Grace Burrowes | The Duke's Disaster

In the first line of THE DUKE'S DISASTER, Noah Winters, Duke of Anselm, announces to his prospective duchess and to the reader that he is not a nice man. His offer of marriage has been turned down by the young lady he’s been courting for months, and because the Season is drawing to a close, and Noah is a pragmatic, unsentimental sort, he offers for that lady’s companion.

Lady Thea Collins is well born and past the silly stage. Also pretty. Also responsible. She really ought to be grateful for Noah’s offer.

Noah thinks he has the problem of acquiring a duchess solved, but the problem for me as an author is that a guy who maneuvers in this fashion—“acquiring” a suitable, grateful duchess—really might not be very nice. Thea has her doubts about him, too, but she’s running out of options, and penniless companions seem to attract men with wandering hands and dishonorable intentions.

So my job, as an author, is prove that Noah is worth Thea’s love, though our hero has started off on a very dubious foot.

It’s tempting as an author to make the hero an isolated, lonely singular person, one without support, one who must thrash, stumble, and fight his way to a connection with heroine, because she alone gets the hero and his problems.

Nonetheless, the heroine needs a few hints that it’s worth her effort to thrash, stumble, and fight her way into the hero’s heart.

Enter the secondary characters…. Noah has three sisters, and they all have husbands. All six family members have relied on Noah at some delicate point in their lives, and are ferociously loyal to and protective of him now. Noah has a younger brother whom he’s also more or less raised, and while the dukedom is a busy, demanding responsibility, Noah will drop everything to look after his brother.

Because of the role Noah plays in the lives of the secondary characters, Thea begins to see that the disaster in Noah’s life isn’t that he’s married the wrong duchess, it’s that he has the wrong impression of himself. What matters nice, when a man is honorable, selfless, shy, loyal, and protective?

And the most lovely fun about being an author is that Thea falls in love with Noah, precisely because “nice” doesn’t matter a bit compared to those qualities. Better still, Noah convinces Thea that she’s worth protecting, worth his loyalty, and his trust, and love.

The hero of THE DUKE'S DISASTER is, in fact, a very nice man, if a bit rough around the edges. I hope you enjoy reading the story of how his duchess averts disaster for him every bit as much as I enjoyed writing it.

About THE DUKE'S DISASTER

Noah Winters, Duke of Anselm, exercises the pragmatism for which he's infamous when his preferred choice of bride cries off, and her companion, Lady Thea Collins, becomes his next choice for his duchess. Lady Thea's mature, sensible and even rather attractive-what could possibly go wrong?

As a lady fallen on hard times, Thea doesn't expect tender sentiments from His Grace, but she does wish Noah had courted her trust, lest her past turn their hastily arranged marriage into a life of shared regrets. Is His Grace courting a convenient wife, or a beautiful disaster?

Check out Fresh Fiction's review double feature on THE DUKE'S DISASTER.

About Grace Burrowes

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Grace Burrowes' bestsellers include THE HEIR, THE SOLDIER, LADY MAGGIE'S SECRET SCANDAL, LADY SOPHIE'S CHRISTMAS WISH and LADY EVE'S INDISCRETION. THE HEIR was a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2010, The Soldier was a PW Best Spring Romance of 2011, LADY SOPHIE'S CHRISTMAS WISH won Best Historical Romance of the Year in 2011 from RT Reviewers' Choice Awards, LADY LOUISA'S CHRISTMAS KNIGHT was a Library Journal Best Book of 2012, and THE BRIDEGROOM WORE PLAID was a PW Best Book of 2012. Her Regency romances have received extensive praise, including starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Booklist. Grace is branching out into short stories and Scotland-set Victorian romance with Sourcebooks. She is a practicing family law attorney and lives in rural Maryland.

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