This is the first City Watch book that I’ve really, genuinely liked. I’ve read others – Guards! Guards!, Jingo, and The Fifth Elephant (though none terribly recently) — and while they’re all good, because Pratchett is good, none of them quite ever grabbed me the way the Witches series did.

I decided to pick this one up after someone tipped me off to the fact that it was Pratchett doing Les Miserables – and, at a wide stroke, this is true. I was expecting a far stricter parody than I ended up getting, though, and I think I’m okay with that. Really what Pratchett does is invert the structure, giving us the story of a good copper with quite a lot to lose. Night Watch is not as broadly comic as many of Pratchett’s novels, particularly those involving the Watch, and there are few moments in it which are truly just gut-wrenchingly awful. Pratchett throws some punches here that he often pulls elsewhere, particularly with regards to mortality. His political satire is as good as ever, with some particularly incisive observations regarding the nature of mob mentality, of anything done for the good of “The People,” and, as Ankh-Morpork so often allows him to demonstrate, of the lifesblood of cities in general.

So: What happens in Night Watch? Well, we begin with Sam Vimes at the top of his career and not entirely sure how he feels about that. He’s restored the Watch to repute and efficiency, he’s been made a Duke, he has a wife and a child on the way… and there’s something discontent, like his life doesn’t fit him quite right. He ruminates on this as his wife is in delivery on the Twenty-Fifth of May — a local day of observation having something, we gather, to do with lilacs. Later that day, while pursuing the maniacal murderer Carcer, Vimes accidentally gets sent back in time thirty years, where he has to fill in the gap left in history when Carcer (also sent back) kills Sergeant John Keel pre-emptively. Keel was, it turns out, young Sam’s mentor when he first joined the force, so Vimes now has to mentor himself to make sure he turns out okay. Make sense? No? Well, here’s Monk of Time Lu-Tze on it:

“Nothing’s certain, ’cause of quantum.”
“But, look, I know my future happened, because I was there!”
“No. What we’ve got here, friend, is quantum interference. Mean anything? No. Well… let me put it this way. There’s one past and one future. But there are two presents. One where you and your evil friend turned up, and one where you didn’t. We can keep these two presents going side by side for a few days. It takes a lot of run time, but we can do it. And then they’ll snap back together. The future that happens depends on you. We want the future where Vimes is a good copper. Not the other one.”
“But it must’ve happened!” snapped Vimes. “I told you, I can remember it! I was there yesterday!”
“Nice try, but that doesn’t mean anything anymore,” said the monk. “Trust me. Yes, it’s happened to you, but even though it has, it might not. ‘Cos of quantum. Right now, there isn’t a Commander Vimes-shaped hole in the future to drop you into. It’s officially Uncertain. But it might not be, if you do it right. You owe it to yourself, Commander.”

It’s more of the exploration of alternate realities that Pratchett does so well, and a theme which I always adore (Trousers of Time, and all). Vimes realises that he basically has no choice, if he ever wants to get back to the appropriate future, and so he takes up with the then-dissolute Night-Watch-as-was, takes himself under his own wing, and pretty soon is running the whole operation, never mind what the higher-ups have to say about it. Of course, this is an extremely effective way to make enemies very fast — especially since Carcer has taken up with the Cable Street Particulars, a special force with an expertise in torture.

Vimes also realises that he’s had the highly-questionable fortune to land smack in the middle of the famous street uprising which led to the bright-but-brief People’s Republic of Treacle Mine Road. He tries to assume the place in history left by John Keel, but his own thoughts and urges assert themselves, too, and as he tries to protect as many people as possible, he discovers that, thanks to his interference and Carcer’s, things aren’t turning out quite as he remembers them having done. Vimes has to out-think and out-react his opponents in order to keep both of himselves alive. We meet a whole contingent of Ankh-Morporkean regulars, including Rosie Palms, Nobby Nobbs, Fred Colon, Reg Shoe, Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler, and even a young Havelock Vetinari, the Assassins’ Guild’s most talented if under-appreciated student.

