Talkshow Thursday: Welcome Iris Lim!

Talkshow Thursday: Welcome Iris Lim!

Thank you, Linda, for having me! I am very excited today to talk about my latest book, Befriending Burgess, and to share a snippet of it with everyone. The entire Beniton Hall series is actually broadly inspired by a family in our church, where a young woman from a family of all girls married a young man from a family of all boys (to the great delight of both sides of the clan). The first book of my series, One Night in Beniton Hall, portrayed the marriage between Heather Nottingham and Edgar Avington, which united the two families. Every book after that has since featured the love story of one of Heather’s sisters or one of Edgar’s brothers.

I’d really looked forward to writing Befriending Burgess from the start because I love Rose. She is sort of the quiet middle child in the Nottingham family, but she’s actually the most insightful of her sisters. What surprised me while I was writing the book was actually the hero, Frederick, the Duke of Burgess, and how endearing he was. As someone abruptly thrust into the spotlight, he is nothing like the usual swaggering, self-important dukes so common in Regency stories. Instead, he is bookish and shy and a little bit awkward but also incredibly sweet. My best friend, who beta reads for me, told me she loves him because, “What’s not to like about a shy and humble duke?”

Here is a preview of the prologue of Befriending Burgess, which starts off from Frederick’s perspective. The story starts off a little sad, but there is a sweet happily-ever-after by the end!

It was ironic, almost humorously and tragically so, that while the world made grave distinctions between a duke and a marquess, a marquess and an earl, an earl and a viscount, and a viscount and a baron—the younger sons born to such peers of the realm had rather similarly unglamorous fates. No matter the splendor of one's upbringing or the diverse trappings that might embellish one's father's name, the only true differences in the lives of younger sons hinged upon two things: the generosity of one's eldest brother and, in somewhat related territory, how keenly one might wish for the untimely demise of said brother.

For all of his two and thirty years on earth, Frederick Arthur Colin Roy Griffith St. John had never truly

Pixabay/Mabel Amber

entertained the thought of ever becoming the Duke of Burgess. His brother was five years his senior and blessed with both a healthy constitution and a hale and hearty young son. His father, while not quite the sportsman, had never shared most of the ailments common to those of his generation. One harsh bout of pneumonia, however, rendered more severe by an unforgiving winter, had ended his father's earthly sojourn with alarming efficacy—and, surprising everyone, taken the lives of his eldest son and only grandson along with it.

It was a twist of fate that inspired plenty of envy, both stated and implied, particularly from Frederick's more ambitious contemporaries. It was a rather public secret that fellow younger sons, and even the odd nephew or cousin, rather resented the fact that it was upon Frederick, and not them, that fortune had chosen to smile thus.

But Frederick himself did not care much for the turn of events at all. He loved his father, brother, and nephew, and had no desire whatsoever to witness their demise. He never expected to be a duke and most certainly never wanted to be one. Shy and scholarly at heart, he harbored little affection for prestige and heraldry.

PIxabay/Dan Johnston

He had been content—content with his books and his writings, content with the simple cottage his formal but charitable brother had allotted to him. The dukedom came with its honors. But it carried with it a frighteningly hefty number of duties as well.

No longer could Frederick live the quiet life of a dedicated scholar, a willing recluse in the English countryside surrounding himself with the beauty of knowledge and learning. Now he had Parliament. Now he had tenants. Now he had an estate, or three, to run.

And perhaps most frightening of all, now he needed to find himself a wife.

Thanks for having me! I hope you enjoy the book and come to appreciate Frederick and Rose as much as I have.

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About Befriending Burgess:

She feeds him information to keep the title hunters at bay. He starts with wanting her help and ends up wanting her heart.

A duke, even a reluctant one, is duty-bound to marry and to sire his own heir. When the savagery of the marriage mart overwhelms the quiet, scholarly Duke of Burgess, he turns to a friend to help him repel the worst of the bunch.

Newly emerged from mourning her father, the unassuming Rose Nottingham believes herself outside most eligible men's notice. Instead, she lends her knowledge of the ton to helping her beleaguered friend Frederick St. John, the Duke of Burgess. But watching him court other, more eligible ladies turns increasingly harder the deeper her own feelings grow.

It takes a rumor and a near compromise, but Frederick soon discovers that the best choice for his duchess is already by his side. A sweet, friends-to-lovers Regency romance.

Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/4dRXQMx