Review: Likable yet Frustrating
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 02 6, 2013
I am hard pressed to say whether or not I actually enjoyed this book.One on hand... the characters were engaging. At the beginning of the book I truly felt for Penelope, thrown into London society with quite a bit of pressure on her to succeed.  I found Charles, the Duke of Blackthorne to be both attractive and interesting; definitely the kind of British stiff upper lip that needs a woman like Penelope to show him that there's more to life than just sitting atop his royal Dukeness. I loved the way his mother and his sister, Lady Anne, manipulate him.My favorite characters, however, were Madame Bellafraunde (and my goodness do I wish I could read a book about Madame!) and the Duke's grandfather Henry who insists that all men be judged my their mustaches.On the other hand, by the time I got to the middle of the book, Penelope no longer seemed quite so charming. I still enjoyed all the other characters, but I wanted to scream in frustration at some of Penelope's antics. For a woman who is so intuitive, intelligent and creative, she's also just downright dumb. Seriously. The little explanations for why all of her ridiculous gaffes didn't cause severe repercussions (most especially bringing her pet goat to a party) just didn't hold up to me. It wouldn't have mattered that the hostess ended up being grateful because of blah blah blah... Penelope still brought a goat to a party. Society would not have been forgiving. And she never learns. She never grows. She never matures enough to stop to think.If you can overlook the fact that Penelope apparently is blindly stupid for no good reason at quite a few points during the book, the ridiculousness of the Falcon's relationship with his wife, and the occasionally dragging scenes that I think were meant to be funny, then Penelope truly is a madcap romp with entertaining characters, just enough intrigue to keep things interesting and a delightful love story. I just wish that she had grown more as a character.And I could have done without the "I'm trying so hard to be cute/clever/funny" scenes with the Falcon.Overall... I wanted to like it. I did like it. The ending of the book made me feel quite satisfied. But I'm not sure I'll ever read it again because I think the second time around I'll just want to bang my head on the wall about Penelope's idiocies even more.