Cloudy with a Chance of Marriage

Kramer's crisp, witty writing is unfortunately undermined by a straw-man villain in the third Impossible Bachelors Regency romance (after Dukes to the Left of Me, Princes to the Right). Runaway wife Jilly Jones set up Hodgepodge, a bookstore, on London's Dreare Street with a trusted but eccentric family friend. Dreare lives up to its name: its inhabitants suffer bad luck, and her handsome neighbor, Capt. Stephen Arrow, is a rowdy rascal. Stephen is attempting to sell his ramshackle inherited house despite an infestation of boorish relatives. When a lawyer shows up and announces that all of Dreare Street is in arrears, the colorful inhabitants come together in a hilariously terrible plan to save the day. The delightful romance and comedy-of-errors feel only falter when Jilly's husband shows up and his paper-thin subplot briefly takes center stage. (May)