Review: A Fall From Grace by Jennie Goutet (2020)

Posted October 20, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

A charming tale, with nothing terribly original about it but none the worse for that. Sometimes a well-written traditional read is exactly what’s wanted.

Here’s the premise: Selena Lockhart’s family is the one who’s suffered the fall from grace of the title, her father having gambled away his fortune and then drunk himself into an early grave. His widow and daughters are reduced to poverty, Selena’s betrothed breaks off their engagement and Selena is obliged to accept a position as companion to a distant relation, Lady Harrowden.

The stage coach breaks down in the snow and she seeks shelter from a nearby hunting box. The tale is channelling Heyer’s Arabella at this point, and to similar effect, for the occupant is Sir Lucius Clavering, a baronet who has retreated from a surfeit of demanding relations and the attentions of matchmaking mamas. He naturally assumes she’s attempting to force a proposal by scandal, not least because he already has one young lady under his roof trying it on. He quickly realises that Selena is genuinely a damsel in distress, and is able to use her to protect himself from the avaricious Miss Woodsley. He takes Selena to her destination.

Here she finds that the widowed Lady Harrowden is precisely the sort of irrational, authoritarian, demanding elderly woman so beloved of Regency romances, and so useful for plot contrivances. In addition, the new Lord Harrowden is another staple of the genre, the rakish but handsome young man who immediately identifies Selena as the sort of destitute but beautiful female who can be seduced into becoming his mistress. He takes her for a long walk in the snow, where she is rescued (again) by Lucius (why on earth did she go with him? I don’t for one minute believe that she couldn’t say no). And the ambitious hussy, Miss Rebecca Woodsley, turns out by a tremendous coincidence to be Lady Harrowden’s ward who has run away from school, and is now added to the long list of Selena’s responsibilities. I wasn’t at all clear how Rebecca came to be Lady H’s ward, or what Lady H meant by not having the blood to marry well, despite a tidy fortune (I wondered if she were illegitimate? Descended from trade? Not clear, although I read this so quickly I may have missed it).

Selena’s arrival prompts the negligent Sir Lucius to fulfil a promise to the late Lord Harrowden to look after his widow, which Lucius now attempts to rectify. And if that throws him into the path of the intriguing Selena, he has no objection to that. Since she likes him too, it seems that the romance is set fair for a swift conclusion. There are no obstacles, after all – or are there?

This is where things go awry, because Selena’s past rises up to disturb the present. Lucius’s sister Maria tries to steer him away from the ladylike Selena (why?) and towards the pretty but feckless heiress Rebecca Woodsley (again, why?) by deliberately inviting Selena’s former betrothed to a ball to make a scene. Which he does, in spectacular fashion, so that Selena is ostracised all over again.

And here is where Lucius fails the hero test, because instead of rescuing her from this humiliation, he stands aside. The stated reason is that he doesn’t want to make what amounts to a declaration by springing to Selena’s defence. But he could spring to his sister’s defence – the man is making a scene at Maria’s ball, and Lucius would be quite within a brother’s rights to step in. So I disagreed very much with his logic here.

And even when he’s made up his mind what he wants to do, he leaves Selena dangling instead of being open with her, and she, silly girl, decides she’s not worthy of him. So it all gets a bit muddled and although it comes right in the end, I wasn’t mad keen on Lucius’s solution to the problem, which is all a bit domineering.

The writing is excellent, but I had some minor quibbles, mostly trivial Americanisms that wouldn’t worry most readers but repeatedly tripped me up – things like ‘go do something’ instead of ‘go and do’, ‘look out the window’ instead of ‘look out of the window’ and one solitary gotten. I told you they were trivial. On the special licence front, I’m not at all sure that it would work that way, but nobody seems to get that right (even Heyer got it wrong) so let it pass. I would have liked more interaction between the principals to show the deepening of their relationship, but there’s a glorious interchange near the end when he’s trying to persuade her to marry him which I adored. I’d have liked a lot more like that to show the connection between them.

This is a solid traditional read, and if I wasn’t certain about Lucius’s motivations, and Lady H’s whims were a little too convenient for the plot, and Selena wasn’t always very sensible, I still thoroughly enjoyed it and tore through it in almost a single session. It’s a very good four stars for me.

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Review: The Swynden Necklace by Mira Stables (1977)

Posted October 20, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

This book ran on swimmingly until about the 98% mark and then the hero committed such an offence, I’m not sure I can forgive him. There will be spoilers ahead, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know.

Here’s the premise: Miss Honoria Fenton has reached the grand old age of twenty-four without attracting a single offer of marriage. That’s what happens to the daughters of devout clergymen buried in the country. Papa has now been dead for more than a year, but it seems Mama intends to mourn his saintly person for the rest of her life, and Honoria is now buried in a different part of the country, with spinster Aunt Thomasine, along with twelve-year-old twins Percy and Tamsin. All Mama’s efforts are bent on getting Percy educated so that he can enter the church, with no thought for her daughters. Or for Percy, whose thoughts run in an entirely different direction (think Felix in Heyer’s Frederica).

