The Runaway Duke (Warner Forever)

by Julie Anne Long

[Amanda]

The Runaway Duke is an earlier work by Julie Anne Long, and it shows. This book didn't have the push and pull of emotions that I've come to expect from JAL. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't fantastic either.

I had a similar experience with Julia Quinn's earlier works.

As an author myself, I find this sort of experience is important, however: It shows that everyone has to start somewhere, and that there are always ways to improve. If the JAL of now had written this book, it likely would have read a lot differently. But she didn't, and that's fine.

Connor is a duke hiding out as a groom, because his father was an asshole and when the opportunity presented itself to disappear, he took it. This kind of character isn't unique in historical romance, except for maybe the fact that he was successfully avoiding his past until he decided to help Rebecca escape a marriage.

And not that I wanted Rebecca to marry the man who set out to seduce her sister, but... carting Rebecca away seemed like a drastic move from Connor. The love between them built at sort of an odd pace, where the climax of the book wasn't their "I love you"s or marriage proposal, but the resolution of Connor's past.

The potential of the bleak moment when Rebecca has lost all faith in Connor was never realized with their quick reunion. Give me more angst! More anger! More groveling... whatever.