I was provided a free copy of this book through Net Galley in exchange for an honest review. When a Duke Loves a Governess by Olivia Drake was book 3 of 3 in the Unlikely Duchess series. It tells the story of seamstress, Tessa James who dreams of opening her own millinery shop funded by the highborn father who abandoned her at birth. To achieve this, Tessa finagles her way into the home of Guy Whitby, Duke of Carlin as governess of his wayward daughter, Sophie. Despite their best efforts to maintain a professional distance, the two are undeniably attracted to each other and must navigate secrets of their past and threats to their future in order to live their happily ever after. This was an enjoyable read and a great end to the series. The story was well paced with plotting that made sense. It was suspenseful without being overdone with a satisfying conclusion. This book reminded me of the late 90s/early aughts books I read but with a modern flare. I genuinely appreciated this and found this book to be a bit of a comfort read. If this is what you're looking for, I would highly recommend.

This was a solid romance. Tessa is an orphan who dreams of owning her own milliner shop. Low on funds she concocts a plan to become a governess to a wayward child of a Duke. With only a pendant that has a coat of arms on it, she looks for the father who turned his back on her & her mother. As she meets the Duke, her plans take a deeper meaning.

I liked the characters. I thought Tessa and Guy were a good match. The “mystery” was decent and managed to keep my interest. This just lacked the banter and humor that I tend to love but, overall, I enjoyed the story.

This was such a sweet charming read between those of different classes. It also had a little mystery with a villain! It really had a lot going on. Tessa wants her own millinery shop & needs to get more money. She hears to a Duke looking for a governess…this is her chance to save and look for the man who fathered her. She doesn’t know who he is only that he is apart of the ton. Guy didn’t want to be a Duke but ends up with the title. He’s been gone for 4 years & his daughter was left behind with her grandparents of her dead mother. Guy is in need of a governess…he’s gone through several. He takes a chance on Tessa. These two have a strong attraction, lust, and slow burn to what really matters! These two have things to overcome & a lot of learning. It was an enjoyable read.

Being fifth in the succession Guy has been able to pursue his passion of sailing the high seas to look for botanical samples. Whether it's a curse on the Carlin line or something more sinister the unthinkable happens and Guy is forced to return to London and take on the mantle of the Duke Of Carlin and being a father to his motherless daughter who has been spoiled beyond belief to become the terror of the household.
Tessa is a successful milliner, Her dream is to open her own shop for which she needs money. Orphaned early, she knows her father is a nobleman in who's household her mother worked. She hopes to find said father and get him to finance her dreams. It's a bit of a mystery how she finds out that the Duke of Carlin is in need of a governess for his daughter but she shows up and despite the glaring holes in her story, she's hired.
Goes without saying that there's chemistry between the duke and the governess and while she's making inroads in taming his hellion daughter and trying to forge a relationship between the father and child she's also doing a poor job of resisting temptation herself.
The story gets more convoluted and the end is a bit unbelievable with a pirate treasure map and fathers and grandfathers thrown into the mix but all's well that ends well. I found the story a bit slow in parts but overall interesting if a bit implausible.

A soli,lovely governess romance. Tessa is strong and bright,Guy is over his head but a good guy, and Shophy acts like a child in her situation would. Everyone is written and developed. The beginning is a little slow but it is steady for the rest of the book.

Tessa James is the bastard daughter of an Aristocrat , left with nothing to identify her other than a pendant with a Family seal on it .......... her only desire in life is open her own millinery shop.
When she overhears the the Duke of Carlin , Guy Whitby, is in desperate need of a Governess for his unruly daughter she sees a chance of inserting herself into the household perhaps being able to gain an insight into her parentage .
What follows is not your typical Duke/Governess romance but something "more" and when danger raises
its ugly head can their growing feelings survive ?

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own

Now, see, THIS is the kind of hijinks heavy romance that I find so entertaining. I won't give away the true threat to our lead couples happiness, of course, because spoilers, but oh the cackle I let out when I figured out who was behind all their misfortune. Drake really took the "orphaned waif with a mysterious past" trope and ran for hell with it and honestly I couldn't be happier. Add to Tess' unknown identity a rash of suspicious deaths, some long lost relatives, a deadly family "curse", and a slew of brightly colored birds, shake vigorously and enjoy with a cup of your favorite warm beverage.

All joking aside though, From the chemistry between Tess and Guy, to Guy's heart-smashingly sweet attempts to reconcile with his estranged daughter, to all the shenanigans that make up the grand finale, When a Duke Loves a Governess has the over-the-top DNA of what made old school historical romances so memorable and fun.