But one day, Honoria receives a curious bequest from her godmother, the widow of the late Marquess of Melborne – a house in Bath, five hundred pounds to set herself up for a season there and the fabulous Swynden diamond necklace. Mrs Fenton disapproves of the frivolity of a season in Bath; Honoria’s clear duty is to sell the necklace for as much as she can get, in order to fund her brother’s career. The present Marquess of Melborne has offered a staggering thirty thousand pounds to reclaim it for the family. Honoria (and Aunt Thomasine) convince her that the offer will still be there if Honoria returns from Bath unwed, and off to Bath they go.

And almost at once, Honoria has an outbreak of stupidity, and decides to go for a solitary walk to the river, and inadvertently wanders into a seedy area. By happy coincidence (yes, that staple of Regency romances), a gentleman happens to be passing by and rescues her from a fate worse than death before escorting her home. He clearly recognises the address and her name. His name, he tells her, is Jocelyn, so naturally she calls him Mr Jocelyn.

Right away, the reader knows that Something Is Up, and that the mysterious Mr Jocelyn is a Very Important Person. He takes a strangely strong interest in Honoria, arranging for reputable chair men (the men who convey Bath residents here and there in sedan chairs), and even teaching her the minuet and dancing it with her at her first ball. Then, having launched her into society, he disappears.

Of course, since he’s the hero, it isn’t long before he returns (magically just in time to rescue her from another outbreak of stupidity) and it gradually becomes clear to the reader exactly who he is. Honoria doesn’t guess, and he doesn’t enlighten her, and this part of the story is actually very funny, because it becomes obvious that he never, ever lies about it. When she asks him direct questions, his answers are the absolute truth (as the reader is now aware) but are misleading enough that she never suspects his secret, that he is (and here’s the spoiler) the Marquess of Melborne, and not merely some kind of employee or associate of acquaintance (Honoria runs through various possibilities).

It’s all quite clever, and of course the reader is waiting for the dramatic moment when he reveals his identity to her. Except that he doesn’t, and here is where I take serious issue with him – he waits until *after* they get married to tell her, even though she’s told him quite clearly that she would hate to marry a marquess and be someone grand in society and have all that responsibility. His given reason for not telling her is that he was terrified that she would turn him down if she knew – which is precisely – precisely – why he should have told her. Instead, he chose to begin their married life with a huge lie, and yes, technically he never actually lied to her, but he allowed her to believe something he knew to be untrue. It was cruel and, frankly, unforgivable.

However, given the age of book and the different mores prevailing then and the way heroes tended to be domineering, and also given that for most of the book I totally enjoyed it, I’m only going to knock off one star. Four stars.

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Review: A Confirmed Rake by Martha Keyes (2022)

Posted October 20, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

I’m loving this new series of Martha Keyes’. I recommend starting with the free (at the time of writing) prequel, Unrequited, and paying attention to the whole family – they really are an interesting lot. This one focuses on the sister and brother of the previous hero and heroine, one an unreformed rake and the other a girl who’s been buried in the country for years finally making a belated appearance in society. It’s a fascinating pairing.

Here’s the premise: Valentine Donovan is that staple of Regency romances, an out-and-out rake, a gambler, womaniser and thoroughly unreliable sort. He’s butted heads with his Admiral father for years, dropping out of the naval career that was planned for him, and getting himself into all sorts of trouble ever since. Finding himself on his father’s wrong side once more, he escapes to the Brighton home of his newly married sister, Diana. Creeping into the house through the kitchen window after a drunken night out, he encounters a girl enjoying a midnight feast, a girl like no one else he’s ever met before.

Rebecca Russell’s brother has finally married, and at last she’s able to leave the seclusion of her reclusive grandfather’s home, where she mingled only with other elderly gentlemen, and make an appearance in Brighton society. She’s never had a chance to develop the finely-tuned social skills she’ll need in high society, and she has no idea how to behave. Her innocence gets her into all sorts of trouble, but she finds Valentine unexpectedly helpful. He knows he’s bad for her, though, so he does his best to avoid her. But when his father gives him an ultimatum – at least try to behave with restraint and start courting a respectable young woman — Diana coaxes him to squire Rebecca around. It will be good for her, she argues, to learn about society while protected by a gentleman, and it will be good for him to demonstrate his good intentions to his father.

Well, we can see where this is going, can’t we? And two more mismatched people would be hard to find. But if Valentine is a conventional Regency character, Rebecca is anything but. She has no idea about anything, and approaches everything with an infectious joie-de-vivre that’s an absolute delight. Her conversations with Valentine, where she asks in all innocence some very probing questions, are glorious. She learns a lot, and charmingly mangles all the terminology (she talks about ‘foxing’ and ‘raking’, instead of getting foxed or being a rake), making detailed and often wildly inappropriate lists of all sorts of things. And in explaining society ways in uncompromising detail, Valentine is forced to face up to his own misbehaviour. In gently steering Rebecca through the obstacle course of society life, he learns to take responsibility for himself, as well. And needless to say, the two are slowly falling in love.

