I bring you, dear readers, another review of a Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton series book. The book, it should be noted, was quite lovely. The first three books in the series: The Duke and I, The Viscount Who Loved Me, and An Offer From a Gentleman all take place in quick chronological proximity. Book number four – Romancing Mr. Bridgerton – takes a jump forward in time, about seven years in fact. The younger siblings are now grown and interacting with the older ones, and at least one Bridgerton has been married and widowed in the intervening years (she shows back up in book six I believe).
This story however focuses on Penelope Featherington, wallflower extraordinaire, and third brother Colin Bridgerton. Penelope has been in love with Colin for twelve years, and it started as a rather cursory love. One typical of the age she was upon first laying eyes on him (don’t we all fall hard and fool heartedly at that age?). Colin has been unable to settle down into the life of a younger brother of a titled family and has taken the luxury provided to him by his father and brother’s forethought and spent much of the past six years travelling around Europe. He has returned just in time for the season, a boring one at that, just in time to be placed back into relatively constant contact with Penelope. He’s not intending to get married and settle down to life in London, but that just may be what happens anyway.
This novel has two stories interweaving throughout: Colin and Penelope and their discovery of who the other truly is in tandem with the social upheaval of Lady Danbury offering a thousand pounds to anyone who can uncover the anonymous gossip columnist Lady Whistledown, who features heavily in the first four books of the series. Everyone has their guesses, but who is the mysterious writer?
I truly enjoyed this book, and Colin’s preoccupations with having a life’s work and not just resting on his laurels. His decision to marry Penelope arrives quickly, but makes sense. The one drawback of this book? Not a whole lot of sexy times.
If you, like me, have not read this series now’s the time. Get to it!
