THE UGLY DUCHESS

How can she dare to imagine he loves her…when all London calls her The Ugly Duchess?

Theodora Saxby is the last woman anyone expects the gorgeous James Ryburn, heir to the Duchy of Ashbrook, to marry. But after a romantic proposal before the prince himself, even practical Theo finds herself convinced of her soon-to-be duke’s passion. Still, the tabloids give the marriage six months. Theo would have given it a lifetime…until she discovers that James desired not her heart, and certainly not her counte-nance, but her dowry. Society was shocked by their wedding; it’s scandalized by their separa-tion. James heads to sea, where he becomes a notorious pirate, and Theo builds their estate into a flourishing concern. Back from the seas, a scandalous tattoo of a poppy under one eye, now James faces the bat-tle of his lifetime, convincing Theo that he loved the duckling who blos-somed into the swan. Theo will quickly find that for a man with the soul of a pirate, All’s Fair in Love—or War. Eloisa James is the critically acclaimed New York Times bestselling au-thor of 19 historical romances. After graduating from Harvard Univer-sity, Eloisa got an M.Phil. from Oxford University, a Ph.D. from Yale and eventually became a Shakespeare professor, publishing an aca-demic book with Oxford University Press. Currently she is an associate professor and head of the Creative Writing program at Fordham.