Kokkumäng

Beautiful, a great start to the series

o duque é um branco sem sal, a daphne é apenas uma garota rica mimada, a lady whistledown é uma diva incompreendida, e nem vamos falar da cena em que a daphne abus@ do duque, e temos que falar do hiperfoco dessa família em colocar o nome dos filhos em ordem alfabética.

★★★☆☆

This was fun... until it wasn't.

The fake dating trope? Loved it. Simon and Daphne's banter carried this book for me, and the Bridgerton family dynamic had me smiling more than once. Lady Whistledown was easily one of the highlights too.

But somewhere along the way, the romance lost me. One minute they're pretending, the next they're hopelessly in love, and I never really bought the transition.

And then that scene happened.

I don't care what year this book is set in or who the victim is—reproductive coercion and violating someone's consent is not romantic. It completely soured the relationship for me, especially when the narrative seemed more interested in brushing it aside than actually acknowledging how messed up it was.

It's frustrating because there was a genuinely enjoyable romance underneath all of that. Simon's backstory was heartbreaking, the chemistry was there, and I had a good time for most of the book.

In the end, though, I walked away feeling like this could've been so much better if it hadn't relied on such a terrible plot point to force character growth.