“I didn’t realize that burgeoning was something a book did. “Not bloated.” Her hip bumped the counter, as her body tried to express its agitation without her consent. “‘A burgeoning tome?’ Is that a kind way to say bloated?” The strange smile he had first sported reappeared, as if he found her odd and vastly entertaining. “It is a lovely, burgeoning tome that when dissected contains a wealth of personal realization and self-enlightenment.” The words, nearly rehearsed at this point from the number of times she had found herself defending them to crotchety men and scandalized matrons, fell from her lips. “You think a book on seduction is lovely ?” He believes the book is silly and about nothing but sex, while she thinks it’s lovely and shows that beauty can be found even in the most ordinary things.

The usually steadfast Miranda is immediately thrown off balance as they exchange quips filled with innuendo pertaining to the newest book that is all the rage in London, The Seven Secrets of Seduction by the author Eleutherios. Shopgirl Miranda Chase is absorbed in the latest Gothic novel while covering for a sick coworker when a handsome stranger enters her uncle’s bookstore. This book, which is now my favorite of 2010, is so brilliantly written that I hope I can do it justice in my review. This is the word that kept going through my mind while reading Anne Mallory’s latest masterpiece and also long after I closed the last page.

Seven secrets of seduction