Print Length: 244 pages
Publisher: Escape Publising (February 4, 2021)
From Goodreads.com: She's running from her past; he's hiding from his.
Miss Ellen Burney doesn't have a penny to her name. Determined to escape scandal, she flees to London and becomes Miss Smith: spinster and lady's companion. London offers security in anonymity. So long as Ellen can rein in her overactive imagination and become the perfect picture of propriety.
Calum Callaghan spent ten years in the Royal Navy fighting Napoleon and has the scars to prove it. Now he's a duke, but all of London thinks he murdered his brother. Heartbroken and battle weary, he's locked himself away for four long years, a prisoner in his own townhouse.
That is, until Cal's grandmother comes to stay with him for the London Season, her new lady's companion in tow. A lady's companion with a passion for life and love that can hardly be contained by even the most spinsterish of lace caps. She's fooling nobody, especially not this grumpy duke.
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My Rating: 3 stars out of 5
A big problem that I had with this novel (which I am hoping was corrected in the final round of edits), is the formatting. New chapters often appeared in the middle of the page with no special formatting, not only making it look sloppy, but interrupting the flow of the novel as well.
Another problem I had with this one (which again the formatting did not help) was the way the narrative would randomly jump from Cal and Ellen to people living in her former hometown, and back again. I found it made it hard to keep track of just what was going on. This fact became even more obvious in later chapters when it seemed as though there were several different story-lines happening at once.
As for the characters, I adored Lady Faye. She was a delight in every scene you encountered her in, and Owen was such an over the top charmer that I would love to read more about him. As for Calum and Ellen? Meh. I wasn't sold on them or their relationship. Something about their interactions just didn't seem genuine to me, and I didn't buy the way he seemed to quickly warm up to her, going out of his way to help her with the (obvious to me) plot twists.
However, this being a debut novel? I definitely see potential here for bigger and better things from this author, and I will definitely read them again in the future.
DISCLAIMER: I received a complimentary copy of this novel from the publisher. This has not affected my review in any way. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are 100% my own.
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The Unworthy Duke is available from Amazon.com
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