Copyright Jan Steckel, 2003. First appeared in Affaire de Coeur, January/February 2003.
When bookseller's daughter Marie-Laure Vernet first feels desire, it is for a ragged book-smuggler with whom she discusses a popular racy memoir by the pseudonymous Monsieur X. Employed later as a maid in the household of the Viscomte Joseph d'Auvers-Raimond, she recognizes him first as the supposed book-smuggler and afterwards as the libertine memoirist. Though he pretends at first not to recognize her, Joseph has in fact been penning a new erotic tale whose heroine is based on her. In a ruse to protect her from his lecherous father and brother, he pretends to seduce her, while secretly spending their nights together discussing books instead, including his own manuscripts. Inevitably, their mutual literary seduction becomes a real romance.
With off-stage appearances by Rousseau and the Marquis de Sade, this 18th-century French historical-erotic romance is also about the reciprocal seduction between writers and readers. Marie-Laure and Joseph imagine themselves as characters in books, and their relationship is a bookworm's dream. As the writer of two previous erotic novels (under the pseudonym Molly Weatherfield) and as the wife of a bookstore owner, author Pam Rosenthal clearly identifies with both her main characters. The dual point of view only enriches the telling of the tale, especially in the expertly executed erotic scenes. If you've ever lost yourself in a good book, you too will enjoy identifying with the characters in this one.