Days of Wonder(ful Romance)
I needed a comfort read and Sarah MacLean delivered
This post contains spoilers for Sarah MacLean’s Day of the Duchess and also contains discussion of miscarriages in relevance to the book.
I had put this one off, only because I don’t love second chance romances and especially not of the marriage redemption variety. I think the only other one I’ve read is the first Bromance Book Club book and that was fine, but not my favorite of the series (the Christmas one is, if you’re wondering). But I should know by now to trust MacLean, a master of historical romances.
I wanted a comfort read that I knew I was guaranteed to like at least a little, and I loved the other Talbot sister stories, plus I didn’t want to pick up in the middle of a set and the only other unread MacLean I had on hand was the last book in the Rules of Scoundrels series. I had read the first two books in the Scandals and Scoundrels series and I loved them, so I decided the worst that happened was I made it a couple chapters in and decided to read it later, and pick up something else (I was trying to hold off on Holiday romances for a couple more weeks, but honestly I think I might just go for it. Time’s not real and I’m ready for festive slug season). Of course, I needn’t worry, because I was in safe hands.
Day of the Duchess features Seraphina, who is technically not a Talbot since she married the Duke of Haven three years prior, and her sisters. The only Talbot left at this point is Sesily; Seleste, Selina, and Sophie are all happily paired off, the latter of the three in the first Scandal and Scoundrel book. But they are certainly a sisterly force to be reckoned with. Having been branded all sorts of terrible nicknames by London society at large, Soiled S’s and Dangerous Daughters having the most sticking power, the group are largely unconcerned with what society thinks of them (especially Sesily).
Seraphina though, does care, in so much that she wants her sisters to find good matches, a prospect she puts in jeopardy when she is caught messing about with Malcom Bevingstoke, the Duke of Haven. They really are in love, but the Talbot matriarch points out that he has not come to visit their home all season, nor asked her father for his permission to marry her, and the season is half over. So they hatch a plan to “trap” the duke. Sera goes along with the plan because she really is in love with Haven, and wants to be with him, believing that this is the only way to have him and to prevent her sisters from being ruined by being in proximity to her scandal. Of course, Haven is not happy with this, despite also being madly in love with Sera, and after marrying her as quickly as possible to try to minimize the scandal attached to his name as well, he sends her away.
When the two see each other again a few months later, Sera is very pregnant and Haven is very upset. He’s upset because of the whole situation, but also because Sera didn’t tell him, which I can’t blame her, considering he straight up told her he didn’t want kids and also the part where he sent her away. So in his fury, he gets himself caught with another woman in a petty attempt to get back at Sera that results in Sophie pushing him into an indoor pond (remember, this is 3 years before the main action of the book, and this incident sets Sophie’s story in motion).
A few months later, Sera shows up on Haven’s doorstep, actively miscarrying her child, and almost dies. Haven is beside himself with a whole bunch of emotions, but before he can sort through them and tell Sera how much he really does love her in spite of everything, his meddling, awful mother tells Sera that while she (the mother) might have been able to marry far above her station the only reason it worked was because she was able to produce an heir, and since Sera is now unable to have children, she is useless to Haven. Sera’s mother-in-law then pays the exorbitant amount of money Sera asks for to start a new life and Sera flees to America.
Three years pass and on a gross, hot summer day, Sera reappears at the last session of parliament, and petitions for a divorce. Everyone is of course shocked, but none more so than Malcom Bevingstoke, Duke of Haven, not only at the reappearance of his wife but at her request for a divorce. She needs this divorce so that she can open up her own tavern with her business-only partner Caleb Calhoun. The “business-only” bit is not a red herring, he’s not the lover boy hero in this book. He has agreed however to play the role of lover so that the divorce can be granted on the easily proved and socially acceptable reason of female adultery (it’s 2024 1833 and women are just property of their husbands, so only the women are held to any sort of marital standards).
Sera wants her freedom and she’ll do whatever it takes to get it, including agreeing to Haven‘s scheme of making her pick her replacement. Sera and her four sisters, including pregnant Sophie and Sesily’s possibly feral cat, Brummell (named for English socialite and regency fashion influencer Beau Brummell), arrive at Highley in spectacular fashion, with Sesily throwing her cat at Haven and then throwing up on his boots as soon as she steps out of the carriage. Haven is less than pleased that Sera has brought her sisters along, but agrees to let them stay, partially because Sophie’s husband also writes a vaguely threatening letter, knowing that Haven is less than keen on Sophie after the pond incident. The sisters, not including Sera, have of course all taken bets on why Haven has brought Sera here, with Sesily making the winning guess.
