The Secret Service of Tea and Treason by India Horton

Penguin | 20 April 2023 | 368 pgs

Source: Library 

This is the third book of India Holton's Dangerous Damsels series and each book can be read as a standalone. 

Alice Dearlove, known as Agent A, is one of the top operative agents in the Agency of Undercover Note Takers (A.U.N.T.) Alice has worked in many secret assignments in all sorts of roles and so far nothing has fazed her until her latest assignment. 

Daniel Bixby, known as Agent B, is another top agent of A.U.N.T. Like Alice, Bixby is competent and he's also most admired by many of his female peers in the Agency. His latest assignment is to infiltrate a pirate house party and to foil their assassination attempt on the Queen. But he's not working alone and A.U.N.T. has come up with a better plan - Agent A and Agent B will pretend as a married couple for this important assignment. 

As much as Alice views Bixby as her greatest rival, she has no choice but to grit her teeth and to take the job. Bixby, on the other hand, has always been working solo and he's equally fazed after learning that he has to work with someone who share the same rank and popularity as him. But they are professionals, as Alice often say, so they'll adjust to their role no matter what happens and see that their mission is accomplished towards the end. But as the days go on, they soon find that fighting off the attraction towards each other may prove harder than the mission itself. 

Well, I've to say this is the best romcom I've read thus far this year. Hilarious and swoony, the plot never get bored with these two agents' banter, the adventures they went through and the mission they carried out as a team. I don't think I'd ever laughed so much reading a book (and a historical romcom for that) and loved the characters so much like this twosome. The secondary characters are equally interesting and on top of it, there's some fantastical elements like flying houses, magical tools and gadgets that would either make you wonder or cringe with the agents (oh, they malfunctioned at times, ha). So all in all, I loved this book so much that I've made a note to read the other two books at some point. And not to mention that India Holton has now become one of my favourite fantasy romcom authors. 

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