--- description: Find out why 'The Duke Who Didn’t' made the list. title: 'The Duke Who Didn’t' Is on TIME’s List of the 50 Best Romance Novels image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt23a41957fbf99e44/698a5947db298750fe26be9f/The-Duke-Who-Didnt-Courtney-Milan.png?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Aug 01, 2024 # The Duke Who Didn’t by [Mahita Gajanan](/author/mahita-gajanan/) ## Mahita Gajanan Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Gajanan is an editor at TIME.  Victorian-era sauce maker Chloe Fong lives for her lists. For her, there’s nothing more satisfying than organizing life into daily tasks and crossing them off one by one. And ahead of the Wedgeford Trials, an annual game that draws out everyone in her village, Chloe is busier than ever trying to launch a sauce her father developed. But a major distraction has appeared in the form of her childhood sweetheart, Jeremy Wentworth, who disappeared for three years. He’s ready to work things out, but first he’ll have to reveal his secret: he’s a duke. As a half-Chinese gentleman in Victorian England, Jeremy has dealt with enough racism that he’ll never feel truly comfortable in nobility—and he hid his status from Chloe because he wanted to spare her the scrutiny that a public relationship would bring. But now he’s determined to find a way to convince Chloe to take a chance on him. As the two [rekindle an old flame](https://time.com/7003369/staying-friends-with-your-exs-friends-essay/ "undefined"), Courtney Milan reveals a sweet friends-to-lovers story in her 2020 novel. **Buy Now:** _The Duke Who Didn’t_ on [Bookshop](https://bookshop.org/a/4973/9798685689276 "undefined") | [Amazon](https://amzn.to/4eUF2gB "undefined") These are independent reviews of the products mentioned, but TIME receives a commission when purchases are made through affiliate links at no additional cost to the purchaser. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/best-romance-books/6996599/the-duke-who-didnt/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/best-romance-books/6996599/the-duke-who-didnt/"},"headline":"The Duke Who Didn’t","datePublished":"2024-08-01T12:05:12.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T00:33:48.881Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/best-romance-books/6996599/the-duke-who-didnt/","keywords":["Books","E-Commerce","list","Special Project"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt23a41957fbf99e44/698a5947db298750fe26be9f/The-Duke-Who-Didnt-Courtney-Milan.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Mahita Gajanan","jobTitle":"Gajanan is an editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/mahita-gajanan/"}],"creator":"Mahita Gajanan","articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt23a41957fbf99e44/698a5947db298750fe26be9f/The-Duke-Who-Didnt-Courtney-Milan.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/books/","name":"Books"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/best-romance-books/6996599/the-duke-who-didnt/","name":"The Duke Who Didn’t"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Romance Authors Share The Book That Got Them Into Romance","description":"Romance authors like Alyssa Cole and Tessa Bailey talk about the book that started it all for them.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/m8vBnzUj/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2024-07-30T10:00:00.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/m8vBnzUj.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/collections/best-romance-books/6996599/the-duke-who-didnt/","duration":"PT2M1S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/collections/best-romance-books/6996599/the-duke-who-didnt/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```