A review by lou_loo
The Duke and I by Julia Quinn

fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

This wasn’t good at all. I think Julia Quinn could write a contemporary romance, but historical, nope. She tries to incorporate language and words from the 1800s, but it feels super forced and unnatural. Complicated words are coming up in sentences that feel very modern and sometimes, the characters talk as if they were born in the 21st century. The writing style was weird and there were some incoherencies, which I was able to figure out and understand because I have watched the series, but with the book alone it is not enough… For example, there is Whistledown, we are told a few times that she has the power to ruin people with her column, but I was able to believe it only because I have seen the 3 seasons… In the book, she never actually ruined anyone or wrote anything detrimental to anyone. (because no, writing that the Bridgertons all look alike and it cannot be doubted that they all have the same parents, that there are no illegitimate children, is not an insult) 
In my opinion, this is not a love story between a Duke and a Lady, but it is a story between two unwell people with their problems, problems which they decided to share and blame on the other person rather than sorting it out and working on themselves before starting this “relationship”. Daphne is used to being the first girl in the family, always cared for by her mother and 3 older brothers, she cannot understand “no” and things not going her way, hence her not understanding Simon’s issues and not giving him the time he needed. Simon is clearly traumatised but he doesn’t really want to admit it and therefore cannot figure things out for himself and get better. 
Moral of the story, they both need therapy and we all know that only meeting up in a park and saying everything is now alright isn’t enough. We are told in the epilogue that they have 4 kids, but my question is how will the kids grow up in a dysfunctional family like this one? Their parents might have figured that they had issues to be fixed but never actually fixed them before having the kids. 
I gave it 2 stars because I still quite enjoyed my time reading it, but I think it’s also just because I watched the series and saw it play in my head, it compensated for the lack of atmosphere written by the author. And I know that I will still read the other books because I want to see if the writing got better and leave another chance to the other Bridgerton siblings since I know that even in the Netflix series, I hated Daphne and season 1 was my least favourite. 
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