Books: Real/Fake Princess #1

Here’s a historical romance that actually gives the genre a good name. I know some people reading this are automatically going to assume “historical romance” and “quality” don’t belong in the same sentence (let alone the same lexicon). Trust me, I’m not normally a fan of this kind of material either — which is why Real/Fake Princess came as such a pleasant surprise.

R/FP is set against the period of the Southern Dynasty in China (1136 C.E., according to the notes), and is — as most romances are — a clash of wills between a man and a woman. The man is Wu, the “Seeker,” yanked off the battlefield and appointed new duties he has no particular interest in. His job is to find members of the royal family who have been displaced by the war, insure they are the real thing, and re-install them in the imperial palace. Since there are entirely too many people out there trying to impersonate the royal family, he’s forced to sift through them all and apply heavy manners to get the job done. His main compensations include alcohol — lots of it — and a fair amount of time spent with a courtesan, Dai Xuan, who’s also growing rather attached to him.

Article originally written for AMN. Click here to read full text.