First in the Desperate Duchesses series, a promising beginning but the later books are much better.

Roberta is an ingenue, she's doing the best she can with an out-of-touch poet for a father but she's at her wit's end. She decides to travel to London to see if her mother's relations will help.

She lands into a real bumblebroth. Her hoped-for-husband, the Duke of Villiers is a cold fish, cares only for chess, especially chess matches with her cousin, Jemma.

A unlooked-for-savior in the part of Damon Reeve, Jemma's brother, helps her out of the brambles and into true love.

Enjoyable, just not first-rate. ( )

I thought the chemistry between the two leads was fairly good. But the the POVs bounced all around, and lots of things seemed *highly* unlikely (even in a genre which tends to sometimes skew that way), and with all the side characters and their story lines I didn't think there was really enough to fall in love with any of them. All the faults pale, however, compared to the heroine being such a ninny from beginning to end! And inconsistent. Fairly minor spoiler examples of these faults: After a courtesan "gave her a great deal of advice" when she was younger she makes the very bold claim to be "in possession of a rather unique amount of information about pleasuring men", the hero even thinks briefly "she probably knew more about bedding than he did!", but then very soon after- she doubts the very existence of oral, is shocked at the idea that a lover might bite, believes that intercourse hardly lasts for more than "a minute at most", knows nothing to do with his pleasure or hers, OR EVEN THAT MEN HAVE NIPPLES! So, in actuality, her knowledge consisted of an awareness that men get erections when they're aroused, basically where the parts go, and, though she claims she knows how to prevent pregnancy and even asks the man if HE "needs some education" on the topic, proceeding circumstances really make me doubt she knows anything beyond that such ways exist. Granted, it's more basic information than many highborn virgin ladies knew at the time, but it's laughable to think that any of that qualifies her as knowledgable on 'how to pleasure men'! Slightly bigger plot spoilers: She's also entirely convinced she's in love at first sight knowing almost nothing at all of the man, and then sticks to that for AGES despite all contrary evidence. And the hero really makes it seem, even to the last, that if she hadn't been interested in someone else instead he never would have wanted her himself. ..... Not exactly a love story for the ages with these two! It was a fine read, but definitely flawed and fluffy! ( )

This is a story of a young lady who grows up in an impossibly 'irregular' home with no rules. She wants to change her circumstance, spies a certain someone and decides he is the one for her. She decides she will somehow get him.
Now this in itself would be enough to turn me away. Its not insta love, insta infatuation even. Just insta scheming.
She ingratiates herself into a house where there is no morality. Every is/was sleeping with everybody.
There are no rules per se and anything is OK as long as the appearance of propriety is followed.
Then there is everyone's mind-numbing obsession with Chess. Long matches, matches, bets over chess, books on chess, an excellent chess player being an excellent duelist. What is even happening.
With all this as the background, the herione somehow manages to get herself engaged to the object of her obsession, all the while flirting with someone else.
This book was first and foremost completely lacking any character that had even a small amount of morals.
To make matters worse, it was actually quite boring due to all the chess.

I am a big fan of Julia Quinn and she had recommended this highly in her social media pages. Goes without saying that I would read any of Julia Quinn's books but probably stay away from her recommendations. ( )

I am not quite sure what to make of my first Eloisa James book. The Desperate Duchess seemed to be more a bedroom farce than a historical romance. Set in Georgian England, the oversexed characters romp and posture through the book as the author introduces a number of characters in this, the first book of the Desperate Duchesses series. At times I felt there were too many characters to keep track of and that the main story, that of Roberta and Damon, seemed almost secondary.

I found this book to have an abundance of humor and sex scenes but was rather lacking in old-fashioned romance. The main couple were not exactly star-crossed but instead, where the male half of the couple was very sure of what he wanted while the female needed to grow up and discover what love and marriage was really all about. In the end though I decided I quite enjoyed this colorful and dramatic story and I will probably try at least one more in this series as I am curious as to which couple the author will feature next. ( )

I think this one suffers a little from first book-itis. So much time is spent on supporting characters because they'll be the protagonists of future books that we lose out a bit on Roberta and Damon's romance. That said, I think James did a good job on the characterizations of each of the characters whose perspectives we get to see, and I liked each of them.

I really liked Damon and Teddy and enjoyed seeing Roberta unwittingly become a stepmother. There could have been less talk about chess (though, of course, this is coming from someone who knows next to nothing about said game). ( )