But, another personal thing, Julius's - I think this discussion has been had before, but I would use Julius'.

I can't find my copy at the moment, but I'm 99% sure I'm doing it the way Strunk & White say you should.

I prefer the way Elena recommended, but I think Susan is right - that style guides say to include the second s. However, (to me) because it appears in first person narration, either is allowable. Susan is only transcribing the heroine's thoughts and the heroine thought Julius's.

Indeed, I suspected that the reason this man galloped about the countryside on an elegant little Arabian rather than a rangy hunter like Hal and Julius favored was yet another species of male vanity. A short man would not show to as good advantage on a seventeen-hand hunter.

Heh. I like this. It does a nice job of letting us know a little bit about the way the narrator things along with feeding us description of the hero.

Susan, the quanitity of descriptive seems basically fine to me, because it's a Regency. Georgette Heyer is the gold standard, and you know precisely what everyone's wearing, down to the pink rosettes in their hair. Regency has its own language, I think.

I'd add one comment to the above:

He looked at me properly for the first time, and I noticed his vivid, dark blue eyes. I had never seen such a color before.

This is the only thing in there that pinged me, and only in the presentation. For me, that first bit is awkward, and reads as telling; a rephrase along the lines of

He looked at me properly for the first time, and I noticed his eyes. I had never seen such a color before - they were a dark, vivid, blue.

I don't know why that reads so much more true to voice, but it seems to. Maybe because I dealt with the "long gleaming dark brown tresses" earlier in the week, or possibly because I'm undercoffeed.

I like that--thanks, deb.

Welcome, ma'am.

I am never going to finish this novel and I am going to be a fucking poseuse all my life.

ARRRRRRRRGH.

Betsy, that's total pants.

You are going to finish it because I am going to stand over you and bully the crap out of you until you do.

Because I have got interested in these two women and I Want To Read What Happens, goddamnit.

{{Betsy}} I wish I had something wise to say other than just sympathy.

Oh, and I'm pretty sure you're not a 'poseuse', whatever that word means (see, I don't even know that!), because from what I got to read from you I think you have a wonderful way of intermingling words and thoughts.

{{Betsy}}

I know exactly how you feel, and often feel the same myself.

Betsy, just so you know, I'm in line behind Deb with the wifflebat.

You know the drill, just keep going, even if it's pants.

So says the woman who has written all of 1,000 words in the last month, all of it madly scribbled in longhand on the bus. Sigh.