But the course of true love can’t possibly be smooth (this is a Regency romance, after all), so both Valentine’s father and Rebecca’s brother have to be appeased, and Valentine’s precarious financial situation has to become a lot worse before all is resolved. I don’t recall any Americanisms or anything else to trip me up, although the monetary amounts stated seemed a bit on the low side to me. At one point, eight hundred pounds was quoted as allowing the purchase of a small estate, which seems a bit unlikely. A small house, maybe. But that’s not a big deal.

The only real problem I had was that the story was told from two points of view, but both were written in first person (‘I went…’ rather than ‘Valentine went…’). Even though the chapters were labelled with the character name, I still sometimes got confused with the switches, and ended up at one point wondering why Valentine was wearing a gauzy overdress. Silly me. That’s the author’s stylistic choice, of course, which I perfectly respect, and I understand why it was done, but it can be problematic. I suppose I should read more slowly!

Another lovely read in this series, which gave us some more wonderful characters, a deeper understanding of the family, and especially the Admiral, and a beautifully written evocation of the Regency. Five stars (again). And now on to book-loving brother Phineas…

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Review: Tempted By Folly by Christina Dudley (2022)

Posted September 24, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 1 Comment

This book was a joy to read. I had a smile on my face from the opening moment, when the irrepressible Lily talks about her sister’s betrothed as ‘the Dreadful Mr Gregory’ to the final scene of the hero and heroine at last in each other’s arms.

Here’s the premise: Miss Florence Ellsworth has grown up in a family made notorious by her father’s many marriages and assortment of children by different mothers, not all equally loving. She’s determined not to follow the same route, and with her mother’s advice to follow her head not her heart uppermost in her mind, she betroths herself to a dull clergyman, and looks forward to a blessedly uneventful future. But her stepmother (wife number three) dies and immediately Mr Ellsworth is looking about him for a fourth wife, another scandal in the making. And then there’s the new attorney, who’s handsome and young and oh so tempting to Florence. And who is the widowed Mrs Whisp, and what does she want?

As far as plot goes, that’s about it, but with Dudley’s books, everything hinges on the characters and the way they interact with each other. Florence herself is lovely, and Mr Fairchild a hero worthy of her. Then there’s Mr Gregory, who is an awesome character, with his puffed out chest that makes him look like a woodpigeon, and his booming clergyman’s voice. There are so many awesome characters here. Miss Gregory, his faded sister. Florence’s sisters, Lily, the outspoken opposite of Florence, Minta, who likes to shoot things (her friend, mainly), and crying Bea. The sunnily wife-chasing Mr Ellsworth. Miss Dunn, the reclusive governess. Mrs Whisp, the rapacious widow. Very different from each other, but all memorable and all busily engaged in pursuing their own objectives.

Florence’s primary objective is to rein in her father’s wife-hunting. She calls on Mr Fairchild, the new attorney, to ask him to do what he can to steer Mr Ellsworth into respectable life as a widower instead. Mr Fairchild is delighted by the prospect of spending more time with the charming Miss Ellsworth, but it’s a difficult task to undertake when Mr Ellsworth is one of his principal clients, and he doesn’t want to get on the wrong side of him. On the other hand, he’d like to please Miss Ellsworth. Sadly, Mr Ellsworth is not a man to be steered, and almost before his late wife is cold in her grave he’s advertising for a governess for the youngest child. Since his previous two wives started as the family’s governesses, Florence can see exactly where this is going to end. And if the governess isn’t quick off the mark, she’ll be out-manoeuvred by the brazen Mrs Whisp, who knows exactly what she wants and sets out determinedly to get it. All Mr Fairchild can do is try to control the selection process for the governess, and suggest legal ways to keep the bulk of the Ellsworth fortune out of the hands of avaricious women.

And all the time, Florence is trying to convince herself that her choice of husband is the right one. Florence is precisely the sort of heroine who must have been everywhere at the time, and her dilemma a common one. Living out in the country, her choice of potential husbands is limited. If she fails to marry, she becomes the spinster dwindling into old age in her father’s home, or looking after her sibling’s children, or she slips out of the gentry altogether as a governess or paid companion. The chance of finding a suitable husband, in rank and fortune, is very small, so if someone offers, it’s very risky to refuse in the hope there’ll be a better offer later. And Mr Gregory is so very respectable, and her present home so rackety…

But… There’s always a but. The handsome and young Mr Fairchild is everything a young lady could wish for, but Florence is betrothed, and she can’t do anything as scandalous as jilting the boring clergyman in the hope that the nice young attorney will look her way. What to do? Try to summon some enthusiasm for her betrothed, that’s what. And surely she’d be happier if her not very passionate lover actually kissed her? And here we get to one of the funniest scenes in a book full of funny scenes, which I won’t spoil by telling you anything more about it.

It’s obvious from the first moment how the story will end, but how that ending is reached is an absolute delight, with any number of twists and revelations along the way. Nothing about a Dudley book is ever predictable, and so although I guessed one very crucial secret, there were plenty of other developments that took me by surprise. And it thrilled me that the final obstacle between hero and heroine is an utterly Regency one, the chains of propriety holding them fast, even though in modern terms there was nothing to keep them apart. The way this is resolved is elegant and pleased me greatly. One other very personal point: it’s common in modern Regencies to end with a long-drawn-out epilogue, and sometimes that’s appropriate, but here the story comes to a close with the final romantic moments between hero and heroine, and to me that felt utterly right.

