Will I love Magic Flutes?

As a romance writer, Eva Ibbotsen is who I want to be when I grow up. Her quirky, hilarious, educated, swoony books are peopled with delightful characters, and Magic Flutes is a perfect example.

Tessa works as the wardrobe mistress and general lackey of a Viennese opera company, but she's really the Princess Theresa-Maria of Pfaffenstein. Millionaire Guy Farne buys Pfaffenstein for his beloved fiancee and hires the opera company to put on—what else?—Mozart's The Magic Flute. Love ensues. Absolutely delightful.

Princess Theresa-Maria has wonderful breeding but no money and little future in the crumbling Austrian castle where she lives with ancient relations. Rebranding herself as Tessa, our heroine becomes a wardrobe mistress, working for nothing for an opera company almost as destitute as she is. Tessa is much happier until she falls in love with a wealthy man…a poor-boy-made-good, who hires the company to delight his fiancée. With much melodrama, an unlikely pot of yogurt, a drastic haircut, a metaphorical silk purse, and a button, this story wends its opulent way to a happy ending. The hero’s foster mother, Martha,… show more.