Mariah Stone Duke of Rath

 Read in 2025

Seven Dukes of Sin book 1

Dorian the Duke of Rath is a damaged man  he had a rough childhood with an awful father trying to make him the "proper" kind of Duke by sending his mom away and punishing him for minor things trying to make him into a "hardened" man.  As a man he no longer has his father's anger against him but he is fighting his own inner demons to the point where when he feels anger he calls it "the beast" a bit dramatic...yes.  

Dorian has a dark secret where an incident happened while he was away at college this was right after finding out his father had died.  His two friends helped him cover up "the incident" and they banded together along with 4 other dukes to form a friend group this is where things get kind of hokey as the names of the dukes are to match (ish) the 7 deadly sins, they also get together regularly as adults to go to the "Gentlemen's" club to help to release their sinful urges.  

Dorian's aunt has been getting onto him about getting married and producing an heir, Dorian wants to remain a bachelor until hearing that his victim's family is about to lose their home with their father going into debtor's prison if they can't find a way to pay back their debts.  Dorian who has been consumed with guilt for the last 12 years decides to "help" the family by marrying one of the unmarried daughters preferably the youngest and paying all of the families debts.  Dorian hasn't met any of the daughters and the first day he sees his wife to be is on their wedding day.  The leading lady Patience is a blonde... so not sure who the cover model is supposed to be. 

Patience is sweet and cheerful, she enjoys gardening and has been working on a research paper related to her attempts to produce a new type of rose, the writer gets the point across and I did like the leading lady, while young she does find a way to start to break thru her husbands thick layers.  Dorian has many rules for his new wife some of them include punishing her when she does something to disobey his orders.  He also doesn't want her snooping and asking questions about his past and the incident that involved her brother many years ago.

The book is fairly repetitive and brings up the same things regularly throughout the book it reminded me at times of when I was in high school and had to write an essay then repeated some stuff and added additional words to pad it out.  Dorian is a bit of a beast at times and flies into a blind rage and smashes things... this has red flags all over it, while you can see from his past that he is damaged emotionally from what his father put him through as a child in modern days he would really need a lot of therapy sessions to help with these problems he has poor coping skills and Patience has a lot of Patience putting up with him and his outbursts as long as she did.

Patience of course doesn't heed Dorian's warnings and continues to investigate what could have happened in the past and how he could possibly know her brother.  Dorian continues throughout the book to have a lot of guilt surrounding the incident to the point where he probably has an infection brewing in his hand which has never fully healed from the day of the "event." 

I had a hard time finishing this one, I went on to read other things midway through and finally finished the book due to it being the closest to being finished percentagewise and I've been trying to read 10 books a month.  Anyways when the end came and it asked if I wanted to read extra about this couple I declined and un-downloaded the book.  

I did read the second book which was slightly better and I have read other books by this author which were more enjoyable.  Have you read this book?  what did you think?  did the extra chapter add anything to this book?

*Historical Romance  *age gap  *marriage of convenience  * Grumpy/sunshine  *beauty and the beast

*some spice  *opposites attract  *Dukes   *mystery (kind of)  *Strangers to lovers

Trigger warnings:  mention of child abuse,  Duel leading to death,  self harm tendencies, anger management issues for LMC

Spoiler alert:

I have to say while the book maybe just wasn't for me I wanted to like this book I just found it kind of a slog to read through.  It has a happy ending but their "break up" is brief and the whole ending feels a bit rushed like the secret comes out at a big event the lead lady is very upset and never to talk to him again then a few weeks later he goes and says he has changed his will to make sure his wife and her whole family is still provided for as additionally agreed upon (only with the condition that she doesn't leave him for a year) and everyone is all of a sudden very forgiving of him and the situation... somehow I don't find this very likely.