This is a wonderful book, beautifully written on every level. It’s literate (watch out for the sly references to Emma and also the Barchester series), witty and very moving. I loved every word of it. Christina Dudley has a unique talent and I recommend this and all her books to fans of traditional Regency romance. This is a great start to the new series. Five stars.

Note: I received an advanced copy from the author, but that didn’t affect my opinion.

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Review: Alethea by Catherine J Bowness (2014)

Posted September 19, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

Catherine J Bowness is a new author to me, but I’ll certainly be reading more of her work. This was delightful. It’s very traditional, so anyone hankering for something in the style of Heyer, complete with presentations and vouchers for Almack’s and rides in Hyde Park, should find this hits the spot. There are shades of Arabella, and also Venetia, although it’s also very much itself, not a pale imitation.

Here’s the premise: Alethea Benstead is seventeen, the oldest of a whole string of daughters to a country gentleman of reduced means and his jaded wife. Alethea is the beauty of the family, so it falls to her to marry well and restore the family’s fortunes. The only trouble is that she doesn’t want to marry at all, and with the dispiriting example of her parents in front of her, who can blame her? But her aunt and uncle have invited her to London for a spectacular come out, and no one takes her objections seriously. One day she’s out for a long walk to escape the thoughts of her unwanted future, when she gets lost (on her family’s land? Where she’s been walking all her life? Really?) and finds herself on the public highway. So she flags down a passing farmer and hitches a lift home…

Wait, what? No, of course not! This is a Regency romance, so along comes a handsome young man, an earl, no less, with the hard-to-pronounce name of Lord Knill, who nearly runs her down, berates her angrily, is berated in his turn and then kisses her. Because of course he does. That just makes her really mad, but he seems to be the only way for her to get home, passing farmers being in short supply, so he drives her home, and she hopes she’ll never see him again. Or so she says.

Her companion on the journey to London is a distant cousin, Eleanor Peabody, who is thirty-one, newly orphaned and penniless, with no relations interested in helping her, so she’s travelling to London to find a position as a governess. Eleanor is (to my mind) a far more interesting character. She’s far more placid and sensible, an interesting foil to Alethea’s volatile temperament. On the journey, they have a couple of encounters, first with Ivo, son of the aunt in London, and then, after their carriage overturns (this is a *very* traditional Regency), they are rescued by Lord Knill, who coincidentally happens to be passing. Because of course he does. And then they are held up by a highwayman who is seen off by Lord Knill, and they haven’t even reached London yet.

The aunt, Lady Algernon Ferris, conveniently is delighted to have two pretty girls to bring out, so Eleanor is told to forget about governessing and enjoy the season. They are rigged out in fine style, and the beautiful Alethea becomes an instant success. This all happens very easily, and even the all-important vouchers for Almacks miraculously appear. In fact, the world of the ton seems to be a very benign place, where almost everyone is friendly, a duke attracts virtually no comment and even a gallop in Hyde Park passes unremarked. Of course, there has to be a villain, but it’s a long time before things become sticky.

The two heroes for Eleanor and Alethea are not exactly the obvious ones. In my opinion, the volatile and immature Alethea would have been better suited with the equally immature Ivo (when they both grow up), and I’d have liked Eleanor to have the charming and dashing Lord Knill, but the author had other ideas. In fact, the state of play between Alethea and Lord Knill quickly becomes very intense, and their passionate exchanges are an absolute highlight of the book for me. Regency manners impose so much restraint that to see them both losing their composure in such spectacular fashion is awesome. This is particularly true of Lord Knill, because while Regency heroines often dissolve into quivering wrecks, heroes tend to be suavely controlled, and I loved him for being so openly distraught. Eleanor and her suitor have a much more sedate courtship, so much so that she completely misunderstands his intentions. Fortunately, they’re both sensible people and very quickly sort out the difficulty.

I did warn you that this is a *very* traditional Regency, so there’s the inevitable descent into implausible melodrama at the end, which is spectacularly over the top. I loved that when the crisis comes, the two heroines respond precisely in character. Alethea rushes off to effect a rescue herself, with the reluctant Ivo in tow, while Eleanor quietly summons help. This was perfect.

However, there is a huge faux pas buried in the melodrama. Anyone who knows anything about Regency marriage laws will have to grit their teeth and pretend that this book is taking place in some alternate universe, one where any random parson can scribble a special licence on the spot, and any vaguely related male can give permission for a minor to marry, and never mind about settlements, we can sort that out later. And then (apparently), the happy couple can decide later whether they’re actually married or not.

A few minor quibbles: the family name is Benstead, but there are several references to the Bearsteds – a last minute change of name, incompletely made? At the theatre, we are told, ‘the house lights dimmed’ – I don’t think so! Regency theatres were lit by giant chandeliers filled with candles and suspended from the ceiling. There was no way to dim them. The writing is lovely, but the early parts of the book, in particular, felt very slow, as every last detail of conversation, no matter how banal, is faithfully reported.

