christ on a bike, what a book. woof.

DUKE OF SIN is about as bodice rippery as you can get without literal bodices being ripped, and shocked me when i learned it was published in the last five years.  it's morality chain with no discernible chemistry between the hero and the heroine and subplots sure to turn your stomach.

val, the duke of montgomery is unapologetically a villain, ready and willing to blackmail anyone for what he wants.  in a rare show of humanity, he refuses to rape anyone, particularly children, but is still willing to join a gang of pedophile nobles to gain more power and make jokes about engaging in sexual acts with his teen valet.  bridget crumb is his housekeeper and enticing because she's the rare woman who doesn't put up with his bullshit. 

when we meet valentine, he's just come out of spending several months in the walls of his home.  since i jumped into this series in the middle, i can only imagine (or hope, i suppose) that this little jaunt is explained in another book since the feasibility of this is certainly never addressed.  the book only devolves from there, rife with murders and kidnappings and a woman inexplicably falling in love with what has to be a sociopath.  the standout character in this entire book is

bridget's brother

lord clare, who upon learning that val

debauched this sister he learned he has literally thirty seconds earlier

punches him in the face.

and look, certainly this book wasn't my cup of tea.  but the one star rating comes from the detailed instances of animal abuse, the very blasé attitude towards a group of nobles raping and murdering children, a <i>lot</i> of weird orientalism - just a lot of stuff that i'm slightly more willing to tolerate in a forty year old book but that an editor in 2016 should have side eyed way harder.  

if you love a very dark bodice ripper or dark romance, you'll love this.  if you're a mafia romance reader looking to try a historical, i think this would really work for you - there's no organized crime subplot but there is a ruthless hero who does a lot of *grabby hands* mine at the heroine.  in particular, i think if you liked [book:Run Posy Run|57488034] you'd like this, and vice versa.

me? not so much.

CWs:

pedophilia, murder, kidnappings, descriptions of near-rapes, a lot of animal trauma (the dog & the cats that show up in the main timeline are fine), racism, Orientalism, blackmail... honestly probably more, idk.