Publisher: Signet Select
Date published: November 2nd, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-451-41300-0
Historical romance
Mass Market Paperback
Reviewed by Dawn
Obtained by Publisher
Duke of Gravenhurst, Samuel St. Aldwyn, has always tried to champion those causes near and dear to his heart-ones that are not popular with anyone else. He’s a rogue, a rake and a secret author with a popular line of historical stories so dark many whisper his author name is poisoning the minds of the public. Flirting with his new housekeeper was something he found enjoyable even if she is as sexy as sin and can go toe to toe with him.
Lily Boscastle is in disgrace after a very public ending to her engagement and she now has to find work outside of London in order to salvage her pride. Hired as the Duke of Gravenhurst’s housekeeper has Lily matching wits with one of the more notorious rakes in the ton and finds she is falling for Samuel. But secrets cloud around both of them. Can Lily and Samuel find a way to survive while falling in love?
THE DUKE’S TEMPTATION is something of a hodge podge of things going on that had me scratching my head and wondering where one of my favorite historical authors went. The characters were so one dimensional they felt almost wooden in stature and the story flowed in fits and starts, going off in all directions that left me wondering if I picked up the wrong book. I haven’t read the other books in this series and frankly, after reading this one, I am unsure if I even want to now. Ms. Hunter normally is a wonderful writer who pens such magnificent tales of times gone by with fascinating characters but in her latest release, fell quite short of the mark.
Meet Samuel St. Aldwyn, the Duke of Gravenhurst. He’s a rake, a champion of unpopular causes and a secret author among other things. When he hires Lily Boscastle as his new housekeeper he finds the perfect woman to match wits with as he flirts with her. She is sexy, outspoken and quite unlike any woman he knows or has seduced. The first thing about Samuel is that I just could not like him at all. He was so not adorable in that rascal sense. He was more along the “oh god, he is so annoying, go away” thinking in my opinion. He was wishy-washy, boring and one hero I just wasn’t too keen about. Lily was even worse, in my opinion. She is so flighty; she had me wondering what planet she was from. All the characters in A DUKE’S TEMPTATION were so one dimensional and unlovable, it felt like the author had no idea what to do with anyone at all. The storyline goes all over the place and I had to put the book down more than once to read something else after several pages of this one.
Jillian Hunter’s A DUKE’S TEMPTATION is a hodge-podge of different storylines all mashed together in one story. As much as I wanted to love this latest by her, I just could not get into the story at all. I am really hoping Ms. Hunter goes back to her wonderful writing before this book in the future. A DUKE’S TEMPTATION is not her best work to date though she does have several gems in her backlist to enjoy if you need a Jillian Hunter book fix.
This is an objective review and not an endorsement of this book.
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