But these are very minor points (apart from the special licence, which was wrong in so many ways it just made me laugh; there was no way that marriage was legal!). Despite the very traditional themes, and the very conventional setting of the season, I totally enjoyed the book, mainly because all the principal characters were finely nuanced. Even Alethea, who teetered on the edge of being the silly and impetuous ingenue once or twice, was actually a lot more subtle than that, and I loved Lord Knill (although I still don’t know how to pronounce his name – Ker-nill? Nill? No idea). I’d have liked a little more of the duke and a little less of the villain, perhaps. But the writing is lovely, there are some very serious points on the position of women in Regency society and those intense spats between Alethea and Lord Knill make it a five star read for me.

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Review: The Luxury of Silence by Susan Adriani (2022)

Posted September 19, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

I haven’t read many Pride and Prejudice variations, but they were uniformly awesome. This didn’t quite match those stellar heights, but the bar was set quite high and this is a pleasant enough read, although it doesn’t add any great insights into the characters.

Here’s the premise: the story starts, intriguingly enough, at Ramsgate, with Darcy and Georgiana recovering from Wickham’s elopement attempt. Here the author has chosen to have Wickham draw Georgiana further from the path of virtue, for when Darcy discovers them, there’s bare flesh on display, and uncertainty about just how far matters have gone. Georgiana has retreated into her shell, unwilling to face the world. Darcy is riven with guilt and self-reproach – he should have protected his sister better! Some time in London does nothing to improve the mood of either of them, but perhaps quiet country life would offer a healing environment? Darcy accepts Bingley’s invitation to join him at Netherfield.

And here we are at the opening of the book, although with the addition of Georgiana to the Netherfield party. Everything else is the same. But almost immediately, the plot veers away from the canonical route; on his first day, Darcy goes for an early morning ride to a nearby viewpoint and immediately bumps into a young lady out for a walk – a surprisingly impertinent and undeferential young lady. After a few hostile exchanges of fire, Darcy discovers that said young lady has a streak of mischief in her – not to mention a pair of fine eyes. They part as friends, but even so, when he encounters her again at the Meryton assembly a few days later, he still manages to insult her. But once more, the plot shoots off at a tangent, for Bingley insists on Darcy apologising and offering to dance with Elizabeth, whereupon she refuses him.

Jane’s visit to Netherfield on horseback and subsequent illness is as per the original, with the happy result of throwing Darcy and Elizabeth together for more of those early morning outings, long discussions in the drawing room after dinner and bonding over Darcy’s dog, Solomon. And so it goes on, with the original story burbling away almost unnoticed in the background, because the main focus here is the growing closeness between Darcy and Elizabeth. He is able to talk openly to her as to no one else in his constrained life, largely because she’s neither a disapproving relation nor an ambitious fortune hunter. He likes her lively wit (as do we all!), and although he doesn’t acknowledge it to himself for a long time, he’s gradually sliding into love with her. For her part, Elizabeth enjoys the intellectual challenge (she’s made out to be something of a bluestocking here), and sees him as nothing more than a friend. He’s absolutely out of her league, after all.

Now this is all very lovely, but it never feels very true to the original characters. We see nothing of Darcy’s struggle to suppress his feelings for Elizabeth, his revulsion at the prospect of such a low marriage or, to be honest, his pride. Nor is her prejudice much in evidence. Instead, there are very few bumps in the road to the inevitable proposal. The minor characters, too, are air-brushed into charming and good-hearted eccentricity, rather than silliness or (in Lydia’s case) outright immorality. Darcy says airily that the younger Bennet girls just need a little bit of guidance to bring them back to sensible behaviour. Because Darcy has no problem proposing to Elizabeth, there is no objection to Bingley marrying Jane, either. Wickham creates the only tension, but even he is dealt with relatively easily. It’s all too simple and conflict-free.

I didn’t have many writing quibbles. One is the constant use of ‘supper’ instead of dinner. The main evening meal was dinner; supper was a separate meal, either a light snack at the end of the evening, or an interlude in a ball or other party. The other question in my mind concerned Darcy’s statement that he would have trouble raising ten thousand pounds. Yet we know from the original that he did in fact raise that sum to persuade Wickham to marry Lydia. Since his income of ten thousand a year meant a total worth of at least two hundred thousand, even if it were all in land, he would have had no trouble raising ten thousand secured against his estate. But it’s a very minor point.

This is a pleasant Pride and Prejudice variation that was a little too bland for my taste. I was tempted to give it three stars, but I enjoyed it pretty well so I’ll be generous and settle for four stars.

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Review: The Duke’s Wayward Wallflower by Maggie Dallen (2022)

Posted September 19, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

This is an oddity. A stern and grumpy duke, a shy country girl all at sea in London, and possibly the oddest romance I’ve read in a long time. I like a quirky story, but sometimes this felt a little too out there even for me. And yet, there are some wonderful moments that will stay with me for a long time.

