Much Ado About You, Eloisa James (Avon, 2005)     Lucius Felton STATS:   A horse lover, London rake who is estranged from his mother due to his nontraditional behaviors.  He likes to play the market with his money and doesn’t adhere to proper London etiquette.  He’s rich.  He’s delicious.  He’s devilishly tempting, and completely opposed to marriage. THE LOOK: Lucius is full of fierce pride.  The hard lines of his jaw make him dangerous.  He’s a large man, muscled, and he is compared to a stallion.  “Alas, Lucius Felton was resolutely conservative when it came to dress.  No mustache.  No facial hair whatsoever, as a matter of fact.  The most he would allow his valet to do was to sleek his thick blond hair back from his face in a style that was most severe.” “His eyes had a wicked twinkle to them.”  They were the color of indigo blue and curious.  His emotions are hidden behind a mask and only interpretable though his kisses.  He speaks the truth through them.  His depth is revealed through the attention he pays to his his horses.  Whereas most men would describe their stables in terms of “parentage, markings, and breeding”, Lucius’s descriptions include the horse’s grace, intricate coloring, and eyelashes. LEADING LADY: Tess Essex, one of four sisters born to a Scottish horse-loving father, is an orphan.  She and her sisters are sent to live with a guardian in England.  There she is quickly betrothed to an earl, a necessary act so that her younger sisters will be able to marry, and marry well.  She has no expectation of love; duty is the thing that drives her decision making.  Until she begins to fall for Lucius Felton.   She can’t figure out Lucius out, especially when he kisses her in the bath chambers at ancient ruins and then asks for her hand in marriage.   But Lucius’s proposal is more serious than Tess realizes.  “Oh, she was beautiful: brandy hair, cheekbones that the harshest sunlight couldn’t diminish.  But it was her eyes, tip-tilted at the edges, serious, intelligent, dark, and sweet in her gaze…” She also has “a bone deep sense of honesty” that he finds irresistible.   BOTTOM LINE: Lucius Felton is a complicated, protective, a fixer, and looks at Tess as if she’s the most precious thing in the world to him.  The dichotomy of this to Tess’s sister Imogen’s marriage heightens the intensity of emotion that develops between Mr. and Mrs. Felton.  They fall in love with each other, but more than that, they develop respect for one another.  What Tess discovers about Lucius at the end of the book enlightens her about his character and shows the depth of his feelings toward her [and all the people who are important to him].  He’s an admirable man.  QUESTION OF THE DAY: Many authors, from Eloisa James [Shakespeare] to Gregory Maguire [The Wizard of Oz and other fairy tales], use past literature to frame their stories around.  A brand new book called What Happened to Anna K. [by Irina Reyn]continues the story of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina.  Do you like this devise and the chance to revisit characters and/or story lines you already know?