The poignancy of the novel really comes into full swing when Vimes ends up in charge of the rebellion, knowing full well how it ends, knowing full well who dies — and trying like hell to change history and to save them anyway. He knows what’s going to happen, and he wants to change it enough to matter, but not so much that he can’t get back. It puts him in a terrible position, really, particularly as he tries to convey the importance of it all to his younger self. There are a few little moments that Pratchett sneaks in there that really do just seem to punch you in the stomach. Right in the feels, as it were.

Overall, I think what I can say the most about Night Watch is that it surprised me. It was not the book I was expecting to read, but I’m exceedingly glad that I read it.

Someday I really must read all of the Discworld novels in order.

The Bridgertons: Happily Ever After

The Bridgertons are one of the best-loved families in historical romance, and for good reason. JQ did something extraordinary, creating a family that was close-knit and loving, but not cloying — always believable, full of rivalries and frustrations, rife with inside jokes, and ultimately, always there for each other. Even more incredible, she managed to sustain the charm across eight books — easily twice as long as most romance novel series. I always thought that the first half of the series was stronger than the second half (as you can see from my reviews), but they’re all solid and enjoyable.

Because this family is so cherished by her fans, JQ decided to do something special — a collection of Second Epilogues, showing just what happens in Happy Ever After. Some of these had been released before, but as I don’t have an e-reader, I hadn’t read any of them, so they were all new to me. And they’re pretty delightful. In so many ways, diving into this book was like revisiting old friends and discovering them, not unchanged, but just as dear and warm and lovely as ever they were.

I’m not going to review each one individually, because it’s really the collection as a whole that made the biggest impression on me. I just love the idea of it — of showing that the story doesn’t end at the altar. The stories in this collection span a wide range of time, some of them coming just weeks after the corresponding book ends, others stretching decades into the characters’ future. The ones I ended up liking the best were in that second category — showing our beloved heroes and heroines years and years on and still madly in love with each other. I appreciate the… I don’t know, the reassurance? So much conventional “wisdom” states that passion inevitably fades over time, that fires bank down to embers, and you’re lucky if you have warmth and comfort enough to sustain a relationship past that. But I have always wanted to believe that that doesn’t have to be true — not for everyone, anyway. And the Bridgertons show me that in fictional form — couples who still desire each other even after many children, even after their own children have children. Who still tease and laugh and flirt, decades into their relationships. Who continue to face challenges and continue to grow stronger from them. I love it.

The two Second Epilogues that stick out in my mind the most are Kate & Anthony’s and Francesca and Michael’s — unsurprising, since those are among my favourite books in the series, anyway. With Kate and Anthony, we get a glorious return to Pall Mall and the Mallet of Death. This Second Epilogue is as cheeky and tempestuous as I could’ve wished, really recapturing the spirit of the original. Francesca’s Second Epilogue, much like her own story, is told in a much different tone, slower and more introspective, but absolutely brimming with passionate emotion. Colin and Penelope’s was, sadly, one of the less sterling sections — sad because they vie for the top spot of my favourite Bridgerton novel. It’s a midquel, actually, for To Sir Philip, With Love, where we find out how Eloise learned Penelope’s great secret; unfortunately, the events aren’t that gripping, and the story sort of meanders.

I do sort of wish that at least one couple out of the eight had remained childless but content with that, even if it wouldn’t really be historically accurate, just because it’d be nice to see childfree families represented in the genre at all — but, I know that’s sort of an unreasonable request, given the market. I also wish that Violet’s novella had been longer — hell, I wish she’d get a whole book of her own, but JQ has always said that will never be the case. But I would’ve liked to have seen more of her and Edmund’s courtship — and of their marriage. The vignettes didn’t fully satisfy, as JQ moves on to the tragedy and its aftermath rather quickly. I see where she wanted to go with it, to show Violet’s entire arc, but I would’ve appreciated a little more

I very much can’t recommend this book to anyone who hasn’t previously read all of the Bridgerton novels — but, of course, I recommend those to all readers of romance, so this can just be the cherry on the sundae. And I do feel it fair to warn that there isn’t a lot of heat in any of these vignettes — JQ drops a few sizzling moments the readers’ way (in Anthony’s and Francesca’s stories, notably, which may also contribute to my favorable impression of those), but on the whole, these stories just aren’t long enough to sustain real sex scenes. By their very nature, they also don’t stand alone very well. Nostalgia definitely plays a large role in my enjoyment of them, but if you’ve missed the Bridgertons as I have, then I thoroughly recommend returning to their world with Happily Ever After.

