Review: The Duke Is But a Dream

The Duke Is But a Dream by Anna Bennett
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I enjoyed Anna Bennett's "The Duke Is But a Dream," but not as much as the first book in the Debutante Diaries series. The main characters of this book, Nash and Lily, were both well-developed and likeable, and it was sweet to watch Lily gradually bring Nash out of his shell and help him realize that he is capable of love. That said, I didn't care for the insta-lust aspect of their relationship. I am not a fan of insta-lust under any circumstances, but I found it to be particularly bothersome here because of Lily's amnesia. There was absolutely no way for either of them to know if Lily was already involved with, or even married to, someone else, so them jumping into bed together almost immediately after meeting easily could have been a recipe for disaster rather than true love.

Nash's pursuit of Lily also seemed pretty hypocritical to me because he was so overprotective of his younger sister, Delilah, that he wouldn't even allow her to attend social events to meet prospective suitors, but yet didn't seem to have a problem seducing Lily without having any plans to marry her. It also seems strange that, as overprotective of Delilah as he was, Nash would bring a complete stranger with amnesia into his home and introduce her to his sister. Not only that, Nash let them pal around unchaperoned most of the time, even after he had essentially made Lily his mistress. This behavior seems way outside the bounds of propriety for any gentleman of the ton, much less a duke. How could Nash be sure that Lily did not pose some kind of threat to his sister or her reputation?

Despite the problems I had with her interacting with Lily, I'm glad that Delilah ended up being such an important part of the story because she turned out to be very sweet and a lot of fun as a secondary character. I wouldn't mind seeing her get a story of her own in the future.

Overall, I would rate this book 3.5 stars if half stars were possible on Goodreads, but since they're not, I rounded down to 3 stars because of the insta-lust and other aspects of the story that bothered me. However, I look forward to reading the next book in this series, which will presumably feature Fiona and Lily's friend, Sophie.

*ARC provided by the publisher via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.

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