The Day of the Duchess

Where to begin with this...

I suppose that first I should say that generally, I hate second-chance romance. Far too often, it seems to me that the problems that led to the original split are never really solved, and at the end of the book I feel like it is just a matter of time until the couple splits again. Even worse, the reconciliation usually happens because one of the pair - or sometimes both of the pair - choose to suck up the horrible thing that happened before, and go forward as if it never happened.

But Sarah MacLean is an auto-buy author for me, and so I knew I'd be giving this a whirl.

Emotionally, this book put me through the wringer. From about the 60% mark, I felt like I was always crying. I mean, like, ugly cry. I didn't put it down until 4am last night, and that was because I hit that 60% point and just sobbed my way forward, unable to step away.

In the end, that kind of emotional engagement is why I can give this book no less than 5 stars.

So what of the story? Well, it was hard. It was hard because ... I was - and still am - so incredibly angry with Mal. I don't know how to forgive him. At the end of the day, I feel like everything that went wrong was his fault. Let's walk through it... (which means we're in spoiler tags from here on, of course)

1. Sera trapped him.

Yes. She did. And for a large part of the story, you believe that's her great crime... until the backstory, the circumstances, were filled in. Mal never courted her properly. He never went to her house, meeting her family. We're told he never even took her out in public - it was all just... clandestine meetings and illicit looks at events. To the world, it looked as if he was ... perhaps drawn to her, despite disdain for her and her family. She was being savaged in society... and that savagery was spreading to her sisters... because it was clear to all that she was pursuing a duke, someone so far above her that it was laughable, someone who clearly had no intention (to the world) of marrying her, but was instead just taking advantage of her cheap affections.

Mal was unforgivably selfish in this. He allowed her to be destroyed, publicly, and allowed her family to be stained, because he could not bring himself to bother to be decent or honorable. Or even discreet! He was obvious about their affair, and again, just displayed this constant casual disdain. He sent a carriage to go and fetch her, for goodness' sake! In the middle of the day! And this is not just the obliviousness of youth - we're told he is 30! And so, I do not believe that he truly cared for her then, I do not believe that he loved her. Love would never allow for her to be savaged like that. For proof, look at his behavior in the end of the book. Someone in the tavern made a casual comment about the Sparrow being someone he'd like to bed, and Mal beat the crap out of that man. Similarly, when that horrible woman slandered Sera at lawn bowling ... his utter rage in that moment ... THAT is love. That need to protect her, defend her honor. Mal feels love now, I believe that. But three years ago, no. He felt selfish infatuation.

So Sera trapped him. Because she had a duty to salvage her reputation before she brought down her sisters. There was some selfishness here, too, on her part - she wanted him, and that was probably at least half of why she trapped him... she loved him and felt, based on his actions, that though he might use her, dally with her, he would never marry her. So she took matters into her own hands... and I do not blame her for it. He had left her with few options. If she didn't marry him - when the whole world believed he was having sex with her - she'd be destroyed, and her family with her.

This leads us to ...

2. When Mal feels duped, his maliciousness is breathtaking.

He didn't allow her to explain any of the above to him... hell, he refused to even speak to her. He didn't take any responsibility for his own role in the situation, but rather cast her as the horrible Delilah, luring him to his doom. And the way he lashed out ... the cruelty is staggering.

To begin, his condemnation. She offers to flee before the wedding, give him his freedom and just disappear. He refuses. He condemns her to a life bound to him, but not with him. He wants her to not be in his house, not be in his life, but to be trapped, always alone. This isn't supposition, he TELLS her this, before the wedding. He intends for the remainder of her her life to be punishment. And when they are married, literally immediately after the wedding breakfast, he throws her out.

Months later, he finds that their indiscretion caused her to become pregnant. He is FURIOUS with her for not telling him ... this despite him telling her that he wants no part of her in his life, wants no children with her, wants no family, wants never to see her. So then he lashes out again, arranging for her to discover him having an affair. I can't ... I don't have words for the cruelty. She has told him she loves him, and so he knows that this ... it will gut her. He just continues to punish her, again and again. And when her sister, Sophie, is with her, catching him at his cruel worst in this moment ... and defends her sister... Mal does his level best to not only ruin Sophie, but to cripple their entire family, trying to destroy their father's business.

And so, alone and probably hideously depressed for her pregnancy, Sera loses the baby... and is told that she has been left barren. Mal's maliciousness has finally utterly destroyed her - she lost everything. Her love, her child, any regard in society, any hope for a future. And so, prompted by his total bitch mother, Sera leaves... disappears. Which costs her the last thing she had: her sisters. She's now utterly alone.

3. How can Mal possibly make up for this?

I don't believe that Mal truly understands what he did. To be fair, that's not for lack of trying. He feels like a proper bastard about it all now. It's probably impossible for him to ever understand the depth of his ... I don't even have a word. Cruelty isn't enough. Maliciousness isn't enough. He was monstrous, in his selfishness.

He searched for her, wanting to bring her back ... but even with that, there was a level of condescension. He admits that he'd always imagined that when he found her, she'd be grateful for it, because he'd be rescuing her. And he did beautiful things. The ballroom, the story of Merope and Orion... guys, I sobbed. I understand that this was his repentance, and the scale of it was also breathtaking. It made me love him, when I thought I should hate him. Was it enough? I don't know. How could anything possibly be enough?

In the end, giving Sera her freedom ... it was the single unselfish choice that Mal made in the entire book, and in that moment, he earned Sera. And I do have hope for them, which is different from how I feel at the end of most second-chance romances. I think because... they both changed so much. Sera was not going to allow herself to be crushed anymore. She was going to be his equal, or nothing at all. And Mal seemed to finally understand that ... I don't know. That perhaps he really didn't love her 3 years ago. That he treated her like a toy, because he didn't really see her value. But he loved her now. He loved who she had become. And so I have hope for them.

One last thing.

On the subject of babies. I know that it is a common complaint in HR that the HEA always means babies, and some people find that tiresome and/or tedious... and those people will probably be unhappy that in the end Sera and Mal had their babies.

I disagree. And I say that as a woman who wants no children, and who certainly does NOT find them mandatory to an HEA.

To me, though, happily ever after means that the characters get

what they want, and Sera so desperately wanted children. Her life was a brutal punishment for a perfectly justifiable mistake, and I honestly hoped that Sera could have babies, that the doctor had just been overly dour (with his, "oh, she's going to die and she's probably barren anyway" bullshit ... wrong on both counts, asshole).

So I was happy for the babies, because I wanted nothing more than for Sera to get everything she wanted. She deserved that.

Five tear-soaked, sleepless stars from me.

The novel was really good. But I prefer if the duke suffered more🙃

Boring

Too much angst and grovelling made it unrealistic