A Lady Never Lies

This is a historical romance with a unique premise, all the more surprising since it is, in fact, loosely borrowed from Shakespeare. Gray transposes the improbable plot of Love’s Labour’s Lost to 1890, and somehow, it works — largely because she doesn’t feel compelled to hold to it too strictly, allowing the “Little Academe” of Navarre to inspire her work without hemming it in. Phineas Burke, a successful scientist whose inventions have made him quite wealthy, convinces his friend the Duke of Wallingford and the Duke’s younger brother, Roland, to spend a year with him at a remote Italian villa, away from the torments of matchmaking mamas and the evils of over-indulgence. Finn wants to spend the year perfecting the engine for his electric automobile so that he can enter it in a race in Rome.

Enter the ladies. Thanks to a mix-up (or to deliberate interference on the part of the real estate broker?), the three gentlemen have rented the same estate as Lady Alexandra Morley, her sister Abigail, and her friend Lady Lilibet Somerton. Alexandra has fled England ahead of the creditors left to her by her late husband and a nephew with catastrophically poor investment strategies. Lilibet has fled an abusive husband,  with her five-year-old son in tow, and while her circumstances are not detailed yet, I’m sure they will be in her book. Stuck together for the foreseeable future, the two groups make a bet on which will crack and head back to England first. Or which will break their vows of chastity and isolation first? It’s a little blurry just what, exactly, constitutes losing the bet.

There are hijinks worthy of Shakespeare throughout the book, as Finn and Alexandra experience a powerful attraction to each other but have to hide it from the others in the house. Finn expects to hate socialite Alexandra, but finds himself charmed by her forthright nature and startling intelligence. They are both imperfect characters with shady pasts, but their ragged edges fit together nicely. There’s also a charming air of rustic mystery surrounding the story, as the housekeeper and groundskeeper interfere freely with everyone’s business, occasionally dropping hints about an old curse upon the villa that needs to be broken — I can only assume we’ll be hearing more about that later on.

There are a few things that don’t come together, and I honestly don’t know if they’ll get better treatment in the remaining two books or not. The whole concept of the bet is sort of flimsy, as is Alexandra’s decision to sort-of-kind-of-not-really engage in industrial espionage. Turns out some of her nephew’s investments were in an automobile company, and she half-heartedly tries to spy on Finn to get some ideas that might save the company… but you never get the feeling that she actually has strong intent there, and the story swerves away from it pretty quickly. The chemistry between Finn and Alexandra carries us along far better than that abortive attempt at intrigue.

Fortunately, Gray doesn’t pull Shakespeare’s ending stunt on us, so don’t worry that you’ll finish this book feeling as awkwardly interrupted as I always do at the end of Love’s Labour’s Lost. My biggest complaint is that I feel it could’ve been longer — the standard 370-380 pages rather than this slightly scant 311 would’ve given a little more room for character exploration. I totally believed in Alexandra’s and Finn’s attraction to and affection for each other, but the initial draw felt a little lacking. It also might have smoothed over some of the leaps in the timeline — the book hops along rapidly, but I could’ve done with a bit more idling, particularly at the beginning, to see them all settle into the house rather than jumping so soon to a month into their tenancy. But — I’m someone who likes world-building a lot, whether fantasy or historical, so I will always permit an author that indulgence. I know not everyone’s patience runs so long, and so many readers might appreciate the rapid pace of the novel.

