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mermaidsirennikita · 5 months

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hi do you have a rec for a book where the heroine is like, nice and polite because Society™ but is bottling up her rage and the hero helps her let out the rage/emotions? preferably historical but i'll take anything!

Yes!

I've been recommending it a lot, but... this is For My Lady's Heart by Laura Kinsale. The heroine is a widowed princess who keeps a very icily polite and cold surface (maybe not nice, lol, but very in keeping with her societal role), and the hero helps her get in touch not only with her anger but her grief as well. So good, with such a unique heroine.

Joss and The Countess by S.M. LaViolette has shades of this. The heroine is a widow who was horribly treated by her husband (TW lots of discussions of sexual abuse in the book) and Joss is her bodyguard as she roams the city trying to meet someone who will take her to bed and make her feeeel. Turns out Joss can make her feel (and she's super into being dominated by him, naturally).

Melissa and The Vicar by S.M. LaVioette is another one you might want to try, and it comes first, I think? Melissa is a madame who now runs her own brothel but was sold into sex work at a very young age (TW). She goes to this village because her health, largely due to stress, has taken a turn. She keeps up a very polite and professional mask for friends, patrons, etc, but she meets this virginal vicar guy who just unlocks something vulnerable in her and allows her to really feel and vent about all the shit she's been through over her life.

Thief of Shadows by Elizabeth Hoyt SOOO has this vibe. The heroine is a society widow who's known for being like, very fashionable, very of high society. She's super polite and puts on a good show, and even takes care of her late husband's bastard child (though she herself is infertile and suffered a lot of miscarriages and suffers deeep down because of it). The hero, again a virgin lol, allows her to really let it all out--her anger, her pain, etc. There's one scene where he like basically holds her in his lap and strokes her hair and her back while she just loses her shit and I love it SO MUCH.

I meeeean lol Between the Devil and Desire by Lorraine Heath definitely has this. Olivia was really dissatisfied in her marriage, among other things, but kept it together because she was the duchess, and Jack empowers her to express her feelings more openly. She actually has a majorly defiant streak, and he triggers that.

Non-historical:

Evernight by Kristen Callihan. This is a Victorian supernatural, and one of my favorite Darkest London books. The heroine has the ability to manipulate metal, and she's this very removed, cool woman; she was used by a big villain to create this like... clockwork heart dealy situation for this guy who's essentially a vampire/demon, and having it in his chest and being this monster, basically, has driven him out of his mind. (He was previously very rakish and fun-loving.) He goes to get her to make her fix it, and she can't immediately, but touching her relieves his agony so he's like "well, I guess we're stuck together until you fix me". She's uptight, he's wild, they end up going on this whole adventure thing and also have very impetuous and poorly-planned sex on like, an exam room table thing, her name is Holly Evernight and even before they're vaguely romantic he calls her "my Evernight" it's GREAT.

No Rest for the Wicked by Kresley Cole. Lol, this is less "she's nice" but big on the "bottled emotions" thing. The heroine is a valkyrie who hunts vampires, and she's known as "Kaderin the Cold-Hearted" because she just can't feel emotion due to the loss of her sisters centuries before. She goes to kill this vampire, and it turns out he's basically a giant nerd who's had sex like exactly twice and lives in his big castle reading books and not hurting anyone. She still wants to kill him, but they end up dry humping on the floor instead, and then she's like "OH NO WHAT IS THIS FEELING???" and runs off. He understandably is all "you don't meet a woman like that every dynasty" and chases her, determined to make her feel a feeling lmao.

#romance novel blogging #book recs #romance novels #romance: ice queen #sort of???

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