Jumping into this series knowing that The Lady with a Mask is your typical business romance, I had hopes it was going to be something along the lines of the infamous "What's Wrong With Secretary Kim?", considering that the protagonist herself was the secretary of the very handsome and rich CEO. However, it was interesting to see the protagonist dislike her CEO for the vast majority of the series, but I felt like this series was a bit too cliche for my liking.
The protagonist, Viola, who is the secretary of a big company, is secretly a children's book writer. She published one book dedicated to a girl named Iris who had an enemy called Henry. To the protagonist, the book was almost a bit like a biography, Iris being the protagonist and Henry being her boss. The last thing she wanted was for her boss to find out she's the publisher and that the book was based off of the two of them, and she was went under the penname of Violet to hide her identify. The worst comes to worst when she finds out her boss' nephew is one of her biggest fans and wants to meet Iris, and her boss will do anything to find the author.
The boss successfully meets with Violet, but her identity is hidden, making the CEO all the more determined to figure out her real identity. It's the very cliché "I left my very confidential notebook with my biggest secret in the hands of the enemy and they now know everything". I had high hopes in how the CEO would find out that Violet was actually his secretary, but the reveal was very underwhelming and the only real good reaction was from Violet's editor. I enjoyed the idea of them calling the editor and tricking her, but overall the CEO connecting the dots purely by noticing Viola's sketches that had the same art style as the children's book his nephew loves had me lose hope for the rest of the series.
Going into discussion of the other characters and their relationships, like Violet's editor, the head secretary, and Gary... it's a little bit too much. To me I really think Gary, the biological father of the CEO's nephew, was a pointless addition to the series. It really just added more chapters and background to the CEO's sister. The background regarding the sister and her passing was a think a needed, but Gary just made the CEO express his very bipolar attitude per usual. You have the CEO all happy, then he turns dark and has a gaslightning personality once Gary was ever mentioned. However, I'm focusing this review more on the development of characters and their relationships than the personality of the characters, since it wasn't all too bad.
The ending was extremely rushed and very disappointing. Viewing this series from a romance perspective, it left me feeling unfulfilled and even a little bit confused. I enjoyed the skip to the future and seeing that Viola was able to successfully become the author she always dreamed to be with her now-husband and step-nephew by her side, but it was wayyy too sudden. It was almost like all of the sudden she was like "Actually, I love my CEO," then bam 10 year skip to them already being married and the nephew is now a high schooler as chirpy as ever. I was a bit sad to see Viola and the CEO didn't have a kid, but I'm actually glad they didn't, since it properly conveys how hard Viola had been working on her career as an author, plus they had both gotten married and moved in together to take care of the CEO's nephew. I wish there was more too it though.
To me, this series isn't very "memorable". It's kind of your typical series you'd pick up and read and sort of move on from over time, maybe a bit memorable in regards to the colorful and cartoon-y style from the children's books, but that's about it from me.