I found the premise of this story refreshing, both in terms of the time period and the details behind the plotline. Gray does herself some great favours by breaking the mold in those ways, putting us in Italy rather than England (even with English characters) and moving to the opposite end of the century. It gives her more room to play, I think, and she clearly has had a lot of fun with it. She sprinkles the story with as much historical veracity as invention and artistic license, and sharp-eyed history buffs will enjoy the cameos.

I also appreciated that Gray didn’t give away everything with regards to the other couples. We sort of see them dash in and out as teasers, but there doesn’t appear to be a lot of overlap in what scenes Gray chooses to show us in this book. I believe that will help this series escape some of the problems I had with Julia Quinn’s Dukes of Wyndham duology. A Lady Never Lies was a fun read, unusual for a historical romance but not in ways that were distracting or disturbing, and I look forward to the rest of the series.

Wolf Hall

Another book I’m honestly not quite sure how I feel about. I know that it’s the sort of book I should’ve eaten up with a spoon — one of my favourite historical eras, told from the perspective of a “side character” with a fascinating story of his own — and yet, somehow, it just didn’t take for me.

Wolf Hall tells the story of Henry VIII from the viewpoint of one of his most trusted advisers, Thomas Cromwell. Cromwell begins the story as the much-abused son of a Putney blacksmith who leaves home to bounce around the Continent for a while before returning and somehow landing a position with the then-triumphant Cardinal Wolsey. After the prologue section showing Cromwell’s early life, Mantel dives right in to the sequence of events that will eventually lead to the English Reformation. King Henry VIII is dissatisfied — with his position on the world stage, with his inability to get an heir, with his once-lovely but now dour and dumpy Spanish wife. He sets Wolsey to fixing all of his problems, as Wolsey has done pretty much since the start of Henry’s reign. Attached to Wolsey’s household, Cromwell’s fortunes also rise — but as Wolsey starts to fall, when he can’t accomplish Henry’s wishes fast enough (and when he makes an enemy out of Lady Anne Boleyn), Cromwell finds himself in a difficult situation, not wanting to betray the man to whom he owes so much, but not wanting to crash and burn, either. Watching Cromwell nimbly navigate the turbulent waters of political intrigue — particularly when the Boleyns start getting involved — is most of the excitement in this book.

But what I like best about it is instead its depiction of life in London as a member of the middle class during Henry’s reign, since so many books focus only on the royal court (excusable, since what a court it was, but still). As Cromwell bounces back and forth between the two worlds, we get to see the contrast. We also watch Cromwell build a home and a family, things that are more important to him than he generally lets on, cultivating the public image of a hardened and devious Machiavel. But he cherishes his home life, and the losses he suffers all too frequently affect him deeply. The economy and status marks of Londoners are wonderful to observe as well — how they aped the court and gossipped about them, but frequently held a different moral standard. Cromwell there stands in stark contrast to Thomas More, another up-jumped adviser to the king, whose home life is supposed to be a model of ideal Christian lifestyle, with a reality that seems almost unendurably cruel.

So, in that regard, it was a compelling novel. But there were some things that rubbed me the wrong way. I’m not a fan of historical fiction told in the present tense. Honestly, I’m not a big fan of present-tense fiction in most instances, but for some reason, in historicals, it bothers me more significantly. It didn’t help that Mantel’s pronouns had unspecific antecedents often enough to be a major distraction. So often she would jump from talking about one character to offering Cromwell’s viewpoint or experience, but without any transition — and if both characters were “he”s, as was typically the case, it was jarring and made the narrative a little disjointed.

Hall also includes a lot of historical rumours that were either known to be completely unfounded in their own time or else were inventions of later centuries looking back on the Tudor era. It’s hard to tell whether Hall means this to be indicative of the rumour mill of 16th-century England — or whether it’s a flaw in her own historical knowledge, if she’s buying into the hype without stripping away the falsities. I honestly don’t know which is the case, and that’s the problem. I want to believe it’s the former, that she’s presenting a semi-satirical commentary on the transmission of information — but since I can’t tell for sure if that’s what she’s doing, then I have to consider it a flaw in the writing either way.