Here’s the premise: Felicity Bishop’s father has just died, and his financial affairs seem to be in something of a tangle. While the helpful family attorney, Mr Beasley, is sorting things out, Felicity is to go to London with her cousin, the very wealthy Earl of Shepley and his sister, Lady Marion. She’s surprised to see the infamous Duke of Mandrick at the funeral, but perhaps it’s because he has an unspoken understanding with Marion. Felicity is at odds with him almost at once. His forbidding countenance reduces her to inarticulate terror, so inevitably he’ll despise her, she’s sure.

Off we go to London, where Felicity is rigged out in the finest of gowns, although in subdued colours because of her mourning, and meets Aunt Greta, who fulfils the eccentric aunt role to perfection. And of course the terrifying duke is hovering around, and having dinner with the family once a week, and reducing Felicity to jelly. When the earl and Marion are invited to the wedding of a friend, Felicity is left to the tender mercies of Aunt Greta and the duke.

Aunt Greta undertakes to instruct Felicity in the not very delicate art of enticing a man to fall in love with her, and this is definitely a highlight of the book. Felicity takes this advice to heart, with predictably disastrous results, fainting in the duke’s arms in the middle of a ball. What she doesn’t realise is that Aunt Greta’s advice is actually working – and not just on the grumpy duke, but on Felicity, too. There are pages and pages of the pair of them suffering with wayward pings and pangs of heart and stomach and limbs and who knows what (lips, mainly; there’s a fixation on lips), and although some of this is very funny, it felt a bit excessive at times. I prefer the palpitations of true love to be a little less overblown.

As a result of this dramatic swooning, the duke sweeps Felicity and Aunt Greta off to his own house so that he can keep an eye on them, and this leads to quite the loveliest scene in the book, in the music room. For once, he sets aside his veneer of dutiful rigidity and she loses her tongue-tied shyness. It’s probably the first time the two of them have been completely natural with each other, and it’s a delight. I’d have liked a lot more of this and less of the pinging and panging.

From here on, it’s all a question of how the duke will escape his understanding with Marion so he can marry Felicity, and I won’t go into details on that. There is some business with the oily Mr Beasley, too, which the duke sorts out handily. The ending irritated me somewhat, because poor Felicity is left in the dark longer than she should be and that’s an unforgivable sin to me.

This is not the book to read if you’re a stickler for historical accuracy. Felicity shouldn’t have been at her father’s burial (ladies just didn’t). Stays weren’t tightly laced in the Regency, since the waistline was so unimportant. The stays were only there to give a smooth columnar silhouette and to push up the bosom. The duke seems to know no other dance but the waltz, which was very rare then and still scandalous for a young unmarried woman, unless approved by the patronesses of Almack’s. And what on earth was Felicity doing even attending balls, let alone dancing, while still in mourning for her father? And finally (you’ll be relieved to hear), the oily Mr Beasley would have been an attorney, not a solicitor (who operated in the Court of Chancery, and didn’t sully his hands with mundane matters of estate business).

There are a fair few Americanisms, too, but if you can set all that aside and read the book as light-hearted entertainment only loosely connected to the Regency, it’s actually a lot of fun. There were a few too many pings and pangs for my taste, which keeps it to four stars, but I recommend it to anyone looking for something a bit different.

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Review: The Art of Victory by Martha Keyes (2022)

Posted September 14, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 1 Comment

I came to this book straight after the wonderful prequel to the series, Unrequited, which I loved. This doesn’t quite set me on fire the same way, but it has an absolutely wonderful hero, and some glorious battles of wits between the two main characters, as well as some entertaining side characters, and of course Keyes’ trademark lovely writing.

Here’s the premise: Diana Donovan is the daughter of an Admiral, practically weaned on battle strategy, especially the book The Art of War by Chines General Sun Tzu. The Donovan children all know it off by heart. Diana’s a battler by nature, so when her best friend Lucy falls in love with the seemingly inoffensive Mr Pike, yet her guardian refuses to countenance the match, Diana decides to go to war on behalf of timid Lucy. She’ll tackle the curmudgeonly Mr Marmaduke Russell head on, and by her superior battle skills, persuade him to see the benefits of the match.

But Mr Russell turns out to be unexpectedly young and attractive, not in the least curmudgeonly, and annoyingly cool under fire. He seems quite unbothered by her efforts, and surprisingly well able to return fire on his own account. In fact, he seems to positively enjoy their little spats – is he actually flirting with her? This makes her even more determined to win the war, because what could be more intensely annoying to a girl on a mission than a man whose only reaction is amusement? Well, one who has an answer to her every devious ploy, that’s what, and the dialogues between the two are gloriously funny, and made me laugh out loud.

It’s clear that Mr Russell is falling in love with Diana, and he’s pretty direct about it too. Diana, of course, is falling for him, too, but she’s so focused on her mission and so determined to hate her opponent that she barely notices the subtle way her heart is gradually captured. I’m going to be honest, and say that Diana is the weak point in the novel for me. I actually disliked her quite intensely, because it never occurs to her that Mr Russell might be better placed than she is to know whether Mr Pike would make a suitable husband or not, and some of her actions are pretty foolish. She’s completely oblivious to everything but winning the war, and frankly, her constant whining over it grew tedious. Happily, Diana is balanced by the truly wonderful character of Mr Russell, who is as subtle as she is obvious, and twice as clever, and I wasn’t at all sure what he saw in her. There’s also a cast of lovely side characters, like Mrs Westwood, with her inexhaustable supply of trite epithets, the young lovers, Lucy and Mr Pike, and Diana’s two brothers, book-reading Phineas and wild-boy Valentine.

