Parasol Protectorate Part 1

This series of 5 books eventually became The Parasol Protectorate.  It started as the potentially Taming-of-the-Shrew-esque story of a respected, landed, member of the peerage (who happens to be a Supernatural, in this case a werewolf) and his hilariously combustible relationship with someone who should be his natural enemy: an educated, witty, spinster who cancels out supernatural powers with a touch.  She is also visibly half-Italian and takes after her tall, robust, dead father and not her tiny, brainless, obnoxious mother.  The best part?  No taming.  Marriage doesn't really make either of them change, per se, except that, you know, sometimes loud people in love can be really stupid.  The secondary characters are enormous amounts of fun, and it didn't really surprise me when Yen Press decided to turn this into a manga series.  It practically screams for a visual medium with which to display all of its genre-mashup glory (and Ivy's hats).

Soulless: That last chapter/epilogue is pure porn.  Just saying.  There are some steamy scenes before that, some in equally inappropriate places, but they're pretty funny, too, and some character and/or plot advancement is occurring.  Not here in this last bit.  This book is the most traditional romance.  Usually, the inevitable marriage would be the end, so it was nice that the world got some more exploring afterwards in 4 other books.  I suppose that's part of what kept it out of the romance section when I worked at Borders.