This HaBO is from Fin, who wants to find this romance:
Once, a long long time ago, I was aspiring to be an archaeologist and spent a hot summer in Southern Illinois digging very precise holes in a cornfield with twenty other college / grad students. On our one day off each week we would pile in whomever’s car had the best AC (not mine) and run amok. One of those weekend days we drove through miles of cornfields only to come upon a farmhouse, set back from the road, with a tiny sign out front that said “BOOKS.”
Books indeed! Inside, the entire downstairs had been turned into a used bookstore of the paperback exchange variety, wall to wall packed with every sub genre of Romance imaginable, from Time Travel and Fantasy, to Thriller and Contemporary. The largest room though was devoted to Historical Romance, and that’s where our fearless leader led us, with the goal of each picking out a book to read over the next week …and one for her to read to us, aloud, on the 20min drive to and from the dig site each day.
I hemmed and hawed, having never read a romance in my life. Finally, with some help from the proprietor, and at the recommendation of a fellow digger, I selected a fairly thick paperback from the shelves.
The cover was one of the old school painting versions, not the newer photos. A white woman stood facing away from the camera, wearing a pale pink satin gown, with full skirts. The back of the gown had lacing …which to my memory was slightly undone, if not in the process of being let out and her falling away from the dress. The background was plain, and I think I remember it being red. I think some of her hair was visible, a reddish blond in a loose ringlet up-do.
I remember being surprised the story, being delighted by the spice (middle w/some open door). I don’t remember anything else and DESPERATELY want to find the book so I can re-read it.
I was hoping that maybe it would show up during a Stepback Saturday on reddit, but I don’t remember there being a stepback …in fact, I remember being mildly miffed that my cover was so tame compared to some of the others folks wound up with. Alas, I’ve dug through the internet to no avail, both instagram and google.
I love this story and I hope we can find it.
Julie Anne Long – The Secret to Seduction seems close, although it may not be old enough
It would help to have an estimate on the latest year for publication for our intrepid searchers. In other words, what summer was this?
Lady Rogue by Suzanne Enoch is also pretty close. My paperback copy is copyright 1997. I see the ebook version (at Barnes & Noble, at least) is on sale for $.99 today if anyone is interested.
Here’s the description, in case it rings a bell:
“Gender bending, spying, blackmail, and a charming love story are just a few of the elements to enjoy in Suzanne Enoch’s popular historical romance, now back in print. It pits a woman who’s no lady — Christine “Kit” Brantley, a smuggler’s daughter disguised as a boy — against a man who’s hardly a gentleman — Alex Cale, the earl of Everton. Kit has been dispatched to find out which English peer is trying to stop her father’s smuggling trade in France. Calling in an old debt of honor, her father stashes her at Alexander Cale’s London home for a few weeks. In her guise as a boy, Kit plays cards and drinks with the best of them; there’s even a woman or two that is falling for her. But despite her outrageous behavior, Alex uncovers her secret and suspects she’s spying for Napoleon.”
This sounds like the old mass market cover for Lisa Kleypas’ Suddenly You…
here’s a link to the cover :
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Suddenly-You-Lisa-Kleypas/dp/0380802325
The novel may be Cathy Maxwell’s “The Price of Indiscretion” which shows a young woman’s back with her pulling down the back of the dress.
Some of the suggested books have a woman in a white dress on the cover, but I am reading the HABO query to be asking about a white woman in a pink dress? Kleypas’ Suddenly You does seem like a good possibility!
@squee me – that’s how I read the question too. White woman in a pink dress. And a painting, not a photo.
The Kleypas is the only cover that looks like a painting not a photo to me.