Two Skimmed Books

I checked out The Perfect Find by the author of Seven Days of May, which I liked. 

This earlier book is less serious though we also get the perspectives of both the man (a younger guy here) and the woman (a forty-something former top fashion editor who has to begin again).  The author has a beauty editor background so is writing from experience.  I didn't get into it like the last book but can see it has charms.  Skimmed it some.  

It is being made into a series on one of the many platforms.  

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I happened to find A Matter of Temptation by Stacy Reid when searching for something else.  She is a black romance novelist who now lives in Jamaica (thus her watching such things as Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms). This book is one of a slew of 19th Century romances involving rich people if here one down on her luck and another who is a reformer type.  

Mina has some spunk, including being willing to tease and express her desires.  She stands in for her brother (who challenged someone to a duel after cheating out of desperation, a bit of complexity) and does best the challenger at fencing.  Unfortunately, he catches her disguise, and this leads to her being hired as his secretary.  An affair results.  

I skimmed the book (there just wasn't enough to keep one's interest for 300 pages; it's amazing how people can write so much) and it was enjoyable enough on that level.  I was annoyed that it never gave Mina the chance (though she handled flirting well) to lead while they had sex.  It was always him driving her wild.  Come on with that stuff.  Give her a chance!

And, she secretly married (it was never consummated) but usefully it turns out her never in the picture husband conveniently died sometime before. She didn't realize this until her lover investigated and found out.  Oh well.  

The book had a short (about a hundred pages) second story that I didn't read.  I have found a few of these books enjoyable if I was in the mood and they were written in the right style.  Of course, there are a proverbial million of them. Racks of books in the romance novel stacks.