A Duke Never Tells by Suzanne Enoch

“As unfortunately as her own visit had begun, Clara was obviously having a grand time pretending to be an earl’s daughter. Meg only wished she could witness more of her performance. In fact, Clara’s flamboyance had almost begun to make her think that she, an actual earl’s daughter, might have made better use of the privilege. Or at least had a bit more fun with it. It was quite possible she wasn’t nearly imperious enough.”

– A Duke Never Tells by Suzanne Enoch

I absolutely love historical romances, and A Duke Never Tells by Suzanne Enoch is one of my new favorites of all time. This is one of the funniest books I have ever read, it had me in stitches laughing so hard and I couldn’t put it down from the moment I started. This is my first read by this author, but I’m really excited to go back and read some of her other titles because I adored this one so much!

Meg is about to debut for her London season when her parents go behind her back and betroth her to a Marquis, James Clay. Meg wants to do everything she can to get out of this marriage, but there’s no way out. When James’ father dies almost immediately after, James becomes the Duke and Meg realizes she’s really trapped. James Clay has a reputation for being roguish and brazen, and Meg is skeptical about what kind of future she could have with this kind of man. Since the Duke died, they have to observe a period of mourning before being wed. But when a year passes and Meg has not received any correspondence from her fiancé, she decides to take matters into her own hands.

Meg goes to the one person she trusts above all else, her aunt Clara. Clara and Meg are close in age, and Meg’s mother doesn’t like for her to spend too much time around her aunt because then she gets all kinds of forward thinking ideas (like women having the right to vote). Clara and Meg decide to disguise themselves as a lady and her companion traveling the English countryside to view all of the estates on a tour. They use the names Sophronia Frumple and Mabel Gooster and travel to the Duke’s estate to get information from his servants on what kind of person he really is.

Little do they expect is that when they knock on the door, James Clay himself answers. Yet Clara mistakes him for the butler and he goes along with it, depositing both women with his business manager, Elliott who he introduces as the Duke. What is meant to be a temporary fraud on the side of all involved becomes a wildly exciting plot where everyone is pretending to be someone else longer than they ever could have expected.

This novel is brilliant. Brilliant!! I absolutely loved that this story alternates between the points of view of Meg, Clara, James and Elliott, and that we see the wonderfully hysterical farce constantly blow up in each of their faces, while they inevitably fall in love ‘with the wrong person’. This is a gem of a novel, I haven’t read such a delightful historical novel in such a long time, and I am so excited for it to be released so everyone can have a chance to read it too. A Duke Never Tells releases in April 2025. Thank you Bramble for the chance to read and review this one early, I loved it!