How to Catch a Wild Viscount, Tessa Dare

I was worried because a) this is a novella and b) this is Tessa Dare's first novella, which doesn't always bode well. (I picked up Julia Quinn's first book the other year, and it was nearly unreadable.) But this was a charming little story. I was worried that the hero was going to be too much of a jerk, bu the pulled it out in the end. I was worried that the heroine was going to be dumb, but she was not only as smart as I hoped, but also had some great backstory he didn't know about. Overall a charming little story, which avoids some of the super melodrama Dare goes for sometimes (maybe because it's only a novella).

Grade: B
#58 in 2016

Lord Dashwood Missed Out, Tessa Dare

I wanted to really really really like this and I only sort of liked it. The premise is great: it's a Regency where she was always pining for the hot guy next door, and he was never interested, so she wrote a book about how great it is to be alone and how he totally missed out on someone as great as she is. She's become the toast of the town, and he's embarrassed (she used a name that's NEARLY but not quite his, and no one is fooled). That sounds great! He can apologize and realize what he missed, she can feel vindicated, they can get together finally as equals.

...that isn't what happens. He's kind of a jerk about it, and for no reason that ever made any sense to me, she still wants him, especially when he's kind of a jerk about it. At the end I still felt like he owed her an apology.

Oh, and there's a lot of dumb stuff here. This is the kind of romance where they're so intent on boning, despite claiming to hate each other, that they get locked outside of a cabin in the snow, naked. If that sounds like something you could read, and nod, and say, "Sure, that happens all the time," then this might be your book.

Grade: C

2015