When a Duke Loves a Governess is a sweet, steamy, and suspenseful romance that explores themes of belonging, family, class, prejudice, and sexism in a historical setting, featuring unexpected twists and turns. The mystery and suspense elements, some of which are surprisingly dark, are well-crafted and interwoven within the novel. However, a Duke Loves a Governess is at its best when the characters, Drake nicely developed, are interacting one-on-one for sweet, emotional, and steamy moments that highlight their depth and growth throughout the novel.

Tessa James dreams of opening her own millinery shop and is close to achieving her goal but lacks funding. So, she pretends to be a governess to access the aristocratic world and discover the identity of the lord who sired her to ask him for a loan. After years abroad, Guy Whitby, the new Duke of Carlin, returns to London, where his daughter Sophy runs wild, scaring away her governesses. Desperate to fill the position and intrigued by her, he hires Tessa, even though he suspects she may not be truthful about her qualifications.

Though they are from different spectrums of the social stratum, Tessa and Guy share the same desire to belong. Although she set out to fund her millinery shop, after spending time with the Duke’s daughter and the Duke himself, Tessa realizes that she is also searching for family – and may have found it – no longer wanting to be alone in the world. Similarly, Guy longs to develop a relationship with his daughter, to whom he is a stranger. While he may initially just be attracted to Tessa, despite himself, his heart becomes more involved each moment Guy spends in her company – especially observing the effect she has on his daughter.

Moments of the novel are frustrating because Tessa and Guy go back and forth in their feelings of what they want from the other. Because of their pasts, it’s understandable they might have trust issues, but it just gets old after a while. Nevertheless, both characters, flaws, and all are likable and evolve nicely as the novel progresses, making it easy to hope they can work out their issues as they balance each other out.

If you are looking for a suspenseful, sweet, and steamy historical romance featuring a well-structured mystery while also tackling social issues such as class, sexism, and prejudice, then When a Duke Loves a Governess is a novel worth checking out.

I received an ARC of this book from Netgalley. It’s a fun diversion. Although the plot is not entirely original, the writing is engaging and the main characters are realistic and likable. It’s a mystery told in third-person from the alternating POVs of Guy and Tessa. I had my suspicions about who might be the villain, but I was somewhat surprised when it became obvious. For the most part, I was pretty sure I knew who wasn’t the bad guy.

There are some wonderful details to direct readers toward what the author wants them to notice, like Tessa’s mother’s last words that were misunderstood and Aunt Delia’s comments about the Carlin Curse. I appreciate Oliva Drake’s attention to detail and the way all of the pieces fit together. Overall, it is well-told and I enjoyed it.

I'd never read Olivia Drake before and honestly what a mistake! I loved the characters in this books as well as the multiple side plots that were happening. Tessa was such an endearing character and I loved her willpower in her quest for her family and to be the best nanny she could be.
Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an arc for an honest review.

3.5 stars rounded up.

Hatmaker Tessa James has worked hard in hopes of opening her own millinery shop but having lost her job and her means of saving money for her own premises, she decides she must try to obtain a loan from the lord who fathered her and then abandoned her and her mother. Unfortunately, she doesn’t even know who he is, her only clue to his identity being a necklace with a noble coat of arms on it. When she overhears two society ladies gossiping about a duke desperate to find a governess he can keep for his unruly daughter, Tessa decides this is the answer to her monetary woes.

Guy Whitby, newly minted Duke of Carlin, has only recently returned to London after spending years sailing around the world researching coastal plants. In his absence his young daughter, Sophy, has been allowed to run wild and now he can’t keep a governess for more than a few days, sometimes only hours. When Tessa applies for the position, Guy decides to give her a chance despite his suspicions of her lack of references and the beauty that he notices entirely too much.

The growing attraction between Guy and Tessa leads to feelings that neither wants to give up but which are wholly inappropriate and impossible given their disparate stations. When an enemy surfaces to threaten Guy and his family, their romance is all but lost and each must decide if they can trust one another or allow difficult circumstances to pull them apart.

