Always Be My Duchess
July 9, 2022
Lord Lysander Blackstone is used to keeping his emotions buried, preferring to focus on his business, where money and numbers can't betray him. When Miss Geneviève Valery, a struggling ballerina looking for work saves his life, the Duke makes her an offer to be his fake fiancée in order to convince his business partners that he has a heart and Nève gets enough money to pursue her own interests.
Fake dating is one of my favorite tropes and I enjoyed it in this book. I think one of my favorite parts of this book is the way that the Duke showed his affection - he clearly has a giving gifts love language which shone clearly around his attempts to crush all of his emotions. I enjoyed Nève slowly being able to read the Duke and getting him to drop his attempts at being emotionless.
I really appreciated Lysander being neurodivergent and showing while many people in society would deride him for it, how he manages to use his strengths to make him arguably one of the most successful dukes in their peerage.
I enjoyed Nève's group of friends - it was fun to read all about the gatherings of Laila, Effie, Vesper, and Briar and even Lushing and Marsden were good at rounding out the group dynamic whenever they choose to join. I see this is the first book of a series and I look forward to the next book, which I am guessing stars Vesper.
And Aunt Millicent! She seems to be a character who is a lazy chaperone at first, but I really liked her moments with both Nève and Lysander.
I think something that worked well in this book were their growth journeys, the way that they grew at different rates and how they couldn't (and Nève wouldn't) form a real realtionship until they had both done the necessary individual work to get to a place where they could truly understand each other. The book even makes it clear that they both still had work to do and would continue their journeys to make things work, which I really liked to see as part of their "happily for now" ending.
A thank you to Forever (Grand Central Publishing), Forever, and NetGalley for the ARC.
More about Always Be My Duchess here:
Title:Always Be My Duchess
Author:Amalie Howard
Lord Lysander Blackstone, the stern Duke of Montcroix, has only one interest: increasing his considerable fortune. After a series of betrayals, he keeps his emotions buried deep. Money, after all, can't break a man's heart—or make promises it can’t keep. But when his reputation for being heartless jeopardizes a new business deal, he finds himself seeking a most unusual—and alluring—solution...
Once an up-and-coming ballerina, Miss Geneviève Valery is now hopelessly out of work. After refusing to become a wealthy patron's mistress, Nève was promptly shown the door to the streets. When she accidentally saves the life of a handsome duke, she doubts the encounter will go any better than her last brush with nobility. But instead of propositioning her, Montcroix makes Nève an offer she would be a fool to refuse: act as his fake fiancée in exchange for fortune enough to start over.
Only neither is prepared when very real feelings begin to grow between them. They both stand to win... but only if they’re willing to risk their hearts.