It was ironic, really, that it had happened on such a sunny day.
This opening line is typical of the opening lines in the series of Bridgerton novels. The author has revealed a keen talent for the grabber: that single opening line that reaches out and pulls the reader right into the story immediately. This talent is demonstrated by creating a question that demands an answer and the key to the crafting is that the answer usually will not be made entirely clearly until one gets fairly well into the story, though this is not always the case. What happened? And what made it ironic that it occurred on a sunny day? One is almost physically compelled to read on and find out.
She could see from his face that he knew he had no valid argument, and it was making him all the more furious. Men. The day they learned to admit to a mistake was the day they became women.
The narrator is here penetrating into the mind of Eloise in order to convey unspoken thoughts. The subject matter is the point here. Not the topic being discussed, but the subject underlying the reaction of Eloise to the topic being discussed. The topic is Sir Phillip's stated desire that he does not wish for his children to go near the lake and how this “making clear” was not specifically conveyed to Eloise. The details are tangential; what is significant is the divide separating how these two representatives of the sexes approach things. And therein lies the conflict throughout this prickly romance.
It could potentially be an interesting sociological approach to an analytical paper to locate online reviews of this novel written by male fans of and compare them to those written by females. Almost across the board, the reviews written by women—or at least anyone writing under a feminine name—are universal in their agreement that this entry in the Bridgerton tales carries a definite Beauty and the Beast vibe. The question: is that an accurate interpretation or one constructed solely upon gender identification with Eloise. Is Phillip universally seen as being that gruff or standoffish or emotionally cold (beastly) or does that appear to be the universal opinion simply because most of those opinions are published by those who identify with Beauty in this version?
Not a single thing to think about other than the comfortable chaise beneath her, and maybe the fact that Sir Phillip was an ill-mannered beast for leaving her alone for the entire day after his two little monsters—whose existence, she added into her thoughts with a mental flourish, he had never seen fit to reveal in his correspondence—had given her a blackened eye.
Do not let the fact that the author seems to be intent on making her novel a different sort of the Beauty and the Beast trope dissuade you. Just because an author intends to do something is not necessarily evidence it was accomplished. The use of the word “beast” here to describe Sir Phillip, for instance, only relates directly to her perception that he lacks manners. This is yet another example of how the novel consistently and persistently situates the rocky romance between Phillip and Eloise as a battle of the sexes. If Eloise perceives his invitation that fails to mention the fact he has two children as ill-mannered, then does it not stand to reason that were the story written the other way around—from Phillip’s point of view—that he might have a perfectly satisfying argument against that assertion? In other words, just because Eloise (or Phillip) thinks it is so does not make it so. If it were, after all, what would be the point of the romance?
