The Impertinent Miss Templeton by Lynn Messina

It's 3 o'clock in the morning. Tuppence Templeton is bemused to find the Harlow Hoyden and her twin sister in Tuppence's bedroom. It seems that they need her help. It's a little far-fetched but leads to a delightful story of the very plain Tuppence finding her way back into the realm of the Earl of Gage. Although, it's not as if he even remembers her from their first meeting.
Nicholas Perceval doesn't remember her. He knows that someone interfered with his sister and a fortune hunger but he straightened out that miss in no time. He knows what he knows and what he knows is always, always correct. Yet, dealing with Tuppence Templeton is teaching him exactly how wrong he can be; about the way that inventions work, what women can do, how well he can run off a fortune hunter, and exactly how plain Tuppence is.
The story was a little thin but the writing is as entertaining as always. Ms. Messina writes the type of romance novel that helped me get nearly perfect on my SAT reading scores.

Four stars
This book came out August 30
ARC kindly provided by NetGalley

The Other Harlow Girl by Lynn Messina

Image linked from Goodreads

Le sigh. This was a good book (after the first quarter) but still not as good as my first Messina, The Harlow Hoyden. 
In this book, our heroine is the twin of the first book in the series. Lavinia, Vinnie, Harlow has always been considered the "good" twin, though a pallid copy of her sister. She is a gifted horticulturalist but it still comes as a surprise  when her name is put in for the British Horticultural Society.
The Marquess of Huntley (BFF of The Hoyden's husband) isn't sure why he put Vinnie's name in for the society. Women are not forbidden to join, but they aren't really encouraged either. Though the first meeting between Huntley and Vinnie isn't particularly auspicious (she soaks him with a hose), as the two are thrown together more and more often, they begin to find the ways in which they are compatible.
The first part of the story was both scattered and drag-gy. We got the same event from both character's point of view. Which, when done well (Mary Balogh), can be a wonderful way to get a glimpse of deeper character. In this case, I just wondered why we were getting almost a complete re-hash of the events. There was nothing added. Luckily, it straightened out and I started enjoying the story more. While the ending also had me a bit underwhelmed, I overall enjoyed this book.

The Harlow Hoyden by Lynn Messina

Image linked from Goodreads

I seem to be on quite the kick of "hellion/hoyden" books right now. I was on a kick one day, requesting books that had interesting covers from NetGalley. This, was one of them. Being a new-to-me author was a bonus here. Another bonus? I quite enjoyed the story.
The Duke of Trent is quite bemused one afternoon to find a young woman assaulting one of his prize orchids (she was going to snap it off at the flower, rather than at the route). He's even more bemused to find out that his intruder is the well-known Harlow Hoyden, Miss Emma Harlow.
Emma is delighted to make the acquaintance of the Duke of Trent. She thinks that he's the answer to her prayers. Her prayers to find some libertine to seduce her sister away from a fiance that Emma wholly disapproves of.
Okay, there was a totally pointless scene at the end

the killer had to come back and strangler her a second time? Why? To eke out a few more pages?

.
And, DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN, I hope the typos are fixed before this book goes to print. I ignored them because this was an ARC but the duke's "think smile" and drinking of "ail" were... whew. If this were a published book, I would have been annoyed enough to mark this book down two stars.

UPDATE: The follow-up, The Other Harlow Girl, is about Vinnie finding her own HEA. Not as good, but still worth reading.