Barbara Daly is an underrated comedy author. I’ve read two books by her so far, and both have been amusing romps with a pretty high cuteness quotient that rarely descends into saccharine sweetness. Never Say Never! is a very amusing runaway-bride story. During her wedding reception, Rhode Island heiress Tish Seldon seems to encounter evidence…
Sandra Hill’s 1998 release The Last Viking was one of the funniest books I have read in a long time. Truly, Madly Viking is just as funny and, unlike that earlier title, which featured a rather annoying heroine, this one has loveable characters all around. I really enjoyed it. It is 998 A.D. Jorund Ericsson…
Danelle Harmon’s newest, The Defiant One, is a lot of fun. I sat down with it on a Saturday afternoon and finished it on the same day. It’s a delightful romantic comedy with compelling characters and a crazy “mad scientist” plot. Believable? It’s about as believable as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde or Frankenstein’s Monster…
Indiscretion is a very lusty farce and an altogether wonderful romance. It’s far more sexual than any of author Jillian Hunter’s books of which I am aware. It also features a fairly daring plot structure, which reveals the hot and heavy past relationship between hero and heroine right at the start. If, as I do,…
I’m giving a really good grade to a book about a scientist who decides to make the perfect man out of plastic. I know, I can hardly believe it myself. Josie Farrington is a biochemist for a toy company that makes lifelike dolls. She is the inventor of a substance that looks, feels, and responds…
I’d never read a book by Jennifer Crusie, and I’m always nervous about picking up a book by an author everyone loves. In this case, I need not have worried. Her new hardcover, Welcome To Temptation, is sexy, intelligent, unexpectedly moving, and Crusie is a heck of a good writer. Her descriptions are so clever,…
Paris Sommers is a woman with a secret. To the rest of the world, she is the manager of best-selling author Montgomery Alexander, a man renowned for his thrilling cloak-and-dagger adventure novels. However, in reality, Alexander is nothing but another invention of Sommers’ fertile imagination, a creation she has fallen for à la Pygmalion. Then…
I always look forward to a new book by Julia Quinn, because I’ve enjoyed all of her books to varying degrees. They aren’t all keepers for me, but I find that even the ones that aren’t favorites generally have plenty of humor and likable characters. The Duke and I fits this mold. It has some…
Miss Darby’s Duenna is a funny, clever story and beautifully written to boot. In spite of this, it was a tough book to grade. Despite its delightfully dry wit and elegent manner, it’s not very romantic. At times it seems as much a takeoff on a Regency Romance as it is a Regency Romance. The…
Need a laugh? Need a pick-me-up? Have I got the book for you. Deborah Simmons newest, The Gentleman Thief has the light frothy appeal of traditional Regency Romance with the extra advantage of some very warm love scenes. It’s a kind of a 19th century screwball comedy with a ditsy-but-tenacious heroine and an appealing Remington…