The Duchess Diaries
Bridal Pleasures—Book 3
By Jillian Hunter
Publisher: Signet Select
Release Date: February 7, 2012
It has been said that “sometimes small things can lead to big trouble”. This quote definitely applies to Jillian Hunter’s latest book in her Bridal Pleasures series,
The Duchess Diaries, as one little diary causes all sorts of trouble.
Miss Charlotte Boscastle is the headmistress at the Scarfield Academy for Young Ladies and a member of the scandalous Boscastle family. However, Charlotte is one of the only members of the family who has
not done something scandalous—at least not in public. Since she was a young girl, she has kept a diary where she has recorded her thoughts and feelings and the ups and downs of her life. But in recent months her entries have gotten a bit more . . .
erotic in nature. They’ve centered exclusively on the sinfully handsome and decadent Duke of Wynfield. When her diary comes up missing and all clues lead to the duke, Charlotte knows she must do whatever it takes to get it back.
Gideon, Duke of Wynfield, finds the diary in his carriage while on the way to make arrangements with a new mistress. Once he reads a snippet of the diary, he can’t stop reading—especially the parts about him! When he returns home, he finds the owner of the shocking book in his bedroom. And when her cousin Grayson, the Marquess of Sedgecroft, finds out, the results aren’t pretty.
“She came to my house.” He concealed a smile as he remembered discovering her on his bedroom floor. “She broke
in, I should say, in an apparent search for her diary. She made quite a muddle of my drawers.”
“Your—”
“Wardrobe
drawers.”
Gideon does the honorable thing and agrees to marry Charlotte to hopefully avoid any scandal. He consents despite the fact that he had plans to never marry again after becoming a widower years before. When he returns to his carriage to fetch Charlotte’s diary . . . it’s gone. Now they must find the missing diary before someone uses it to hurt Charlotte and/or the school.
The Duchess Diaries is a great addition to this series. I enjoyed visiting the wonderful Boscastle family. There is certainly never a dull moment! Gideon and Charlotte are lively characters who had me rooting for them in their quest to find the diary and, of course, love. Gideon knew a good thing when he found it . . . or rather,
her. Despite the fact that he knows how Charlotte feels about him (after reading her diary), he doesn’t get mad about what she wrote nor does he make her feel uncomfortable. He is flattered and that endeared him to me.
It didn’t matter anymore which one of them had instigated this burning attraction. Maybe she had poured all her passion into her diary. But he had unleashed it and transformed it from the page to the physical.
I loved this paragraph! To me, it captures the heart of the story. The secondary characters grabbed my attention and I hope one young lady in particular will have her own book one day.
The Duchess Diaries is a wonderful book that I recommend to all lovers of historical romance.
~Andrea
