Duke Who Didn't

I have had such a hard time lately finishing books (and I don't even list here the books I give up on, of which there have been a couple recently, which is unusual for me, a compulsive book-finisher) but I had no trouble at all breezing through Courtney Milan's latest, The Duke Who Didn't, so maybe part of the problem has been a run of bad luck/bad timing in my selections? This was lovely, squarely within my beloved Milan dynamic of "women with drive and men who support them", and a great "longstanding mutual interest finally happening" kind of arc. And stuff about what it might be like to be Chinese or half-Chinese in Victorian Britain that manages to be simultaneously sharp, thoughtful, funny, and suitably wish-fulfilly for genre romance. And the food writing is so good, and Milan's author's note and separate recipe blog about the food are so good, and, damn, I wish I could go to an asian grocery and try making some of this stuff.* *Anyways*. If you read het historical romance at all, this is the top tier.

*Edited for self-deprecation about my cooking skills! which I guess I don't technically have a specific rule about not doing, but is probably a bad habit.