I had a few minor quibbles. Firstly, Americanisms. Nothing outrageous, but there were many, many uses of ‘shall’ that struck me as wrong. And then I wondered about the inheritance of five thousand pounds that’s made out to be a big deal, and a target for fortune hunters. Five thousand really isn’t a large amount. It’s what Mrs Bennet had in P&P, after all; enough to attract a respectable husband who already has a good income, but not enough to bail out an estate that’s in deep trouble. After all, five thousand invested would only produce an income of (say) two hundred and fifty a year, which is barely above subsistence level for the gentry.

The ending is a little too contrived for my taste, but the romantic elements play out just fine, and despite all my little quibbles and even the (mostly) unlikeable Diana, I enjoyed it enormously. The glorious Mr Russell and the author’s brilliant writing earns the book five stars from me.

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Review: Unrequited by Martha Keyes (2022)

Posted September 14, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

I’d almost forgotten just how good Martha Keyes is. I’ve been a fan of hers since first stumbling across Wyndcross three years ago, and read all her early work avidly. She took an authorly excursion to Scotland, which didn’t interest me, but now she’s back in the English Regency and she’s only improved in the interim. This is the prequel to her new series, and it’s a wonderful, nuanced, layered work. I loved it.

Here’s the premise: Elena MacKinnon is an orphan, whose four brothers are all serving in the army. Elena can’t stay alone at their Scottish estate, so she’s been living with her godfather’s family for seven years, being educated in the ways of English ladylike behaviour. Her godfather, Admiral Donovan, has three sons, Theo, Phineas and Valentine. Theo has been at sea, following in his father’s footsteps, but it’s not clear to me quite what the other two have been doing. All we know is that Phineas is bookish, and Valentine is the cynical, wayward one. There is also a daughter, Diana, and since the death of Mrs Donovan, the girls have been largely left to their own devices. But now, with the end of the war, Admiral Donovan and Theo are coming home. Although Theo’s just been promoted to Captain, his future is uncertain, as there’s a lack of naval vessels to command.

That’s a fairly brief summary, for this is a family with a LOT of history. Some of it we read about here, like the lingering illness and death of Mrs Donovan, and some is obviously being saved for future books in the series (Phineas and Valentine, for instance). But the key piece of history is between Elena and Theo, and the letter she tucked in his luggage as he left for sea several years ago, when he was nineteen and she an impassioned and lovesick fourteen. He broke her heart by never writing back. Now he’s home again, they’ve both changed but is there the possibility of a grown-up love for them? Or should she marry Mr Bailey, the dull but worthy man Admiral Donovan is steering her towards?

The answer is obvious, of course, but how they reach their happy ever after is an absolute delight.
Keyes has the power to weave a multitude of strong story threads into beautiful cloth. Every one of these characters springs to life on the pages as a fully rounded person, with history and temperament and an agenda of their own, and their interactions feel like spontaneous reactions rather than plot devices. There are no villains here, just good people doing the best they can according to their lights, and making mistakes along the way, mistakes that ripple through the family.

There’s so much depth here. For example, Elena is Scottish, and her normal accent is a strong brogue, but she’s learnt to moderate her voice into a more ladylike English accent. But is she throwing away her heritage with the accent? Can she be true to herself with a false voice? If she is to consider marrying Mr Bailey, she has to talk like a lady but can she maintain that indefinitely? Or should he accept her as she really is? The attitude of the English characters to Scotland both intrigued and amused me, particularly the Baileys, since they see the Scots as barbaric heathens (unless they present themselves in a flawlessly English way, of course). But Elena has the best line: “The English took a strange view of [Scotland]— simultaneously romanticizing it and looking down upon it— but I felt uncomfortable with both approaches. For me, it was simply home and all that such a word encapsulated.” And that’s just one of many threads running through the book.

But what of the romance? There isn’t the joy of watching the two fall in love, for Elena did that long ago. For her, there’s the agony of seeing Theo again, not knowing whether they can even rekindle the close friendship of their childhood years, and she doesn’t dare to hope beyond that. For him… well, we don’t know what he feels, because the story is all written from Elena’s point of view, so the reader has to glean hints of his state of mind from his words and actions, and try to interpret the subtlest gesture, just as she does. I normally prefer to see both points of view, but here it works perfectly.

Theo’s feelings are gradually revealed, but of course there’s more to a Regency romance than just feelings. What about Theo’s career in the navy? And perhaps more important, what about his father’s wishes for him and the obligations of family duty? This is why I say this book is nuanced, because all of this comes into play, and much more, before the situation is resolved. And along the way there are some memorable interactions between the two, particularly those walks on the beach.

The writing is excellent on every level, and very little tripped me up. Admiral John Bailey is a baronet, so he should be Admiral Sir John Bailey, surely? And I wondered about the use of ‘trek’, which sounds too modern to me, but the Oxford English Dictionary puts it at 1824, which is close enough. One or two Americanisms, but trivial stuff.

