This HaBO comes from Julia, who is looking for a category romance:
From back in the 90s, I read a category romance (I think?) where the hero was a gorgeous model who was average (or less) intelligence. The heroine was a brilliant business woman, maybe a photographer or ad exec. Their jobs brought him into her sphere for a photo shoot. She initially views him as a beautiful but empty-headed dude. But as she gets to know him, she discovers that he is a genuinely nice, charming guy who doesn’t really get his own beauty. She doesn’t like the way other people take advantage of him. And she slowly falls for him.
I remember thinking that I had really never read a romance where the guy was so clearly intellectually average and unashamedly okay with that.
Does anyone know this one?
No, but I want to.
It’s not the book you’re looking for, but I’m reminded of Tim by Colleen McCullough (author of the Thorn Birds).
@Kareni: I thought of TIM too—but in that book (and the movie, which features a very young, pre-anti-Semitic meltdowns, Mel Gibson) Tim isn’t just less intelligent than other people, he is definitely mentally-disabled (probably what would be termed “mild-moderate” today). In fact, I wonder if 40-plus years on, the book and movie would seem more than a little skeevy: an older woman entering into a sexual relationship with a much younger man with cognitive processing issues. Certainly if the genders were reversed, it would be.
A historical version is “Simple Jess” by Pamela Morsi.
This sounds a little bit like All Summer Long by Susan Mallery, but it only came out in 2012…
It sounds like a – this? – season of The Bachelorette.
Average-intelligence men want an apology for that, Todd. Comparing us to Jordan is, er, hitting below the belt.
I have Simple Jess. That book is what reminded that I’d really like to get my hands on this HABO again.
I know this isn’t the book and I know that this is not a Rec League, but I just happen to be reading Eve Dangerfield’s OPEN HEARTS right now and it has a somewhat similar setup in that the hero is extremely kind and accommodating, but he is rather unfocused and clearly not as intelligent as the heroine (a nurse). So if you’re looking for a book that has a somewhat similar theme to this HABO, OPEN HEARTS might be a good choice.
The Duchess War by Courtney Milan has a dynamic like this–brainy heroine + hero who’s far from an intellectual powerhouse but has great people skills. (There’s a bit where two of his friends engage in snappy banter & he just beans happily at them without having anything to say.)
I have a feeling I’ve read this, and that it’s probably a Harlequin Presents, and probably written by someone from New Zealand or Australia….
Someone was just talking about book recs with similar heroes in the Bachelorette post! I also thought of Dangerfield’s book (I loved the hero/disliked the h) but I forgot about Simple Jess which I did enjoy,
The book described above sounds interesting!
Susan Reader, yeah, I can totally see this as a Susan Napier book. I miss her! Or Miranda Lee, because she can write some funny.
Certainly not the book being sought, but it also made me think of Cash Carmichael in Amy Jo Cousins’ The Girl Next Door – he knows he isn’t the smartest (or stupidest) person in the room, but he values himself and what he wants to do with himself. (Book 3 in the Bend or Break series, and we meet him in the first book.)
I would still love to find this book–but I’m getting some great suggestions for in the meantime… Thank you
@DiscoDollyDeb: The movie was actually remade with Candace Bergen in 1996. I was going to say recently remade, but I guess not that recently!
Vasha—if you liked the Courtney Milan, you might like Georgette Heyer’s Cottilion. Freddy is fashionable and good with people, and good hearted, but tends to underestimate his capacities, and what starts as a pretend engagement ends up being excellent for both of hero and heroine. It’s funny and lovely.
@Katrina just what I was thinking! It has grown to be one of my all-time favourite GH novels, partly for that reason. When she [SPOILER] gently tells Jack to get lost. Brilliant example of alpha-male getting what’s coming to him. And Freddy’s father is a riot. *off to dig out Cotillion*
There’s also a Loretta Chase – Mr. Impossible? – where the heroine is fascinated by hieroglyphics and has taught herself to translate them. Her much older husband dies, leaving her LOTS of money, so she heads off to Egypt with her brother, meets the hero (who’s not that bright). They fall in love, get married and he’s always boasting about her “enormous brain”.
I was just going to say that Mr Impossible has this dynamic!
I can tell you that it’s not any of the Susan Napier books available on kindle because I own them all and have coincidentally been doing a massive binge read of them. They are good comfort books!
That also sounds similar to one of Loretta Chase’s Dressmaker books, Scandal Wears Satin. The hero is described as very handsome, but not especially bright.
Yeah, I was gonna say I’m pretty sure it’s not Susan Napier because I’ve read all hers and don’t recognize this. Would definitely like to read it though.
I dug a couple of suggestions out of romance wiki. Though, the last one’s older than the 90s.
https://www.romancewiki.com/A_Gentleman%27s_Honor_-_Ruth_Alana_Smith
https://www.romancewiki.com/Everything
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0515066877/ref=nosim/103-3685024-2000659?n=283155
I commented with some links that sound similar to this HABO description and it seems to have gotten stuck in a filter.
I want to know !
A Gentleman’s Honor could be it. I’ll order a copy and see. I don’t remember the part about him wanting to quit the industry or that she had stakes in his decision. But the model and ad exec part feels right.
OK, you guys made me reread Cotillion yesterday. Now I have to read the last three pages again because they get me in the feels EVERY SINGLE TIME.
Gosh, Julia, are you positive you didn’t just dream the whole narrative after falling asleep during the latest Bachelorette?