It took quite awhile for me to get into this book as much of the plot initially focused on Sophy and her wild antics as Tessa tried to improve her behavior. In fact, for much of the book, the relationship between Guy and Tessa is one of mistrust and suspicion. This gives way to lust soon enough, but that didn’t really convince me of true feelings. The romance was believable enough here by the end, but it was a long time in coming I think, with Guy and Tessa both bumbling around with their communication with one another and various villains coming between them in the meantime. I love steamy scenes and thought the ones here might be the key to solidifying this relationship, but somehow, they felt rather flat and unemotional, so I still didn’t get the connection I craved between the MCs. I enjoyed the slight aspect of mystery we got here and would’ve actually liked to see more of that. The villain was fairly easy to peg, but the plotting was skillful and sealed the relationship between Tessa and Guy into something that felt real. There were a few aspects of the plot that were left open and unfinished, such as Tessa’s friend from her old life, but for the most part I found the ending to be satisfying as a whole. Now I’m wondering if we’ll get a book for Avis and her earl, but if we do, I will likely read it as well.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

When a Duke Loves a Governess is the third book in the Unlikely Duchesses series by Olivia Drake. It can be read as a stand-alone book but as the series is wonderful I am sure you will want to read the others as well.

Tessa James doesn't want much in life, just to find her real father which in turn should enable her to afford to open her own Millinery shop where she will enjoy making her beautiful hat creations. In the meantime, she works in another woman's milliners and she has to make the most awful hats ever. She doesn't earn much money so when an opportunity presents itself for her to take on a better paying job she takes it. She applies to be a governess, something she has never done before but a job that could come in very handy in more ways than one.

Guy Whitby, the Duke of Carlin, not being able to deal well with his grief after losing his wife, goes abroad leaving his new baby girl behind in the care of her grandparents, his in-laws. When he returns it is to discover that his lovely baby has turned into a wild child. He takes her into his home determined to make up for leaving her, but he just can't seem to get through to her. It doesn't help that she is forever running governesses off. It is getting so agencies are running out of women to send him for the position.

When Tessa arrives to ask for the position it seems the only option Guy has, despite her having no references, is to take her on. From that moment his, Tessa's and his lovely, yet wild daughter's lives will never be the same.

This was a really lovely feel-good story that had me smiling throughout. There was never a dull moment, how could there be with so much going on. Tessa was doing a job she wasn't qualified for, her charge was a wonderful little sprite, her father desperately needed a good woman, and then we have the mystery as to who Tessa's father is. There is a thief thrown into the mix, a would-be murderer too, wrap all that up in a jolly good passionate budding romance between Tessa and Guy and you have a perfect read.

I am more than happy to recommend this book and the others in the series.

High marks for a focused ambitious young heroine. Tessa wants to open her own millinery shop, and seizes the opportunity to become a governess to the daughter of the new Duke of Carlin. She hopes to find more information about her own unknown aristocratic father who abandoned her and her mother.

An entertaining historical romance, with good dialogue and some fun plot twists!

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

When a Duke Loves a Governess
Unlikely Duchesses
by Olivia Drake
(Unlikely Duchesses, #3)
Published by St Martins Press
July 27, 2021
Pages: 320


A stunning new Regency from beloved author Olivia Drake, When a Duke Loves a Governess...!

Tessa James has worked and planned tirelessly to open her own millinery shop. All she needs now is a loan from the lord who sired and abandoned her. The only problem is, she doesn’t even know his name. What’s a woman to do to find him but enter the aristocratic world by becoming a governess?

Guy Whitby, the new Duke of Carlin, has returned to London after years abroad to discover that his young daughter Sophy has become a wild-child known for scaring away every governess who's crossed his doorstep. When Tessa James applies for the job, he hires her in desperation despite his misgivings that she’s too bold and beautiful–and that she might be fibbing about her qualifications.

Their blooming attraction leads them on a completely unexpected path to love that neither wants to deny. But when an old enemy threatens Guy's family, their forbidden romance goes up in flames. Can they still learn to love and trust each other as forces try to tear them apart?

#oliviadrake #whenadukelovesagoverness

Was I hooked by that book? Sort of. It's a fairly standard historical romance where the Duke falls in love with what seems to be an inappropriate woman.

Tessa James certainly is no governess, but that doesn't stop her from applying for the position anyway. She desperately needs the money to open her own shop. The man looking for the governess is Guy Whitby, the Duke of Carlin. His unruly 4-year old daughter has run off every single governess so far and he is at his wits' end. Tessa doesn't come with references and Guy is quite suspicious of her, which is as it should be. But he employs her on a trial basis and she definitely has more success with Sophy than anybody else before her. And that is how a seamstress in a milliner's shop became a governess. Oh, and Tessa sees this as an opportunity to try to figure out who her father is.

Guy has a lot to make up for when it comes to Sophy. He basically neglected her for the first 4 years of her life and then uprooted her whole existence when he took her from her grandparents' home. No wonder she was acting out. He was just clueless, really. Tessa helped him to reconnect with Sophy.

