{"id":4581,"date":"2022-09-24T12:06:36","date_gmt":"2022-09-24T12:06:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/?p=4581"},"modified":"2022-09-24T12:06:36","modified_gmt":"2022-09-24T12:06:36","slug":"review-tempted-by-folly-by-christina-dudley-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/2022\/09\/24\/review-tempted-by-folly-by-christina-dudley-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Tempted By Folly by Christina Dudley (2022)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"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\u2019s betrothed as \u2018the Dreadful Mr Gregory\u2019 to the final scene of the hero and heroine at last in each other\u2019s arms.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the premise: Miss Florence Ellsworth has grown up in a family made notorious by her father\u2019s many marriages and assortment of children by different mothers, not all equally loving. She\u2019s determined not to follow the same route, and with her mother\u2019s 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\u2019s the new attorney, who\u2019s handsome and young and oh so tempting to Florence. And who is the widowed Mrs Whisp, and what does she want?<\/p>\n

As far as plot goes, that\u2019s about it, but with Dudley\u2019s 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\u2019s Mr Gregory, who is an awesome character, with his puffed out chest that makes him look like a woodpigeon, and his booming clergyman\u2019s voice. There are so many awesome characters here. Miss Gregory, his faded sister. Florence\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

Florence\u2019s primary objective is to rein in her father\u2019s 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\u2019s a difficult task to undertake when Mr Ellsworth is one of his principal clients, and he doesn\u2019t want to get on the wrong side of him. On the other hand, he\u2019d 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\u2019s advertising for a governess for the youngest child. Since his previous two wives started as the family\u2019s governesses, Florence can see exactly where this is going to end. And if the governess isn\u2019t quick off the mark, she\u2019ll 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.<\/p>\n

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\u2019s home, or looking after her sibling\u2019s 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\u2019s very risky to refuse in the hope there\u2019ll be a better offer later. And Mr Gregory is so very respectable, and her present home so rackety\u2026<\/p>\n

But\u2026 There\u2019s always a but. The handsome and young Mr Fairchild is everything a young lady could wish for, but Florence is betrothed, and she can\u2019t 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\u2019s what. And surely she\u2019d 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\u2019t spoil by telling you anything more about it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s 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\u2019s common in modern Regencies to end with a long-drawn-out epilogue, and sometimes that\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

This is a wonderful book, beautifully written on every level. It\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

Note: I received an advanced copy from the author, but that didn’t affect my opinion.<\/p><\/div>\n

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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\u2019s betrothed as \u2018the Dreadful Mr Gregory\u2019 to the final scene of the hero and heroine at last in each other\u2019s arms. Here\u2019s the premise: Miss Florence Ellsworth has grown […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[187],"class_list":["post-4581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-review","tag-dudley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4581"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4581\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4585,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4581\/revisions\/4585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}