redmayne.
Frank is worried because she believes that someone wants to hurt her, or her friends, and she doesn’t want to marry Redmayne.
Alex is also being threatened in a way - she was being blackmailed. She didn’t know who it was, but they knew what she and her friends had done. And she wanted to protect them at all costs, but her family doesn’t have any more money, so she decides to make a trade: she’ll marry the duke, he’ll protect them, without knowing what had happened at school. Frank and Cecil don’t want her to do that, but she persuades them that Piers is a good man, and she somewhat trusts him. And she wants to be a mother, so she knows she’ll have to overcome her trauma for that to happen.
The book happens is a small time frame - the 10 days, give or take - and that doesn’t really give the characters a lot of time to connect with one another. I did like Piers - even though he was a bit too rough for me personally - but I get that Alexandra liked that part of him, because he could protect her, and at the same time he was a good man and so he wouldn’t overpower her.
I really liked the way Kerrigan Byrne dealt with such an important, difficult, traumatic issue, how she described it and its impact on the life of the characters. It shaped some of it, but the love that develops between Alex and Piers showed that it didn’t have to rule her life.
There’s some mystery, and sometimes a bit too much happening, but it was a great book, a great start with this author, with romance, friendship, strong and interesting characters. What more could I ask for?
I received an eARC at no cost from the author, and I am leaving a voluntary and honest review. Thank you.
Trigger warning:
I think there are few HR authors (from time periods I like) out there whom I have not yet read, and Kerrigan Byrne was one of them. After hearing such high praise about this author, and having been given the opportunity to read How To Love A Duke In Ten Days, I couldn’t refuse. And at the end of this book, I said to myself: why did I wait this long?!
This book has such a strong friendship between the heroines of this series. I always love a book where female friendship - well, any friendship, really - is championed. They support each other, they are always there when needed, and they don’t judge. Isn’t that wonderful?
Alexandra had a traumatic event in her teenage years at school, and Francesca (Frank) and Cecelia (Cecil) - her friends, and fellow red-heads - helped her hide what happened, and at the same time supported her with her feelings and the fear she - rightfully - developed after such an event. Now that Alexandra had a secret that needed to be kept with their lives, Frank and Cecil wanted to assure her their loyalty, and so the three friends told each other powerful, damaging secrets, so that they would all be connected by something stronger their school years.
Alexandra became a doctor through the Sorbonne, an archaeologist, in reality. She buries herself in work, and her only true connections are with her school friends. One day, she received a note from Francesca, saying she was getting married, and she was needed. The cryptic note was especially odd since the three women had sworn never to get married.
Frank is supposed to marry Piers Gedrick Atherton, the Duke of Redmayne. When Alexandra gets reaches the station and awaits her friend Cecil, she meets a huge, strong horse - a man to, and the description fits just as well! - and she manages to calm the horse down, and the man, whom she believes to be a man that worked at the stables, is the first man to arouse her in a certain way.
Due to her past, she believes no man can ever be trusted, and they must be feared, but with this man she doesn’t really feel afraid. Even though he was a very large man that could pick her up easily, she feels he’s more of a protector than anything else.
Believing she won’t see him again, Alex and Cecil go to the castle of the Duke of Redmayne, and meet with Frank in their rooms. And out of the window, Alex sees the man from the station, and she assumes that he works at the castle. I’m sure you already know, dear reader, that he was indeed the Duke of Redmayne.
Frank is worried because she believes that someone wants to hurt her, or her friends, and she doesn’t want to marry Redmayne.
Alex is also being threatened in a way - she was being blackmailed. She didn’t know who it was, but they knew what she and her friends had done. And she wanted to protect them at all costs, but her family doesn’t have any more money, so she decides to make a trade: she’ll marry the duke, he’ll protect them, without knowing what had happened at school. Frank and Cecil don’t want her to do that, but she persuades them that Piers is a good man, and she somewhat trusts him. And she wants to be a mother, so she knows she’ll have to overcome her trauma for that to happen.
The book happens is a small time frame - the 10 days, give or take - and that doesn’t really give the characters a lot of time to connect with one another. I did like Piers - even though he was a bit too rough for me personally - but I get that Alexandra liked that part of him, because he could protect her, and at the same time he was a good man and so he wouldn’t overpower her.
I really liked the way Kerrigan Byrne dealt with such an important, difficult, traumatic issue, how she described it and its impact on the life of the characters. It shaped some of it, but the love that develops between Alex and Piers showed that it didn’t have to rule her life.
There’s some mystery, and sometimes a bit too much happening, but it was a great book, a great start with this author, with romance, friendship, strong and interesting characters. What more could I ask for?
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