Love it! And recommend!

Got into the book from the start and enjoyed every minute. I listen to these books while walking outside for exercise. I do not permit myself to listen unless I am out exercising or on the treadmill. Let me tell you that this book was really good for burning calories! LOL

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Less Appealing

Honestly, after I read Romancing Mr. Bridgerton I felt this story fell short in the romance department. I still enjoyed the book to an extent.

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very good

Eloise's story was a little different then her brother's and sister's. She took her own destiny into her hands and she ended up with a husband. Very good.

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Fabulous Writer!

I really found that the hype associated with “the Bridgerton series“ really felt too cutesy and although I have of course watched (binge) to date I found myself listening to the first audiobook and then by the time I had listened to the second one I was utterly hooked on Julia Quinn and her writing. This author, Bar none, writes exquisitely the stories the detail the love scenes absolutely charming and so refreshing I had become so completely convinced that there was no way to actually write compelling scenes – this writer has the ability and is my all-time favorite author now. As an afterthought, I realize it’s probably simply because she is such a decent compassionate thoughtful human being. That degree of empathy is merely revealed in her writing. I can’t wait to read everything else she has written :)

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What an interesting addition to the series!

Sir Phillip is… a lot to get used to, but worth it.
The story goes over completely different topics/issues than the other books (thus far). The topics are darker in my opinion
Rosalyn was pure perfection as per usual ♥️

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An Entertaining Listen

This is a fine addition to the Bridgerton series. I completely enjoyed myself. Rosalyn Landon is good, as always.

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1 person found this helpful

Eloise's Story

Love the Bridgerton Series, Love Eloise's journey to finding love, her encounters with crane children and Philip.

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lovely

as always hung on every word not only was the story well written but the narrative exceptional

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Hilarious

Love Rosalyn Landor’s story telling and Julia Quinn’s stories. They truly are hilarious but more so when listening.

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Decent story but troubling take on mental illness

*Potential spoiler warning, TW for child abuse and suicidality.*

This one is….interesting. It’s better-written than the early books, and the intimate scenes as a result are much steamier (this is a trend I’ve noticed in both Eloise and Francesca’s stories compared to the first four, so I must assume Quinn’s writing just improves over the course of the series). It seems like a bit of a ‘beauty and the beast’ story, but without adhering to many of the details of that story, and the premise is honestly quite interesting. But the book has some…..odd and troubling takes, particularly on two topics. One is that it uses - relatively subtly, but still - the question of whether the children are being abused, and by who, as a plot device for creating tension and suspense. Idk, I guess it WORKED (I was indeed feeling tense), but I don’t appreciate being made to wonder whether the romantic lead is a child abuser just for the sake of suspense. It just felt like it cheapened the issue of child abuse, which should always be dealt with delicately or not at all in fiction. The second topic is much more pervasive in the story: the book’s stance on depression and suicide. The tone of the story, and it’s characters, sympathize with Marina on a surface level (it’s revealed in ch 1 what happened here so I’m not apologizing for spoilers), but make it very clear that Marina is to blame for her depression and that her depression and eventual suicide make her a failure as a mother and a wife. There’s an actual internal monologue line from Philip that goes, “Marina was a burden.” That idea is everywhere in the book, and the book does this weird thing where it seems to reward Eloise for her strength and happiness in contrast to the underserving and burdensome melancholy Marina, as if not having depression is what makes Eloise worthy of love and makes her the wife Philip and the children truly deserve (and as if Marina simply was weak and couldn’t choose to be happy?). I get that at the time, this probably would’ve been exactly how it went down, as it’s not like ‘melancholy’/depression was widely understood, but as always I just think Julia Quinn, writing in the 21st century, should’ve known better. I’m not saying we should ignore what a mentally ill parent can do to a family, or that it’s difficult to live with and care for such a partner. Of course it is. That’s it’s own kind of trauma. But there are ways to communicate that idea without vilifying the sufferer themselves. Quinn just doesn’t have the subtlety, finesse, or capacity to do so in a way that gives mentally ill people any dignity. It’s deeply problematic.

A lot of people probably won’t be bother by this as they read, and, whatever, ok. If you can swallow the generally shady sexual politics throughout Quinn’s romances, you’ll probably do fine with this. But if you have any sort of history with suicidal depression, or have experienced related trauma, I’d steer clear of this one for sure. It can be deeply damaging to have a novel essentially indulge all the depressive beliefs a suicidal person has that drive them *to* that point (ex. I’m not worthy of love, I’m just a burden to my loved ones, they’d all be better off without me, etc), with all the main characters at one point or another expressing or hinting at such beliefs (though Marina herself never has a voice).

So, idk. I enjoyed aspects of this story, so it gets an ok rating, but the problematic elements here really affected my enjoyment of the book overall (plus at the very end I wasn’t convinced they’d really fallen in love, they were well on their way but it felt like they did a slow build most of the novel and then rushed it into HEA right at the final act, which sort of left me feeling like the love here wasn’t as deep as the other matches in the bridgerton series).

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