Romancing Mr Bridgerton by Julia Quinn (The Bridgertons Book #4)

TITLE: ⟫ Romancing Mr Bridgerton

AUTHOR: ⟫ Julia Quinn

SERIES: ⟫ The Bridgertons Book #4

RATING: ⟫ 2.5/5

BLURB: ⟫ Everyone knows that Colin Bridgerton is the most charming man in London. Penelope Featherington has secretly adored her best friend's brother for...well, it feels like forever. After half a lifetime of watching Colin Bridgerton from afar, she thinks she knows everything about him, until she stumbles across his deepest secret...and fears she doesn't know him at all.

Colin Bridgerton is tired of being thought nothing but an empty-headed charmer, tired of everyone's preoccupation with the notorious gossip columnist Lady Whistledown, who can't seem to publish an edition without mentioning him in the first paragraph. But when Colin returns to London from a trip abroad he discovers nothing in his life is quite the same - especially Penelope Featherington! The girl haunting his dreams. But when he discovers that Penelope has secrets of her own, this elusive bachelor must decide...is she his biggest threat - or his promise of a happy ending?

REVIEW: ⟫ Like many, I arrived at this book following the series on Netflix. However, Colin and Penelope’s story was the first that made me want to read the accompanying book – I adored the first two seasons and don’t get me started on Queen Charlotte – but I wanted more of Colin and Pen and decided to visit the source material.

I can well see why some of the book fans feel that Netflix has taken the essence of the characters and bounced off from there – it wasn’t impossible to imagine the characters as the actors but their actions and behaviours were so different from the series that I finally decided to divorce the two in my mind. I don’t read many heterosexual romances – MM is more to my taste – but I had hoped that the chemistry between Colin and Penelope would take over. However, in the book I was disappointed by so much. Colin’s internal dialogue about Penelope, his reasoning, his attitude – it was all a tad fratboy (or rather rakish) than I was expecting. He seemed quite shallow and superficial and I found myself wondering just what it was about him that Penelope fell in love with. I saw very little of his much vaunted kindness and indeed, more often than not I felt he was quite a petulant little boy in his behaviours and actions.

Admittedly, his declaration of love for his wife was brilliant – touching, romantic, proud – but it took what felt like far too long to get there. I think I will happily watch the series on Netflix and not read the rest of the books – I cannot imagine they will engender more affection for the characters than I already have and might instead taint my expectations/hopes.

I understand that the books have a very passionate fanbase, which I am glad for because without them I doubt the series would have been made, but it feels like the novels are not for me although obviously YMMV.