I am also just, personally, a big fan of Anne Boleyn. And of Catherine of Aragon. (The two opinions are not as necessarily mutually exclusive as you might imagine). This book isn’t a fan of either. Anne is a complete shrew, Catherine a dullard. None of the Boleyns come off well, really — brother George is a fop, father Thomas is a pompous grasper, and Uncle Norfolk has a hot temper and a viciously inventive vocabulary (he’s hilarious, though, and he may be my favourite character for that alone). Sister Mary fares a little better, more a pawn than an agent and at the mercy of her sister and father, but she still displays a pragmatic streak that Mantel paints in a less-than-flattering light. Queen Catherine appears infrequently and never to good effect, and Princess Mary is generally described as weak both of body and mind — hugely unfair to them both, since they were both pretty incredible women, whatever their faults. Nor is Wolf Hall a fan of Thomas More, though I’m okay with that, having always thought him a bit too much of a pompous stick. And it’s far too forgiving of Henry, who I, frankly, view as the villain in this entire story. That, at least, I can understand, from Cromwell’s point of view — though you would think that a man as keen and calculating as Cromwell wouldn’t be quite so mentally permissive of his king’s really obvious foibles. Mantel makes some gestures in that direction, with Cromwell musing on how “you choose your prince” and then stick with him, but ultimately, there’s still just a little too much adoring glitter thrown on a man I’ve always seen as self-deceptive to the point of total immorality. I think, with all of the above characters, Mantel falls into the same trap: in attempting to flesh out Cromwell, she ends up flattening everyone else.

On the whole, this book definitely has some great stuff in it, and I love getting to see the story from a new viewpoint. I think the technical merit of the work leaves a lot to be desired, however. I understand that she’s continuing this as a series (presumably through Cromwell’s fall and death), and I don’t know whether or not I’ll pick up the others.

Mr Cavendish, I Presume

Another double-header! These books are so closely interlinked that it just makes sense to review them as one — and, honestly, that’s the biggest problem with them. Julia Quinn chose to tell the same story twice, from different viewpoints — and while I admire the effort and like the idea, the execution was a little lackluster. The second book repeats far too much information and too many conversations. I think these stories better could’ve been combined into one slightly longer book, still exploring both couples, but unfortunately that’s not the way the romance novel publishing industry works.

So how do we end up with these two intertwined stories? Thanks to the heroes. Jack Audley is a highwayman who waylays the Dowager Duchess of Wyndham and her companion, Grace, on their way home one night — trouble is, the Dowager recognises him as the spitting image of her second son, who died traveling from Ireland to England years earlier. Her first son having also died without issue, the title is currently held by Thomas, the son of her third son. Thomas is engaged to marry Amelia, a neighboring daughter of an earl, but has sort of been dragging his feet on the matter. In order to figure out which of the two men is the real Duke of Wyndham, the Dowager insists on dragging everyone to Ireland to find out if John’s parents were legally married, which will settle the matter. So, there we are: two heroes, two heroines, one story.

I like Jack and Grace’s story better, though I don’t know if that’s because Thomas and Amelia’s story comes second, and thus it always feels like retread. Jack and Grace have a charming “love at first sight” dynamic. I think, for modern readers, that concept can often fall flat if not handled properly, but Quinn weaves them through it rather well. There’s a tenderness to them, along with the magnetic passion that you would expect from such a sudden attraction. Jack’s emotional journey is an interesting one, as we get to explore both the circumstances that led to him becoming a highwayman and his knee-jerk reaction to reject the life of entwined luxury and responsibility that the dukedom implies. Grace, too, has bounced up and down the social ladder in her life, and it’s one of the things that matches them nicely. It’s also a lot of fun to watch Grace deal with the decidedly unpleasant Dowager Duchess (such a contrast to JQ’s favourite dragon, Lady Danbury). The Lost Duke feels, on the whole, to be the stronger book.

