Courtesy of Lisa Harsma of BooksListsLife, behold a scene from NYT bestselling author Tessa Dare‘s latest novel. I haven’t read this one, but like Lisa, I’m a big Tessa Dare fan. Booklist calls her one of the “new stars of historical romance,” and her stuff is beautifully written, funny, smart, infused with a feminist sensibility and smokin’ hot. Sorry about the ridonkulous cover: It’s a genre problem. I read them on my Kindle. Problem solved.

In this scene a duke forces a bookseller to apologize to a serving girl he has humiliated.

The scaly man turned to Pauline. He barely met her eyes. “Miss Simms, please accept my profoundest apologies. I didn’t realize. I am deeply sorry if you interpreted my remarks in any way that offended you.”

“Well?” The duke turned to her. “Do you accept his apologies, Miss Simms?”

Pauline glared at the shopkeeper. His was the worst, most insincere apology possible. To say “I’m sorry you were offended” was not the same as apologizing for the offense. She didn’t believe he was sorry in the least, and if she’d been alone and feeling brave, she would have told him so.

YOU GO, PAULINE.

If Dare’s authorial history is any guide, by the end of this book Pauline will be both extremely sexually satisfied and capable of telling off any vile shopkeeper who insults her.