Books like Georgette Heyer

Barbara Buncle seems the least consequential woman in her English village; secretly, she has written a novel using her neighbors as material. When it is published, the villagers recognize everyone except the observant, supposedly unimaginative author—and indignation begins to expose exactly what Barbara saw in them.

The comedy is quieter than Heyer’s but shares her gift for revealing character through vanity, manners and domestic commotion. Barbara also has Frederica’s clear sight and underestimated strength, while the large cast gradually becomes more than a collection of jokes. Rediscovered and reissued decades after its 1934 publication, this is now a cherished comfort read: mischievous, humane and immensely satisfying about a sensible woman discovering her own authority.

For readers who loved the dazzling nerve behind the disguises, Dunnett offers Francis Crawford of Lymond: outlaw, polyglot, provocateur, and virtuoso performer. He returns to sixteenth-century Scotland amid war and factional intrigue, treating danger as an opportunity for outrageous improvisation. Every conversation may be a duel; every apparent piece of bravado may conceal another purpose.

Dunnett is denser, darker, and more demanding than Heyer, but she supplies the same intoxicating pleasure of watching formidable minds assess one another. Her six-volume Lymond Chronicles became a touchstone of historical fiction and still inspires unusually devoted rereading. Once its rhythms click, The Game of Kings offers the rare thrill of encountering a novelist—and a protagonist—capable of staying several moves ahead of you.

Gen begins the novel in prison after boasting that he can steal anything, including the king’s seal. His boast earns him a dangerous commission: accompany the king’s scholar to retrieve an object from an ancient site. He is insolent, observant, apparently lazy, and constantly underestimated—the ideal companion for anyone who enjoyed Robin and Prudence turning other people’s assumptions into weapons.

Turner writes with deceptive simplicity. Jokes, quarrels, and seemingly casual observations are placed with extraordinary precision, while Gen’s personality dominates every page. This Newbery Honor novel opened the much-loved Queen’s Thief series, whose readers are famously reluctant to discuss its pleasures too explicitly: discovery is part of the design. Read it attentively, then resist the nearly irresistible urge to begin again at once.