Books like 'An Ideal Husband'
Readers who enjoyed An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
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Hell's Belle by Annabelle Anders
Rated: 4.67 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThere comes a time in a lady’s life when she needs to take matters into her own hands… A Scheming Minx Emily Goodnight, a curiously smart bluestocking – who cannot see a thing without her blasted spectacles – is raising the art of meddling to new heights...Categorized as:
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Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 100 ratingsSince its immediate success in 1813, Pride and Prejudice has remained one of the most popular novels in the English language. Jane Austen called this brilliant work "her own darling child" and its vivacious heroine, Elizabeth Bennet, "as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print." The romantic clash between the opinionated Elizabeth and her proud beau, Mr...Categorized as:
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The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion: Vol. 6 by Beth Brower
Rated: 4.78 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThere is bedlam, and there is delightful bedlam. This afternoon touched on the second, much to my pleasure. The Year is 1884 and Emma M. Lion has, at long last, gained her majority. Entering a golden age of friendship with Pierce, Islington, and Hawkes, Emma is confident she will manage whatever comes her way...Categorized as:
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The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 98 ratingsWhat happens when the most beautiful girl in the world marries the handsomest prince of all time and he turns out to be...well...a lot less than the man of her dreams?As a boy, William Goldman claims, he loved to hear his father read the S. Morgenstern classic, The Princess Bride...Categorized as:
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The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion: Vol. 7 by Beth Brower
Rated: 4.72 of 5 stars · 18 ratings"The image of Pandora’s Box being opened by my own hand flashed across my mind. A sobering and somewhat disappointing realization when one understands they are their own worst enemy."The Year is 1884 and Emma M. Lion has, at long last, gained her majority. Entering a golden age of friendship with Pierce, Islington, and Hawkes, Emma is confident she will manage whatever comes her way...Categorized as:
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The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion: Vol. 2 by Beth Brower
Rated: 4.60 of 5 stars · 20 ratings“I was sitting at my desk reading, with a cup of tea, my windows flung open, when I heard The Tenant enter his garret, just on the other side of the wall from myself.” The Year is 1883 and Emma M. Lion has returned to her London neighbourhood of St. Crispian’s... -
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsis as original and vibrant as its protagonist... -
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 43 ratingsThe Importance of Being Earnest A Trivial Comedy for Serious People Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People is a play by Oscar Wilde. First performed on 14 February 1895 at the St James's Theatre in London, it is a farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictitious personae in order to escape burdensome social obligations...Categorized as:
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Pygmalion / My Fair Lady by George Bernard Shaw, Alan Jay Lerner
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsThe ancient Greeks tell the legend of the sculptor Pygmalion, who created a statue of a woman of such surpassing beauty that he fell in love with his own creation. Then, Aphrodite, taking pity on this man whose love could not reach beyond the barrier of stone, brought the statue to life and gave her to Pygmalion as his bride...Categorized as:
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A Guinea Pig Pride & Prejudice by Alex Goodwin, Jane Austen
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 9 ratingsIt is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.Jane Austen's classic story of love, manners and muslin, retold in an entirely new way... -
Dare to Cause a Scandal by Emma V. Leech
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsTheir mothers dared all for love. Just imagine what their daughters will do…A one track mind…Miss Arabella Hunt is a vivacious redhead with a kind heart and decisive nature. The daughter of the man who owns the notorious gambling den known as “Hunters” has set her sights on the beautiful Louis César de Montluc, the Comte de Villain. The trouble is, the devil doesn’t know she exists...Categorized as:
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Battling the Bluestocking by Martha Keyes
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsGreat minds do NOT always think alike.Phineas Donovan is possessed of a sharp intellect. Fresh from Cambridge, he obtains a generous live-in position as tutor for the son of the wealthy Lord Bettencourt. If he can prove his value, he has hopes of being given the patronage of his employer, allowing him to take up a position as vicar... -
A Governess Should Never... Deny a Duke by Emily Windsor
