Books like A Brother's Price

This stand-alone book had been tugging at my attention for years; I finally got around to loading it up on my Kindle in advance of an out-of-town trip.The plot and set-up have been described adequately in other reviews, but briefly, a young man born into a world where the ratio of men to women is about 1:20 has adventures and romantic adventures. This is social science fiction rather than fantasy as such, as the world has no magic. (Though it does have an early 19th-Century tech level.)What the prior reviews I'd read didn't indicate was how funny the book was. It was not written as a comedy as such -- the humor is mostly in the world-building and the, so to speak, genre-meta levels as it plays wittily with romantic melodrama tropes. (Which if one is a reader coming strictly from the SF side of things, I suppose one might miss.)Also, you know that male fantasy where the guy finds himself vastly outnumbered by women...? They might want to rethink that -- happily, Spencer does that work for them.It also does just exactly the thing I think SF-romance crossovers should do yet do so seldom -- use the SF elements to change and therefore examine the underlying parameters of the whole romantic negotiation and reproductive dance (while not losing the charm). Recommended for SF readers, romance readers, and any guys who have ever entertained the aforesaid fantasy -- do allow it to entertain you back.Ta, L.