This is a book about being true to yourself, and not having your life dictated by other people’s expectations of you, and it’s also about family and home and freedom and a lot more besides. It’s a short book but with tons of depth, and it was free when I got it. A great read – highly recommended. Five stars.

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Review: The Rake’s Challenge by Beth Elliott (2011)

Posted September 14, 2022 by Mary Kingswood in Review / 0 Comments

This is one of those books that absolutely shouldn’t have worked for me. It was too tropey for words, and channelled some of my least favourite Georgette Heyers. And yet I enjoyed it a whole heap. So there.

Here’s the premise: Annabelle (Anna) Lawrence is a straight-out-of-school heiress running away from home because of a wicked stepfather trying to push her into an unwanted marriage (I told you it was tropey). Giles Maltravers, the Earl of Longwood and heir to the Duke of Hawkesborough (because of course he is) is a world-weary rake, bored with his fast-living scandalous life of duels (three this year!) and tired of his avaricious mistress. Yes, I know, Heyer wrote this plot several times, but stay with me. Anna has enterprisingly arranged a job as a companion to an elderly lady to tide her over until she can draw on her inheritance and be independent, but, being scrape-prone, she’s missed the stage coach and can’t afford to stay at the inn, so she sets off along a quiet country lane in the middle of nowhere, where she is set upon by two upper-class thugs bent on… well, rape, presumably. Was Hampshire really so lawless that an obviously gently-bred girl would be targeted in that way? Fortunately, along comes our dissolute hero, who surprises even himself by becoming an actual hero and rescuing her.

So far, so unoriginal. This book was first published in 2011 (according to Goodreads) but it feels a lot older than that. Yes, it’s an unoriginal start but I’m always prepared to give a book its initial premise. It’s how things develop that I judge on, and here things look more promising. Giles takes it upon himself to protect Anna, successfully negotiates the hazards of the overnight stay at an inn, and drives her to destination, where there’s a much more interesting setup. Lady Fording, Anna’s elderly employer, turns out to have a daughter who’s an Italian Contessa and a nephew who’s also very Italian and clearly some kind of revolutionary. The three are hoping to return to Italy soon now that things have settled down on the continent a bit. So that’s all a bit different.

Lady Fording is supposedly ill, but happily her indispositions never interfere with the plot. The three decide to decamp from the Hampshire countryside to Brighton for a little shopping and socialising, and they buy a whole new wardrobe for Anna. She’s a little surprised that the paid companion is to be fashionably dressed but she’s young enough not to refuse. And so off they go to Brighton, where everyone turns up – not merely Giles and a couple of cronies, but also his mistress and the two thugs who assaulted Anna, and a mother and daughter determined to hook Giles by any means necessary. And of course the Prince Regent, because what self-respecting Regency romance can visit Brighton without Prinny?

And so the plot trundles on, with Anna falling into one scrape after another, Giles rescuing her in gentlemanly fashion, and his attentions attracting the jealousy of his ex-mistress and the ambitious mama and her daughter. And then there’s the scheme which required the fancy clothes. I’m not quite sure just how much Lady Fordham and the Contessa were involved in all that. Were they complicit, or merely willing dupes? In other hands, this story might have been dull work, but Elliott gives it a light-hearted froth, and the main characters are likeable. Anna is the innocent abroad, not exactly silly but not always wise to the machinations of those around her, although she’s a fast learner.

As for Giles, he’s a charmer right from the start, clearly falling in love with Anna from day 1, yet stoutly refusing to believe it’s anything more than a gentlemanly urge to protect her. Even when the idea of marriage seeps into his brain, he finds all sorts of reasons why it won’t do – he’s too old for her, for heaven’s sake! He’s thirty, not exactly at his last prayers. And although much is made of his scandalous reputation, we never see him as other than honourable. It seems to be a habit with the genre that a man can be described as a rake of the most committed sort, yet behave impeccably throughout. Giles steals one kiss, under provoking circumstances, but is stricken with guilt afterwards, so no, not in the least rakish, and no, I don’t believe for one minute that rakes give up their wicked ways the instant the heroine hoves into view. Not plausible. But, as I said, he’s a charmer, despite the author’s attempts to paint him as a stern sort of man, and I liked his very honest discussion with his father, which was the best scene in the book, with real emotion showing through. I’m not quite sure what he saw in Anna, who seemed a little bit too young and innocent for a sophisticated man-about-town, but he says he’ll never be bored with her, and that’s as good a reason as any. Love is ineffable, after all.

I spotted very few errors. The Duke of Hawkesborough was referred to as Lord Hawkesborough, which is wrong. I baulked at ‘weekend’, but there were pre-Regency usages, although not necessarily in the modern meaning. I also wasn’t sure about the use of fans to convey meanings, which sounds more Victorian to me. Other than that, nothing tripped me up, and the writing was very smooth. It’s not as literate as Heyer (but then, what is? She was one of a kind), but for a Heyer-esque plot with a fine, independent-minded heroine and a charming hero, I can recommend this. Four stars.

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