I’ve been rereading all the Bridgerton books in prep for the new show, but while the first four or five have stayed pretty solid in my mind, I realized I couldn’t even remember the plots of the last three.

Francesca’s story was particularly forgotten because she’s such an incredible non-presence in the other books. Really with eight siblings, JQ I think saddled herself with one too many characters, and that ended up being Frannie, who gets married and widowed off-screen to a Scottish earl some time between books 3&4. The events of this book actually coincide with books 4 & 5, and yet she barely ranks a mention in either of them. Even Gregory, who is often At School for most of the early novels, doesn’t rank such little screen time. (I would rank Benedict next in Shafted Bridgertons, as most of his extra appearances are mostly as the pack of Bridgerton brothers, or notably Sophie’s Husband in book 5.)

Francesca’s story itself actually held up better than I remembered. She is explained to not fit in with her fellow Bridgertons, all though this is more told than shown. Michael, however, is a great sexy hero. Their friendship takes appropriately awkward turns as it becomes something more and his unrequited love for her is palpable and painful... until suddenly it’s not? The change of mind that suddenly he CAN have Francesca despite his dear dead cousin (nay because of his dead cousin?) is really kind of without a catalyst. But overall it was a more fun read than I’d remembered. Originally I gave it 3/5 which I’m upping by to 3.5/5 (or 4/5 for Goodreads purposes).