Seducer

Tom is a great seducer.

But Ted Farrell couldn't stop; that armful of active girl was too much for the wise precautions of a seducer. He kept panting, "Don't be a nark, Cora," while struggling to hold her down.

Knox takes us through the lives of memorable seducers and their critics, in sometimes academic and sometimes rococo prose dappled with doges, coups de foudre, rakes, bawds, coquettes, coxcombs and procuresses — with guest appearances by members of the Frankfurt School sunning themselves in La Jolla.