The following day, the four potential new wives arrive, chaperones in tow, among them Felicity Faircloth (the Bareknuckle Bastards also make brief appearances in this one). Caleb also shows up, and of course the chaperones are scandalized, though it is pointed out that the whole situation is already quite out of the ordinary and rather scandalous. Sesily, for her part, is quite pleased with Caleb’s presence (*Wink Wink*) and Haven is not (obviously), though he is pleased to see the result of his handiwork two years previous when he broke Caleb’s nose (we’ll get to that in a bit).
Haven of course, has ulterior motives for this harebrained scheme. He is going to win Sera back. Sera, still in love with him but in denial, refuses his emotional advances, but not his sexual ones because, why not? Get it, girl! But she refuses to even consider that perhaps he has changed for the better. This man built her an underwater ballroom/performance space monument featuring stained glass. He might have been angry at one point but the man has clearly been wildly besotted with Sera the whole time.
The four suitesses are whittled down to two, with one leaving to marry the man she actually loves, despite her overbearing mother’s protests, and the other being sent home because she does not like soup. She’s never had it, but she’s certain she does not like it. The whole soup thing is like a bit from Seinfeld, and had me giggling so hard I had to put the book down, and the giggling again when Haven, after vowing to make sure the other three girls find suitable matches after dragging them into his scheme insists to himself that he can find a man who also doesn’t like soup, that surely one must exist.
The two remaining girls (Felicity and Lilith) get wise to what’s going on, and encourage Haven to tell Sera the truth. He does, but he does it as she walks in on the conversation he’s having with Felicity and Lilith about telling her. This does not go well and Sera bolts. Haven catches up with her and does some more groveling, along with showing her the gravestone/smaller monument he had made for their dead child and telling her that as soon as he found out his mother (who hadn’t really liked him anyways, seeing him only as proof that she “earned” her title) had paid Sera off to leave, he banished her from his house and his life (good riddance). Have they at last reconciled?! No. Haven is still missing a fundamental part of Sera’s desire for the divorce, and after they have some more sex, she once again bolts, leaving a note for Felicity, telling her some fun facts about Haven and wishing them both well.
Felicity, for her part is not interested in the marriage, and tells Haven as much. Haven is obviously not interested and goes after Sera, tracking her to the bar that she and Caleb are going to be partners on. Caleb is currently holding it in trust for her, since she can’t ow property while married. When Haven arrives, he finds Sera performing in disguise as The Sparrow (the bar is also named the Singing Sparrow, so that’s fun). The scene is reminiscent of when he tracked her to Boston, a year after she had fled the first time, only to be stopped by Caleb (remember the broken nose?), who figured that whoever he was, he didn’t need to be anywhere near Sera. Caleb never mentioned this encounter to Sera, though, so she had no idea that Haven had spent years looking for her (this was a revelation when they talked through their past after the ill-timed “I Love you”).
This time, though, Sesily is also there (She’s trying to seduce Caleb) and accidentally reveals that the bar belongs to both Caleb and Sera (sort of), and the pieces fall together for Haven. He leaves (after starting a brawl resulting in quite a bit of property damage), and does not seek Sera out again.
Parliament reconvenes and there is a split vote for granting Sera her divorce, 80 and 80, with Haven nowhere to be found. Until of course he makes a very gran entrance, scales the wall to the viewing gallery, not dressed appropriately (he has left his robes and wig elsewhere), and declares his love for Sera. And then, in the final deciding vote, grants her the divorce (Haven had basically stuffed the ballot box on this one, convincing half of parliament to vote for the divorce).
Sera meets Haven back in his office (wearing his parliamentarian robes and nothing else) and sees that they really are for each other and no one else. But she gets her bar, and they end up being remarried, and the epilogue finds them with two lovely children and two more about to be born, because it turns out the doctor was wrong when he told Sera she wouldn’t be able to have children.
Like all Sarah MacLean books, Day of the Duchess featured such a delightful cast of strong, utterly delightful women. But what sets this one apart is the hero. Haven really did have to also earn my love, because even though I had the privilege of a third person omniscient narrator, I still didn’t know if he could come back from the things that he had done. But I also think that Sera matched him in terms of mistakes, both of them contributing to aspects of the shared trauma of the past. But Have still has the most important trait of a Macleanverse hero - he loves his lady so much, even when she is wild and stubborn, and accepts the wild and stubborn women around her as part of the package deal.
Other Things I Read and Watched This Week
The Golden Bachelorette - Maybe Guy is the real winner here. Y’all know I love Love, but like the Talbot sisters, I also enjoy a friendly wager, so any guesses on whether or not Joan and Chock will outlast Gerry and Theresa?