If you’ve never read a Courtney Milan book then make it one of your reading goals in 2014 to begin reading her. Her historical’s are full of so much awesomesauce that I can’t tell you. You can start with today’s book, A Kiss for Midwinter. A Kiss for Midwinter is a about a young woman who sees the best in everything, and the dour, sarcastic doctor who manages to put his foot in the mouth every time he’s around her, much to his detriment.
Here’s the excerpt:
“I see both the good and the bad in everything that comes my way. That way, I am never unprepared.” She shot him a look, one that had him swallowing.
“Ah. So you might not wonder why I have come. But perhaps you’ve theorized about it.”
She pressed her lips together and looked away. “It wouldn’t be polite to say.”
“The one thing we have never been to one another is polite. But never mind, Miss Charingford, I shall fill in the bad and the good. Either I am an unspeakably rude fellow, the kind who vents his ire and spleen on perfectly innocent young ladies, or…” His gaze slid to her profile. She was still looking across the room, refusing to meet his eyes. “Or,” he said softly, “I am madly in love with you. And I have been for this last year.”
His heart seemed to stop in his chest as he spoke. The seconds that should have ticked by froze into an agony of waiting, watching to see if her eyes would widen. If she would turn to him and see the truth writ large on his features. If she would even care.
But she didn’t look at him. He couldn’t read what he saw in her expression—a tightening of her jaw, a tensing of her hand before she pressed it flat against the table.
“Well,” she finally said, “you’re doing it wrong. You are supposed to pick two possibilities—one dreadful and one lovely.” She turned then, deliberately meeting his eyes. There was a spark of merriment in them. “Confess, Doctor Grantham. That’s two dreadful ones.”
It was such a curious sensation, that constricting feeling that settled about him. He felt as his heart were made of green bottle-glass—cold and wavy, distorting the light that passed through it until even the brightest emotion was stripped of all illumination. He pushed the corners of his lips up into a smile.
“Ah, Miss Charingford. You slay me.”
Maybe some hint of the truth leaked out, because the light faded from her eyes, and she peered up at him. “I didn’t hurt your feelings, did I? I meant it—”
“In all good fun,” he said brusquely. “Yes.”
Miss Lydia Charingford is always cheerful, and never more so than at Christmas time. But no matter how hard she smiles, she can’t forget the youthful mistake that could have ruined her reputation. Even though the worst of her indiscretion was kept secret, one other person knows the truth of those dark days: the sarcastic Doctor Jonas Grantham. She wants nothing to do with him…or the butterflies that take flight in her stomach every time he looks her way.
Jonas Grantham has a secret, too: He’s been in love with Lydia for more than a year. This winter, he’s determined to conquer her dislike and win her for his own. It all starts with a wager and a kiss…
Purchase at Amazon
