Title: The Perks Of Being A Beauty
Publisher: St Martin's Press
Publish Date: June 18, 2013
Buy: Amazon
Review Copy Provided By: Net Galley
Blurb: The beautiful Miss Amelia Snow is not accustomed to being snubbed by the gentlemen of the ton. But when her mother dies unexpectedly, forcing Amelia to take employment as companion to a wealthy cit's daughter, she quickly learns to play down her looks or risk losing her position. When her employers, the Smithsons, decide to throw a country house party, she is determined to fade into the background. But how can she when the Smithson's guest of honor is Lord Quentin Fortescue, the childhood friend who stole her heart?
Blurb: The beautiful Miss Amelia Snow is not accustomed to being snubbed by the gentlemen of the ton. But when her mother dies unexpectedly, forcing Amelia to take employment as companion to a wealthy cit's daughter, she quickly learns to play down her looks or risk losing her position. When her employers, the Smithsons, decide to throw a country house party, she is determined to fade into the background. But how can she when the Smithson's guest of honor is Lord Quentin Fortescue, the childhood friend who stole her heart?
Younger son, Lord Quentin Fortescue, is far more interested in his host's cotton mills in the north than he is in courting the man's dim-witted daughter. But it's the girl's companion who makes him look twice. Years ago, Miss Amelia Snowe rejected his proposal without a backward glance. Quentin has molded himself into just the sort of man she'd have wanted back then, but is Amelia still the smug beauty who broke his heart? And can either of them risk their newfound positions to indulge the fiery attraction that burns between them?
Review: Manda Collins is one of my go to writers for historical romance. I always enjoy the stories and the characters.
This novella takes one of the not so nice girls from the Ugly Ducklings series and sees her reformed. Amelia snow was really the "B" word in the 3 previous full length novels. (All of which I highly recommend)
A change in fortune has brought her low and sees her working as a companion to Harriet Smithson. It is during a house party that she meets an old flame...one that she didn't treat too kindly when he had proposed to her years before.
I wish that somehow we could have had a longer story than the 70 pages of this novella. Once readers really get to know Amelia, you can't help but like her, but I really would have liked to have known more of what really made her what she was before her mother died. Even more so, I would have loved some flashbacks to when she first knew Quentin.
Oh and Quentin is the kind of hero that you really want in your own life. There may have been issues between the two, but he was instantly protective of Amelia and you knew just as quickly that he still loved her.
This is the kind of story that you will instantly feel is too short, because Manda writes characters you want to know..you want to be part of their lives.
Still if a novella was all that we could get for Amelia Snowe and Quentin Fortescue, I'll take it.
Rating: 5 flowers
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