Ya’ll made a huge mistake when you didn’t vote for this book for our first bookclub read. I voted for it because I already owned it and needed an excuse to finally get to reading it. How silly I was to wait!
This book was so good. SO. GOOD. I have heard Georgette Heyer referred to as the author whose style is closest to Jane Austen, and if this book is representative of her work, then that is definitely true. Every character is well defined. Some you want to befriend. Some are just utterly ridiculous. But they all feel REAL. And the banter is excellent.
This book was published in 1958. It is billed as a ‘clean’ romance. So, my delicate sensibilities were truly shocked when there was a passionate kiss. ;) I usually prefer steamier romances, but it would have been inappropriate for this story and I loved every minute of it. Each and every sentence is one to be savored.
The story can be summed up in just a few sentences. Venetia Lanyon lives in the countryside with only her younger, disabled brother while she manages the estate for their other brother (who had fought in the Peninsular Wars and was dawdling coming home). Lord Jasper Damerel spends as little time at his Yorkshire estate as possible, but when he runs in to his beautiful neighbor out on a walk one day he decides to stay. A beautiful friendship ensues.
That’s it. That’s the story. The story doesn’t matter – what matters are the characters. Venetia is the well-known romance trope of the innocent, beautiful girl living in the country who has never encountered a rake and libertine of Damerel’s caliber. Or is she? From the first you can tell that she is not even if many of the people around her believe her to be. Venetia is incredibly smart (especially about understanding the character of others), unfailingly kind (without being sickly sweet), and has a sense of humor that favors the absurd. She is 25 and has her own money from an inheritance. She may be sheltered, but her common sense and ability to read people serve her well. She is a joy to read about. Possibly my favorite heroine ever. Damerel is the older (38), world-weary rake that we all know. He is much as he seems on the surface, and even he admits he didn’t know where the relationship was going when they met. They share a sense of humor, general good sense and love of quoting literature. I am in love with their friendship. (For anyone who has read and loved Julie Anne Long’s What I Did For a Duke, this relationship reminded me much of that one).
The (rather large) surrounding cast of characters are all fully realized people and it’s rather amazing to read. It made me feel like other authors are so lazy when they can’t be bothered to flesh out characters. I don’t want to get in to all of them because I think some of the best ones should come as a surprise as you read the book and explaining them would ruin it. One of the best things is that even the worst characters are not *bad* people. There are no villains. There are people who get in the way of Venetia’s happiness (and oh! HOW you want her to be happy!), but none of them are evil. They are people with motives – some better than others – that all come across as completely plausible and real, and you recognize all the people you have known in them.
If I wasn’t clear enough – RUN out and read this book. It is marvelous!
I adore this book, and yes, it’s almost shocking how rique that kissing scene seems compared to some of the other Heyer’s. In Frederica (which I’m also incredibly fond of), I think the most the hero does is put his arm around the heroine at the end, I honestly can’t remember if they even kiss.
If you haven’t really read any other Heyer’s, some of my favourites are Devil’s Cub, Frederica, Sylvester, Black Sheep and Faro’s Daughter.
I believe there were TWO embraces in this one – so now I know to temper my expectations for others. :)
This reminded me that I’ve been meaning to get the Richard Armitage read version of Sylvester. Have you listened to that one? how much would I miss with an abridged version?
I sadly haven’t listened to it, because I didn’t want an abridged version, so I can’t really tell you which bits you’d miss out on. I love Sylvester, it’s got a whole lot of Gothic novel pastiche.
Malin, Frederica is one of my faves! The Grand Sophy goes on and off my list – I love the characters, but the cousin thing and anti-Semitism are problematic for me.
Ellepkay, Venetia was the first Heyer I ever read, and a complete delight. Her mysteries are great as well.
My friend Erica and I are also very fond of Sylvester, as both the hero and my friend have what can be described as “evil eyebrows”.
Okay, you convinced me.
She’s better than Jessica Trent?! Okay, I’m in. I put on hold at the library.
That is a tough one. I adore Jessica Trent. She’s so no-nonsense.
I like Jessica, but I can’t condone violence – even if Dain deserved it.
But it leads to that preposterously hilarious dead arm he’s lugging around, flapping in the breeze.
I don’t think I’ve ever read any of Heyer’s books, I’ll have to do a search at the library. This one sounds lovely.
I got the audio version on sale from Audible a few weeks ago… it’ll probably be my first May listen. I’m working on The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime now.
Oh, this sounds delightful. I’ll have to check it out. I am a sucker for Jane Austen disciples. If you haven’t read Barbara Pym, you absolutely must. Her writing also mirrors that of Austen, and it’s written and set in the 1950s and 1960s.
All of her heroines are just perfect, especially their faults. I’ve never thanked my father enough for putting a Georgette Heyer in my hands after he had introduced me to Austen at age 14. I now have all of them proudly in my bookcase, but I haven’t read them for so long. The one that I used to re-read all the time and would love to see made a delicious tv mini series is These Old Shades. It’s just ridiculous but I adore it.
I literally just reread These Old Shades and Devil’s Cub! So good.
I found These Old Shades really hard going and mainly finished it because my friend said it gave nice background to Devil’s Cub. I frankly feel that you can enjoy the latter just as well without having read about his parents first, especially because the age difference of These Old Shades made me really uncomfortable.
These Old Shades is creepy, not just because of the age difference — which seems even greater than it is because Avon, although supposedly only in his 40s, seems older because of his world-weary, jaded attitude and Leonie, although supposedly in her late teens, is disguised as even younger when Avon meets her. The heart of the story is that Avon would never consider marrying Leonie until her parentage (and it had to be the right sort of parentage) is determined, otherwise she is SOL regardless of how much she loves him … which was probably realistic in the context of the times, but isn’t terribly romantic. For Heyer, this would have been perfectly reasonable, she was never going to write about the working-class Cinderella marrying her prince against all odds. You had to be one of the Right Sort of People to be her heroine.