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratings“So tell me, Miss Beaujeu, why should I employ you as governess?”A question to rouse fear within the breast of any prospective governess but for Isabelle, a lady with impeccable references and tightly pinned hair, it barely raises a brow...Categorized as:
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Lady At Last by Annabelle Anders
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsShe can't make a baby without a husband! Or can she? A fter witnessing the miracle of birth, self-determined spinster Miss Penelope Crone is having second thoughts about swearing off marriage. She wants – no, she needs – to experience the blessed event herself...Categorized as:
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The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas by Machado de Assis, Enylton de Sá Rego
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsFans of Latin American literature will be thrilled by Oxford University Press's new translations of works by 19th-century Brazilian author Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis. His novels are both heartbreaking and comic; his limning of a colonial Brazil in flux is both perceptive and remarkably modern...Categorized as:
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The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion: Vol. 1 by Beth Brower
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratings“I’ve arrived in London without incident. There are few triumphs in my recent life, but I count this as one. My existence of the last three years has been nothing but incident.”The Year is 1883 and Emma M. Lion has returned to her London neighborhood of St. Crispian’s...Categorized as:
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The Perfect Spinster by Annabelle Anders
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsHe’s more rake than gentleman and she’s more minx than spinster. Miss Olivia Redfield’s prospects for marriage are nonexistent, bleak at best. Removed from society for an ill-fated physical defect, she’s resigned herself to caring for others in a somewhat dreary existence...Categorized as:
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The Impertinent Miss Templeton by Lynn Messina
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA PATENT FOR PASSION No, no, no! It doesn’t matter how many times the Duchess of Trent (The Harlow Hoyden) requests her help with a delicate matter regarding a patent for her sister’s invention, Tuppence Templeton will not lend a hand...Categorized as:
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The Lord and the Cat's Meow by G.L. Robinson
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA languid Lord Devin is astonished when a petite virago called Wilhelmina accuses him of selling an unfit horse to a drayman. He isn't aware of the irregularities in his stables. Later, she foists a stray, starving kitten called Horace on him. But Hermione, his betrothed, hates cats. And Horace hates her...Categorized as:
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The Grand Sophy by Georgette Heyer
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsWhen the redoubtable Sir Horace Stanton-Lacy is ordered to South America on business, he leaves his only daughter Sophia with his sister, Elizabeth Rivenhall, in Berkeley Square. Newly arrived from her tour of the Continent, Sophy invites herself into the circle of her relatives...Categorized as:
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Five Kisses by Rachael Anderson
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThe first kiss crumbles her world. The second mystifies. The third unbalances. The fourth sends her reeling. And the fifth –ah, the fifth . . .Inspired by Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew, Miss Sarah Meacham has always behaved circumspectly, until an emotional outburst directed at a well-deserved gentleman earns her the nickname of Miss Shrew. As a result, she vows to never trust—or love—again... -
My Fair Lady by Alan Jay Lerner, Frederick Loewe
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe ancient Greeks tell the legend of the sculptor Pygmalion, who created a statue of a woman of such surpassing beauty that he fell in love with his own creation. Then, Aphrodite, taking pity on this man whose love could not reach beyond the barrier of stone, brought the statue to life and gave her to Pygmalion as his bride... -
The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 68 ratingsOne dollar and eighty-seven cents is all the money Della has in the world to buy her beloved a Christmas present. She has nothing to sell except her only treasure--her long, beautiful brown hair. Set in New York at the turn of the twentieth century, this classic piece of American literature tells the story of a young couple and the sacrifices each must make to buy the other a gift...Categorized as:
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Venetia by Georgette Heyer
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsTwenty-five-year-old Venetia Lanyon's beauty is rivaled only by her sensibility. Intelligent and independent, her future seems safe and predictable... -
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The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsThe first and most successful in the Baroness’s series of books that feature Percy Blakeney, who leads a double life as an English fop and a swashbuckling rescuer of aristocrats, The Scarlet Pimpernel was the blueprint for what became known as the masked-avenger genre...Categorized as:
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Her Prairie Knight by Kit Morgan
