Penelope by Anya Wylde Jun 2020 LTER
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1mamanyt1953
What a fun book! It is a delightful romp through Regency England, and I am so very happy to have read it. Now, I am no professional reviewer, so let me just tell you what I think. I love Regency romances. I cut my teeth on Georgette Heyer and never looked back. I think from where she is now, she is smiling, and murmuring “Nicely done, Anya, nicely done.”
Our heroine is Penelope. Virtually shoved out the door of her village home by a jealous stepmother, she is sent to the willing arms of her real mother’s dear friend, the Dowager Duchess of Blackthorne. If only the dowager were the one person Penelope had to contend with! Alas, there is her son, the Duke, and a more irascible, high-and-mighty, my-word-is-law gentleman would be hard to find, even in Regency England, where such men abounded.
All this we learn in the first handful of pages, so of course we know how the book will end. It is, after all, a Regency Romance. Unlike mysteries, this genre insists that you consider the journey an end unto itself, and, OH, what a journey it is! There is apparently no rule of social conduct that Penelope does not break, all unawares. She is a combination of hard-headed and soft-hearted, and always amusing. I fell a bit in love with her myself when she showed up at the Ducal mansion with her pet goat in tow, and a highway man as an escort!
There are wonderful vignettes which show us life in the elite circles of London society of the period. From my researching I can tell you that they are, in the main, true to life. There are deftly drawn characters, fully fleshed and three dimensional. Even the good guys have warts, and even the bad guys have a (teeny) saving grace. The dialogue is interesting and fresh. I giggled my way through this book and laughed out loud several times! This is what Regency Romance should be.
Perhaps the very best I can say of both the book and Ms. Wylde is that I have put the rest of the series, as well as the Lord Adair detective series on my “Must Read” list!. ENJOY!
Our heroine is Penelope. Virtually shoved out the door of her village home by a jealous stepmother, she is sent to the willing arms of her real mother’s dear friend, the Dowager Duchess of Blackthorne. If only the dowager were the one person Penelope had to contend with! Alas, there is her son, the Duke, and a more irascible, high-and-mighty, my-word-is-law gentleman would be hard to find, even in Regency England, where such men abounded.
All this we learn in the first handful of pages, so of course we know how the book will end. It is, after all, a Regency Romance. Unlike mysteries, this genre insists that you consider the journey an end unto itself, and, OH, what a journey it is! There is apparently no rule of social conduct that Penelope does not break, all unawares. She is a combination of hard-headed and soft-hearted, and always amusing. I fell a bit in love with her myself when she showed up at the Ducal mansion with her pet goat in tow, and a highway man as an escort!
There are wonderful vignettes which show us life in the elite circles of London society of the period. From my researching I can tell you that they are, in the main, true to life. There are deftly drawn characters, fully fleshed and three dimensional. Even the good guys have warts, and even the bad guys have a (teeny) saving grace. The dialogue is interesting and fresh. I giggled my way through this book and laughed out loud several times! This is what Regency Romance should be.
Perhaps the very best I can say of both the book and Ms. Wylde is that I have put the rest of the series, as well as the Lord Adair detective series on my “Must Read” list!. ENJOY!