Tessa was very resourceful and committed. She talked her way into the position and the entire time she teetered on the edge of discovery, but by the time her secrets were revealed, Guy didn't really care about all that anymore. Luckily for her. I quite liked Tessa for her straightforward ways. Guy didn't really make an impression on me either way. He was very dedicated to helping Tessa and to investigating all the accidents that seemed to plague him lately.

I would have liked to see more of Tessa connecting with her newly-discovered family.

The story was fine, not brilliant, but I enjoyed it enough. This is part of a series, Unlikely Duchesses, but stands on its own.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with a copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This was not a typical aristocrat and his governess. The duke was far down in line to inherit the title and had been spending his life on his pursuit of knowledge. The governess was no such thing truly, with no education to speak of, no interaction or knowledge of how to interact with nobility and varied ranks, and her dialect would slip every so often to reveal herself. Yet she should have had education and so much more. The evolution of the relationship between the adults, the one between the child and each adult, and watching the individual growth of each was just as much a part of the story as the happy ending. #netgalley #whenadukelovesagoverness

It just didn’t hold my interest. Tessa and Guy didn’t have much chemistry to me. Half the book, Tessa was worried about her secret being exposed. 2nd half of the book, it was on the investigation of the curse. I don’t know. I just didn’t enjoy the flow of this book, nor the characters who were just ok.

Thank you St Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the copy of this book.

Tessa has been alone most of her life. When her mother dies in an accident, she leaves Tessa with a necklace featuring a coat of arms that she leads Tessa to believe is tied to her father that she never knew. When she hears about an opening for a governess at a Duke's home, she decides this is her chance to try to track down her father and ask him for money to open her own hat shop.

There is a lot to like about this book. Tessa is smart and strong. The Duke she winds up working for, Guy, is brooding, yet kind, and is not quite your typical duke. He has traveled a lot doing research on botany all over the globe. These two make quite the pair. There is a mystery and adventure part to the book that is intriguing but does take away from the romance aspect quite a bit. It was hard to truly feel the connection between them. In addition, while it definitely falls clearly on the side of consent, the relationship felt a bit too lopsided with Tessa believing herself a low-born governess and Guy being a duke. Again, it was clearly consensual but it still felt a bit off for some reason.

The writing in this one is well done and the side characters intriguing to the point of wanting more about them. While part of a series, this book fully works as a standalone. I have enjoyed Drake's work and will definitely read more from her in the future.

I was a bit hesitant to pick up this one of Olivia Drake. Because I read Forever my Duke and found it a bit slow. Lovely, but slow.

But my curiosity got the best of me, so I dove in. And I'm very happy I did! This one is indeed a bit more fast paced.

Tessa has been orphanage d as a young girl, so she had always relied on herself and herself only. She is trying to find her father, with the help of the necklace her mother gave to her, just before she died. Because hopefully her father can help to fund her dream: her own millinery shop.

Since her father is supposed to be one of the thon, Tessa is looking for a way to get in closer contact with the aristocracy. When she overhears that the Duke of Carlin has lost yet another governess, she presents herself as the new hire.

Guy is at his wits end, when the fifth governess quits her job of taking care of his daughter. When Tessa arrives, he is sceptical: both of her age (too young to handle his daughter) and because of her faulty background story and missing references. However, he agrees with Tessa on a week on trial to show some improvement in his daughter's behavior.

Tessa can relate to the girl, since she has also lost her mother at a young age. Furthermore Sophy had never met her father until recently, since guy was sailing around the world to investigate botanic plants. As fourth in line for the dukedom, he didn't think he would become the Duke of Carlin. But after some incidents and illnesses, both guy's father, uncle, nephew and grandfather are gone, so he needed to return home.

So while Tessa tries to reconnect Sophie to her dad, she learns more and more about the fascinating duke. And she can't help but feel attracted to him.

Guy doesn't know what to think of Tessa: clearly she lies about several things. But she is great with Sophy. And he can't deny that he finds her attrac­tive. But a duke and someone in his household? Unconceivable. So both a determined to ignore their attraction. But when Guy learns of her search for her family and Tessa learns of the curse of the Carlin's, they decide to team up and face the challenges. What will they find? Find out for yourself in this wonderful read. Four out of five stars from me and a special thank you to Netgalley for providing the arc.

When a Duke Loves a Governess Olivia Drake was an enjoyable afternoon read. The third book in the Unlikely Duchesses series, it can be read as a standalone.

I loved Tessa's hard as nails character and Guy's dedication to his daughter. But I felt the romance between Tessa and Guy was lacking and the plot turned a bit wearisome.

Thanks to NetGalley and SMP for gifting me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.