The Duke of Dark Desires by Miranda Neville

Narration by Shaun Grindell

The Duke of Dark Desires proved to be a delightful mix of a historical romance (poised among the backdrop and life-changing consequences of the French Revolution) and an intriguing romantic suspense title. Do not be fooled by blurb though, there is so much more to this addicting romance than just the duke and the nanny seduction story that is immediately apparent from the book’s description. Moreover, Shaun Grindell’s adept narration of this romantic tale makes it an all-around good choice for an audiobook selection.

Julian Fortescue, the Duke of Denford, has had many unexpected changes of late. For one, the once black sheep of his family and questionable art dealer never expected for a tragedy to befall all of the male heirs in line before him, but it did, and quite surprisingly he ended up a duke. Now two years into his new station, he is still trying to adjust to the numerous, onerous responsibilities he never imagined inheriting. Second, his mother’s remarriage and related whirlwind arrival and departure left him in charge of his three young half-sisters, sisters he previously had no relationship with, which was quite the inconvenient change of circumstances. After all, what does he, an unmarried duke, know about being a guardian?

Julian must now quickly find a governess, something he doesn’t even have the first clue how to pursue. Fortunately, the answers to his prayers – well at least to the ones seeking an end to his long drought without female attentions – comes in the form of Jane Grey. What Julian could never have surmised, however, are Jane’s true intentions for interviewing for the position. Oh, Jane is definitely eager to fill the position, but not for her stated intent, or even Julian’s hopeful one. Instead, the governess position is rife with the potential for revenge that she has been plotting for years.

Born Lady Jeanne de Falleron, she too comes from nobility, a French noble family that perished at the hands of an English man who promised them passage out of France in exchange for the family’s valuable art collection, but betrayed them instead. Jane knows that the English man was a Fortescue, and she is determined, via her new position, to ask the right questions to find out exactly which one, so she can avenge the death of her parents and two sisters. The closer she gets to Julian, however, the more she is able to break through his defenses. Soon she begins to see a side of Julian that no one has seen – of the true man that lies beneath the tough exterior. Seeing such a rare glimpse, Jane can’t help but be fascinated. resulting in some quite unexpected turn of events of her own. Could Jane possibly be falling for the one man who might be the man she has plotted against for years?

This was my first experience with Shaun Grindell as narrator. While I have to admit that I did not immediately fall in love with his narration, he eventually won me over. For one, with a story that had many different nationalities and accents, both country and class based, I was quite impressed with Mr. Grindell’s ability to bring all these regional and cultural differences to life.

While as an American, I am admittedly no expert on European accents, I easily believed that we had an eclectic cast of English, French and Irish characters. Moreover, the gentry had distinct intonations from the commoners.

In addition to being able to distinguish characters based on accent and class, Mr. Grindell created sufficient differences between his female and male voices to allow you to easily distinguish characters, and I had no need to rely on dialogue tags. Additionally, I thought Mr. Grindell did a good job of conveying the particular emotion of the scene and had a good sense of timing. From the action of the more suspenseful scenes to the tender moments between Jane and Julian to the more heat-filled ones where their passion bloomed, I could easily garner the mood of the scene by just the tone of his delivery.

I love romances that prove that the facts are not always black and white. The Duke of Dark Desires does a good job of reflecting these gray areas and convincing its audience that not all characters are all good or all bad. Instead, the truth, like life, lies somewhere in between depending on one’s own unique experiences, and it is our ability to accept this reality that often holds the key to true happiness.

All in all, I highly enjoyed The Duke of Dark Desires both for its unexpected twisted suspenseful journey and introspective soul searching, as well as for its believable and touching romance.

BJ

Narration: B

Book Content: A-

Steam Factor: Glad I had my earbuds in

Violence Rating: Fighting

Genre: Historical Romance

Publisher: Tantor Audio

The Duke of Dark Desires was provided to AudioGals by Tantor Audio for a review.