Polished off Mary Robinette Kowal’s Shades of Milk and Honey this evening. It’s a well-regarded fantasy and Regency romance. I liked it, but I don’t think I liked it as much as I was supposed to like it. The Regency-romance thing is nothing special to me, as I have a wife who is way big into Georgette Heyer and who has recommended many of Heyer’s books to my attention, so all the period stuff Kowal puts in there is already familiar to me. Perfectly serviceable, but not remarkable.

What’s more interesting is the magic, which is a) pretty neat, b) elegantly limited, and c) appropriate to the setting; she did a nice job of working it out. I like how Kowal is brave enough to let the story be small: there’s no danger of the world being destroyed or anything; the stakes are important to the characters and so they’re important to us.

The natural comparison for this book is to Wrede and Stevermer’s Sorcery and Cecelia; they’re both Regency fantasies, and yet very different in how they go about it. I think the comparison actually makes both books look good.

That may not be my strongest recommendation, but it is a recommendation. I liked it.