This most be the year for throwbacks to the 1980s in fiction and memoirs. I was born in the eighties, so I have been enjoying stories from that decade.

This book was short compared to other fiction novels, just over 330 pages, and it was an easy read. I read it in two sittings.

The characters are high schoolers who, in the early eighties, were wiser than their age. Private schools, creepy male English teachers, NYC, New Haven, and the East Coast vibe is strong.

I enjoyed this.

I got an ARC from Edelweiss and Penguin in return for an honest review.

How dare a wallflower writes to the gossip sheets that she is engaged to the reclusive, mostly chair-bound Duke of Thornton?!? How, dare, the Duke read about it in the gossip sheets!?!

Let's just say both are playing a game that will force one or the other to change their expectations and dreams—fighting for the HEA with Scotland rains, one-bed in a cottage, and a beauty and a beast trope that gets called out by the hero and heroine. I. Am. In.

I got an ARC from Edelweiss and Entangled in return for an honest review.

I received an ARC from Edelweiss and Berkley Publishing.

It felt like a YA novel that was a fanfiction of Pride and Prejudice that rearranged the plot. I find historical romances an excellent easy breezy read that I usually finish in one sitting or at least evening or a day; they should not be a struggle. This one was a struggle for me; I would put it down and brought myself back to it a week later and still didn't enjoy it.

There was a lot of telling but not showing reader emotion and setting, no drawing me into the story. It was "this and then." Then I realized the author is a screenwriter, so that made sense, and once I learned that tidbit, I understand the writing style.

I saw the 10 minutes of the beginning of the supposed movie of this, and I noticed it takes a more satire approach, which is what I did when I read this.