The trap that JQ falls into with Mr Cavendish is in not spending enough time with Thomas, who does know what’s going on, and instead leaving the reader more often with Amelia, who is totally clueless for two thirds of the book. She’s assuming the reader knows what’s going on, as I imagine most do, but it’s still odd to be put into the head of someone so utterly out of the loop for the bulk of the story. What’s amazing there is that, rather than filling the gaps with new incidents, JQ still manages to repeat so much material — generally conversations with Grace or conversations Amelia overhears. The story between her and Thomas also just feels less genuine to me. I could believe their growing to attraction if, say, he’d been engaged to her yet never actually met her — but clearly he sees her all the time. So why does the spark not get set off till now? It doesn’t help that Thomas is a reserved, detached sort of person, and that doesn’t change much when we get inside his head. He isn’t a bad person, but he isn’t tremendously likable, either, and that makes his part of the story more difficult to enjoy.

So, ultimately, I don’t think this experiment in storytelling format worked as well as JQ intended it to. I’m not against the idea on principle, but the approach needs to be different, offering truly divergent perspectives on the same events. I agree with other reviews I’ve seen suggesting that the two books not be read back-to-back, as was probably my mistake with this re-read, because you really will feel the retread quite keenly. But, then again, I don’t know that they improve all that much with greater separation, either.

Darcy & Elizabeth: Days and Nights at Pemberley

Unfortunately, while Berdoll’s first Pride and Prejudice sequel was at least entertaining, if flawed, the follow-up falls completely flat. This book was badly in want of better editing. The first one hundred pages are a recap of the previous book — far too much time to spend catching readers back up, and poorly orchestrated, at that. Berdoll jumps to and fro in her own timeline without any solid anchoring, such that it becomes difficult to follow the sequence of events. This problem persists throughout the book. Berdoll frequently jumps back months or even years to visit other characters, and while this narrative device can work, her efforts are far from seamless. It becomes particularly distracting when she bounces back to investigate in greater detail something she already talked about once or twice before in the “main” narrative thread, but offers contradictory information as to the sequence of events. The jarring shifts are worst at the very end of the book, when she inexplicably interrupts the climactic sequence (involving George Wickham, back from presumed death and more dastardly than ever) not once but twice to go check in on other characters. If Berdoll meant this to build suspense, it fails, building only frustration.

Characterization suffers in this book as well. Though Darcy is much the same as ever, Lizzy hardly ever rises to the spirited nature we’ve come to expect from her. She spends the first half of the book hesitant and unsure of herself, and while on the one hand I appreciate the realistic treatment of a woman’s post-pregnancy bodily concerns, it went on for far too long and made Lizzy far too much unlike herself. The new characters added to the narrative mostly feel like retreads from the first book — unsurprising, since half of them are relatives or otherwise connected. In some places, it feels like Berdoll actually wanted to write a book about the experience of the lower classes during this period, but thought that no publisher would take that on, so she stuffed the material into something that she knew had a market. I appreciate the desire to show, as she did in the first book, a world outside that of the gentry, but the interplay between the stories here lacks finesse.

Berdoll also fails in the premise of a family focus for this book. None of the children, by any set of parents, are granted the chance to have a personality. They are admirable props while infants, rendered invisible once they’ve grown enough to speak. Jane’s and Lydia’s children remain entirely off-screen, and are referred to so infrequently that I often wondered precisely where they were and who was looking after them. If you read this novel hoping to see much of the Darcys as parents, you’ll be disappointed in that as well; the children don’t age above a year, and there’s precious little beyond breast-feeding and knee-dandling going on with them. Family life has no depth in this book, no nuance. The fecundity of the various characters is a plot device and no more, which I found disappointing.

There are enjoyable episodes in this book, but ultimately, the total muddle Berdoll makes of her own timeline and her haphazard manner of storytelling make it difficult to enjoy them. I see that she published a third installment to the series in 2011, but I feel no compulsion to acquire it.

