BRINGING DOWN THE DUKE BY EVIE DUNMORE
PUBLISHED ON 3 SEPTEMBER 2019
GENRE ROMANCE NOVEL, HISTORICAL FICTION, HISTORICAL ROMANCE.
PURCHASED THROUGH AMAZON EBOOKS
This book is a period novel, which goes back to 1879 United Kingdom . As most of us knew that period was the Victorian Era.The author has beautifully depicted the historical events and romance in this book. Our girl Annabelle Archer, brilliant and a wise country girl daughter of a vicar .She masters Greek and Latin by herself as her father inspired her to read Greek novels and mythologies from childhood. Due to a mistake she commited during her adolescent period, her father gave all his property to her cousin in his last will,to whom she is now working like an unpaid maid for the past five years. When she came to know that Oxford university is starting its first womens college, she noticed a distant light to her future. With quite a manipulation she managed to convince her cousin to send her to Oxford with a condition that she has to somehow send two pounds every month . Annabelle was granted scholorship by the womens suffrage group for which in return she had to support their cause. In the midst of her classes, tutoring sessions inorder to raise two pounds and suffrage movement she barely had time to sleep and eat. As a part of the womens suffrage movement their first battle was to amend the married womens act; in early days it was said that the women has to handover all her property to husband after marriage, losing her right to vote in return for the protection their husband provides . The suffrages wanted to break this law so women can have their own property and the right to vote for democracy which was seriously opposed by queen, council and most men in the country. Thus, they put forward a plan to approach influencial men in the society and campaign their agenda, so that when the council gathers to discuss the law ,they would have votes and supports of the influencial men.
Our Annabelle was assaigned to convince the Duke of Montgomery (Sebastian), who was known as the cold hearted man among any other in the country. Our Sebastian was made duke at the age of nineteen when his gambling father died and lost the montgomery castle. Sebastine wanted to get back all the things his father lost and to rebuild the montgomary reputation which was at stake, prior to his seccession. The thriving pressure under his shoulders made him the man he was today, he had to buried the real Sebastine deep beneath him. The Duke was one of the queens favourite because of his self determination. When the queen wants him to get a job done, he makes sure it gets done and expects a generous reward as return. The queen orederd the duke to make sure the ruling party wins the election and stays in power as a reward he will be offered the castle of Montgomery which his father has lost. One day the paths of our Annabelle and Sebastian was made to cross , he knew for sure that he is attracted to this beautiful women from the first day when he saw her emerald green eyes. Due to certain circumstances they had to meet repeatedly where they both started falling for eachother. Sebastian certainly knows that marrying a country girl would make him lose his position in the council and put his title at stake . It took the Duke so much effort to build the reputation once lost,and he could never afford to lose all this. On the heat of the election campaign , losing his love or losing his title has put so much pressure on Sebastian. Likewise Annabelle is also put under the same pressure and undergoes emotional turmoil. The way Sebastian understands what really matters in life and how he handles this entire situation with politics and love is put up beautifully.
There where so many reviews about this book in which several have mentioned that it looks like Annabelle and Sebastian’s relationship was forced and happened so quick, but i think that is quite natural as we know how in olden days any man of influence can have any women in his country as his misstress even if it was against the girls wishes. There was also other characters in the story like Annabelle’s friends from Oxford , lady lucie,lady greenfield and lady cartiona, I think that these sub characters where underrated and the author should have given a storyline for them. On reaching the final chapter , I expected to see the endings of those characters like what happened to lady greenfield, was she finally recognised for her talent?!; likewise what about lady catriona’s secret love which was almost left hanging. These where the few flaws I left the author left, but overall i enjoyed reading this historical romance.
“THE TROUBLE WITH FREEDOM IS IT ISN’T JUST AN EMPTY PHRASE THAT SERVES WELL IN A SPEECH. THE DESIRE TO BE FREE IS AN INSTINCT DEEPLY INGRAINED IN EVERY LIVING THING. TRAP ANY WILD ANIMAL, AND IT WILL BITE OFF ITS OWN PAW TO BE FREE AGAIN. CAPTURE A MAN, AND BREAKING FREE WILL BECOME HIS SOLE MISSION.”
-DUKE OF MONTGOMERY.
“PERHAPS THIS IS NOT A QUESTION OF STAYING OUT OF TROUBLE, YOUR GRACE. PERHAPS THIS IS ABOUT DECIDING ON WHICH SIDE OF HISTORY YOU WANT TO BE.”
– MISS ANNABELLE ARCHER.
MY STAR RATING
Toodles…!!!
Starcrossed Lover 