If there’s an author who could get me to love books with billionaire in the title, it’s Alexis Hall. Just like if there’s an author who could get me to love books with duke in the title, it’s going to be Alexis Hall’s upcoming historical romance. (2022, baby!)
(That is too sweeping of a declaration. I have enjoyed romances with both BUT, on general principle, I am justifiably prejudiced against dukes and billionaires, ‘kay. As interesting subjects or as viable sexual objects. It’s a hurdle to clear, is what I’m saying.)
So it turns out the Alexis Hall magic works even when there is billionaire (it helps when said billionaire geeks out for Ursula K. Le Guin—although if he truly geeked out for Le Guin he would not be a billionaire, nb). The non-billionaire half of the equation, though, is the manic pixie dream boy we quite frankly don’t even deserve, too good and pure for this world, dropping more Jane Austen references than Jane Austen herself, wearing his heart on his plum velvet sleeve. There’s a scene with a ballgown at the end that transforms my kind-of-maybe-meh billionaire feelings into that emotionally raw Alexis Hall magic that no distaste for billionaires could erase.
George FTW, though. GEORGE!