A quick glance at this book on GoodReads or Amazon will quickly reveal a rather vitriolic hate for it among many readers, voicing objections that are not wholly without foundation — but which I don’t necessarily share, either. I first read this book and its sequel ages ago, and honestly, barely remembered the details of them. I’ve recently had my interest in P&P spinoffs prickled, however, by the truly excellent Lizzie Bennet Diaries (which I intend to review once the series has ended). With that on my brain, I first re-read Pride and Prejudice itself, and then turned to Berdoll’s inventive sequels for further fulfillment.

I will confess from the start that, while I enjoy those of Austen’s works I have read, I am not a fanatic, nor have I completed her canon. As such, I suspect I am far less protective of the characters than other readers would be, and so the liberties that Berdoll takes with the characters don’t trouble me as much. I can empathize, however. I suspect those readers feel the same way about this book that I feel about the Pink Carnation series. For those readers, I suggest some other Austen derivatives which I found less engaging, but which they may find less offensive. I think these things are a very definite case of Your Mileage May Vary.

Berdoll sets out in this book to continue the story of Darcy and Elizabeth past the chastity of the altar. Happily, the couple well-matched in intellect and temperament find themselves likewise equals in passion. Berdoll devotes many pages to their exploration of “connubial bliss” — admittedly in a somewhat odd mixture of explicit details and coy evasions. Their honeymoon period is long indeed, with the couple seemingly unable to keep their hands off of each other. Beyond the bedroom, we follow the Darcys through the first few years of their marriage, and as much as Elizabeth has to adjust being mistress of an estate as grand as Pemberley, Darcy also has to adjust to sharing his life with someone. It’s fun to watch them negotiate that out, particularly given some of the wrenches Berdoll throws in their way. Much as they might wish to stay in their cozy privacy, there is a whole lot of world out there, ready and anxious to insert itself into the Darcys’ lives.

I think a lot of other reviewers, their heads spinning from the sauciness, miss some of the other things Berdoll attempts which are really quite notable. She doesn’t only address Austen’s lack of sexual experience; she also addresses Austen’s lack of social experience outside of her own sphere. However good a social satirist Austen was for her own class, her books don’t treat much with, well, anyone else. What she knew was the country gentry, and so that is what she portrays. Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife remembers that life in London was none so pleasant for those without funds or titles. It remembers that the Napoleonic Wars happened (an omission I always found particularly curious in Austen’s works, considering how much energy she does expend on officers and regiments). It remembers that infant mortality was high, as was maternal mortality; that disease and accidents could strike swiftly. It remembers that upper-class society at the time had no expectation that husbands would remain faithful to their wives.

Now, notice that I do say that these inclusions were “attempts” — I think Berdoll misses the mark sometimes, veering from historical authenticity into near-lurid melodrama and never quite finding the right balance — but even so, I think it admirable to give Austen’s work a mindful dose of reality. Darcy and Elizabeth have to weather all manner of tragedy, and if it is at times overwrought, it also gives the book a little more depth and nuance than you would find in a typical historical romance.

Berdoll also expands not only on other characters from Austen’s canon, but also on some new faces as well — and many of them characters from outside the Darcys’ social class. We get more insight into Georgiana, whom Berdoll eventually invests with the spirit to break free of her brother’s well-meant but undoubtably patriarchal dominance, into Colonel Fitzwilliam, always feeling a bit of a loose end, into Lydia’s unhappy marriage and into Jane’s domesticity. We also meet Pemberley’s housekeeper, Darcy’s valet, and various women from Darcy’s past. Berdoll will occasionally break off from the main narrative for a chapter in order to explore those characters. This is a writing style that I know not all readers will favor, but it’s one I like. I’m less concerned with a straightforward plot than I am explorations of characters, and so it doesn’t trouble me in the slightest to have a chapter that veers from the narrative to tell us the background of Elizabeth’s maidservant, of a French courtesan, or of a misbegotten stable boy. I like the diversions. They give more of a sense of a complete world.