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsAlso available: His Prairie Princess (Prairie Brides, Book One) Prairie Brides is a series, so you'll definitely want to read the books in order to have the most fun! Enjoy these sweet romances and getting to know the Cooke brothers along with the rest of the townsfolk of Clear Creek! Newly released from prison, the last thing Colin Cooke expected to see in Clear Creek was an angel... -
The Partridge: The First Day by Kit Morgan
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsDear Mrs. Walters, One of my fellow clergy told me of Denver’s Benevolent Society of Lost Lambs. I believe your organization is just what our town needs to become a community of virtuous men and women...Categorized as:
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The Re-education of Mr. Darcy: A Pride & Prejudice Variation by Alexa Douglas
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratings“I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.”– Mark TwainElizabeth Bennet is the daughter of one of New York’s first families. When her grandparents take her and her sisters on a journey abroad, she is not surprised to encounter anti-American prejudice among the members of the English upper class...Categorized as:
historical-fiction humor industrial-era literary-fiction book comedy enemies-to-lovers family -
The Earl’s Hideaway, No Ladies Allowed by Esther Hatch
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsIf there is one woman Samson Rutherford, Earl of Riverton, can’t abide, it is his meddling sister. He has spent his whole life being a pawn in her plans and tricks, but when one of her schemes leaves him dressed in women’s clothing, he has finally had enough... -
A Town and Country Season by Joyce Harmon
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsTwo identical sisters – one London season. Identical twins Elizabeth and Marianne always imagined they would have a London season together. But money is tight. Marianne will have a season, while Elizabeth will spend the summer in the bucolic country village of Piddledean. But the twins have a plan of their own... -
The Lord and the Red-Headed Hornet by G.L. Robinson
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsAmelia Organizes Herself Into Trouble!She's a born organizer and a redhead to boot. Can she get everyone around her marching to her tune?Amelia and Aurelius are orphaned twins. She's a bossy, fiery red-head. Her handsome brother wants to join Wellington's army. But she wants him to become a diplomat...Categorized as:
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Love in a Cold Climate and Other Novels by Nancy Mitford
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsContains: The Pursuit of Love (1945)Love in a Cold Climate (1949)The Blessing (1951)Nancy Mitford's Love in a Cold Climate and Other Novels casts a finely gauged net to capture perfectly the foibles and fancies of the English upper class, and includes an introduction by Philip Hensher in Penguin Modern Classics... -
Full Moon by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsWhen the moon is full at Blandings, strange things happen: among them the commissioning of a portrait of The Empress, twice in succession winner in the Fat Pigs Class at the Shropshire Agricultural Show. What better choice of artist, in Lord Emsworth's opinion, than Landseer...Categorized as:
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The Pursuit of Love & Love in a Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsMitford's most famous novels, "The Pursuit of Love" and "Love in a Cold Climate," satirize British aristocracy in the '20s and '30s through the amorous adventures of the Radletts, an exuberantly unconventional family closely modeled on Mitford's own...Categorized as:
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Maggie's Mistake by Carolyn Brown
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsMaggie vowed to never marry a man who can't laugh or dance, but when she and the dull new doctor in town, Everett Dulanis, wind up spending the night together in an abandoned dugout house, all that changes. Her father is the best man and his shotgun is the bridesmaid at the wedding where a union has been made, but there's certainly no unity... -
Miss Buncle's Book by D.E. Stevenson
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsThe storyline of Miss Buncle's Book (1934) is a simple one: Barbara Buncle, who is unmarried and perhaps in her late 30s, lives in a small village and writes a novel about it in order to try and supplement her meagre income. D.E. Stevenson had an enormously successful writing career: between 1923 and 1970, four million copies of her books were sold in Britain and three million in the States... -
Arabella by Georgette Heyer
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsTo Arabella Tallant, the eldest daughter of a penniless country clergyman, the invitation to stay with her London godmother was like the key to heaven, for in addition to living in the glamorous city, Arabella might even find a suitable husband there...Categorized as:
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The Nonesuch by Georgette Heyer
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsAt the age of five-and-thirty, Sir Waldo Hawkridge, wealthy, handsome, eligible, illustrious, and known as the nonesuch for his athletic prowess, and when he comes north to inspect his unusual inheritance at Broom hall in the West Riding, his arrival leads to the most entertaining of ramifications. When they learned that Sir Waldo was coming, the village gentry were thrown into a flurry...Categorized as:
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Sylvester by Georgette Heyer, Joan Wolf
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsWhen the news went out that Sylvester Rayne, the elegant, impeccable Duke of Salford, was seeking a wife, all England was aflutter! Lord Sylvester is a polished bachelor who has stringent requirements for his future wife -- she must be well-born, intelligent, elegant and attractive. And of course she must be able to present herself well in high society...Categorized as:
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The Alienist by Machado de Assis
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsA classic work of literature by “the greatest author ever produced in Latin America.” (Susan Sontag) Brilliant physician Simão Bacamarte sacrifices a prestigious career to return home and dedicate himself to the budding field of psychology. Bacamarte opens the first asylum in Brazil hoping to crown himself and his hometown with “imperishable laurels... -
Emma by Jane Austen
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 86 ratingsEmma Woodhouse is one of Austen's most captivating and vivid characters. Beautiful, spoilt, vain and irrepressibly witty, Emma organizes the lives of the inhabitants of her sleepy little village and plays matchmaker with devastating effect...Categorized as:
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Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsWidely considered the most popular modern French play, Cyrano de Bergerac has dazzled audiences with its wit and eloquence since it premiered in 1897.Cyrano, a quarrelsome, hot-tempered swordsman, as famous for his dueling skills and pugnacity as for his inordinately long nose, is hopelessly enamored of the beautiful Roxane...Categorized as:
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Katherine, When She Smiled by Joyce Harmon
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsKatherine Rose has a secret. She was shocked to discover that her late father, a famous scholar, was secretly the author of lurid Gothic novels. These novels, wildly popular though critically disparaged, are her family’s main source of income... -
Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare, Gail Kern Paster
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 72 ratingsIn Much Ado About Nothing, Shakespeare includes two quite different stories of romantic love. Hero and Claudio fall in love almost at first sight, but an outsider, Don John, strikes out at their happiness. Beatrice and Benedick are kept apart by pride and mutual antagonism until others decide to play Cupid...Categorized as:
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Miss Benwick Reforms a Rogue by Maggie Fenton
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA lady in disguise...A rogue out for revenge... What better way to escape an abusive fiancé and a tyrannical mother than by masquerading as the very male secretary to the most infamous scientist in the land? Davina Benwick can't think of a single one. But pretending to be a man is hard work, especially around her employer... -
Hell Hath Frozen Over by Annabelle Anders
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThe Duchess of Prescott, now a widow, fears she’s experienced all life has to offer. Thomas Findlay, a wealthy industrialist, knows she has not...Categorized as:
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Hell of a Lady by Annabelle Anders
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsRegency Romance between an angelic vicar and a devilish debutante: A must read if you love sweet and sizzle with an abundance of heart.THE DEVILISH DEBUTANTEMiss Rhododendron Mossant has given up on men, love, and worst of all, herself. Once a flirtatious beauty, the nightmares of her past have frozen her in fear. Ruined and ready to call it quits, all she can hope for is divine intervention...Categorized as:
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残疾暴君的掌心鱼宠 [The Disabled Tyrant’s Pet Palm Fish] by Xue Shan Fei Hu, 雪山肥狐
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsOne day, Li Yu transmigrated into a fish. Furthermore, this fish even had a master. This master was the sinister and terrifying, mute tyrant from a novel. The system gave Li Yu a task. If he wanted to change back into a human, he had to obtain the tyrant’s heart.Li Yu full of tears: System, please wake up. I’m only a fish. He can’t even speak. How can we interact?System: Stop jabbering... -
Les Liaisons Dangereuses a Play by Christopher Hampton
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratings"Les Liaisons Dangereuses", A Play by Christopher Hampton, from the novel by Choderlos de Laclos. Produced on the Broadway Stage by James M. Nederlander, The Schubert Organization, Inc., Jerome Minskoff, Elizabeth I. McCann and Stephen Graham in association with Jonathan Farkas...Categorized as:
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Piccadilly Jim by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe fall brings four more antic novels from comic genius, P. G. Wodehouse. In Picadilly Jim (soon to be a major motion picture), Jimmy Crocker has a scandalous reputation on both sides of the Atlantic and must do an about-face to win back the woman of his dreams...Categorized as:
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