Mills & Boon, £4.99, ISBN 978-0-263-91697-3
Historical Romance, 2016
Eliza Redgold’s Playing the Duke’s Mistress comes with some wait-a-minute-isms that can make or break this story for some readers.
Set in 1852, Convent Garden is the new ballroom of a historical romance of this sort. Actresses mill around hoping to snag a nobleman husband, and indeed, many noblemen are marrying actresses like it’s all the rage.
Meanwhile, no one blinks an eye about this. It’s all perfectly acceptable! The upper class folks of 19th century London are such an egalitarian lot, after all.
Darius Carlyle, the Duke of Albury, begs to differ. His cousin Sir Herbert is besotted with and determined to marry the actress Mabel Coop, and he is determined to put a stop to the whole nonsense.
When Herbie has a date with Mabel, how cute, and he needs a plus one for Mabel’s friend, the famous actress Calista Fairmont, for the whole double date, Darius decides to accept his invitation. While his little buddy stands at attention at Calista’s awesome hotness, he proceeds to call her and Mabel 50,000 shades of harlotry, driving the furious Calista to call him a hypocrite.
So yes, it’s nice that Calista calls Darius out on his hypocrisy, but she’s also one, as while she talks about how all actresses are not hos hunting for titles and money, she herself has some unkind thoughts about Mabel being a ho.
The author also tells me that she’s a hypocrite herself, as while Calista acts like acting is a noble profession, she has the heroine doing it solely because of the obligatory sick sibling needing medical care and what not. So, actresses are only noble and respect-worthy if they were in that line of work out of necessity?
A better option would have been Calista being one out of passion, but I guess the author is worried that her readers do think that actresses are hos, so Calista’s speech to Darius is just lip service.
Everyone here and the author believe that actresses are hos, in other words.
The bizarre premise of noblemen marrying actresses by the dozens and the blatant hypocrisy radiating from the first few chapters aside, the story does itself few favors by having an idiot plot.
You see, Herbie is still determined to believe in the best of Mabel, so to prove to his cousin that all actresses are hos, Darius will get into some sham engagement with Calista. You want me to repeat that?
The rest of the story follows a tedious and predictable path.
Darius realizes that in addition to wanting to boink Calista 29 ways and back, he conveniently decides that she is also loyal and honest, so yes, she’s the perfect wife for him.
Of course, as an honorable actress of integrity, Calista will never agree to an honest marriage because she will never force him into a chain and ball situation that will surely make him unhappy. Never mind that her frail and sickly sister will be better off having lots of money and a few big houses to run wild in, it is far more important to appease our heroine’s determination to be a martyr for the peen. Yes, she’s okay with putting out and proving to Darius that all actresses are hos, so long as he gets laid and she happily plays the martyr.
You know, if the author had made Calista an impoverished bluestocking, this story would have made far more sense. Sure, I’d still be mocking these characters and their story, but at least I won’t be scratching my head at the bewildering ability of actresses marrying noblemen every day without any issues. I also won’t be distracted by how the author can’t seem to make up her mind as to whether actresses should really be seen as hos or not.
All in all, Playing the Duke’s Mistress is a perfect example of how not to do a historical romance with a supposedly unconventional heroine. The author comes up with this heroine and then tries to force the story to play out like Calista is any random impoverished blue-blooded bluestocking with a sick sibling stuck in a typical fake engagement with a duke. That’s like trying to force a square peg into a round hole—no, that’s not a dirty statement–and it just won’t do.