One very valid complaint levelled at Berdoll is that she is over-enamoured of her thesaurus, and I confess the truth of it. She props up her narrative with an abundance of polysyllabic words and on contorted euphemisms for various body parts and functions. Even that didn’t bother me so much, though. It seemed far more heavy-handed in the first part of the book, and either I just got accustomed to it or it became more moderate as the book went on. I also think that, coming to this immediately after re-reading Pride and Prejudice itself, I was better armed to appreciate what Berdoll was attempting to do. The style is somewhere between a tribute to and a gentle mockery of Austen’s own (if you’ve read Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, think of it as similar to that, only not quite as adeptly handled). With that in mind, I can forgive the verbosity to an extent. Plus, well, I like words. I tend towards the effusive (my mother, I suspect, would say “affected”) in my own speech and writing, so Berdoll’s style rarely rubs me the wrong way. There were only a few occasions where a sentence was so burdened that it irritated me; the rest of the time, I chose to relax and let the consciously antiquated diction wash over me.

All in all, I think this book comes down to a matter of taste — which leaves me unable to make a particularly good recommendation one way or the other. It will not be for everyone, and I don’t know that I would argue that it’s a good book even for those readers who will not take offence at Berdoll’s liberties. There are definitely flaws both in the aim and the execution. I found it entertaining, however. For a nearly 500-page book, it still moves quickly, and the characters are, if not totally in line with what Austen may have imagined or faithful to what her devotees would wish, still reasonably extrapolated from those origins. I suppose the best I can do is suggest that, if you think the book would interest you, read the first few pages on Amazon. From that, you should be able to determine whether the style will infuriate or amuse you.

The Thirteenth Tale

I am in the unusual position of thinking that a book was exceptionally well-written and compelling, and yet still not liking it very much.

The Thirteenth Tale is a modern Gothic tale, very much in the vein of Rebecca, Jane Eyre, Northanger Abbey, The Woman in White — and Setterfield is not only consciously aware of it, but calls attention to it throughout the novel. Her heroine, Margaret, is steeped in these books, but also in obscure biographies. She works at her father’s used book store and has never, it seems, really had to do much of anything; her father occasionally trades in priceless literary artifacts, and that sustains her family while the shop is just a side project. She is introverted to the point of being something of a recluse, and she is haunted by her dead twin — a twin who did not survive much past birth. Her mother could never emotionally connect to her because of this (something I’ll expound on later).

Margaret is surprised to receive a summons to write the biography of the notoriously private but fabulously successful writer Vida Winter, whom the narrative posits as a modern-day Dickens, voice of England in a new century. Winter has stalwartly refused all previous attempts at biography, but she knows she’s dying and she chooses Margaret (for reasons that become clear as the book goes on) to document her life. Margaret is suspicious at first, knowing that Winter could easily play her and fob another falsity off on her, so she asks for verifiable details. She gets a few, including Winter’s real name – Adeline March. And then Winter starts telling her story.

It’s compelling, dark, twisted, and thoroughly saturated with death. It begins with death — her grandmother’s, leading to her grandfather’s withdrawal from society. Their children, Charlie and Isabelle, grow up almost entirely without supervision; Charlie becomes obsessed with Isabelle. She goes along with him, teases him, but eventually runs off and marries another man — only to return with twins not much later, announcing that her brief husband is dead. The twins, indiscriminately named Emmeline and Adeline, have Charlie’s colouring. Draw your own conclusions. The twins grow up even more feral than Charlie and Isabelle did, speaking in their own language. Adeline is brutally destructive and without empathy; Emmeline is soft, weak-willed, controlled by her sister, and captivated by stories. The cook and gardener do little to influence them; a governess briefly instills a bit of order but is driven away by scandal. That’s the inner story. The outer story is also saturated with death. Winter is dying, Margaret cares more about dead people than she does about the living, someone else she meets was abandoned as a child and everyone he knows seems to be dead — themes of death and loss just permeate the entire book.

And that is what made it really difficult for me to enjoy. It was just too morbid. I am, by nature, far more sanguine. I mean, it certainly isn’t that I mind death in a story, but throughout The Thirteenth Tale, it just seems as though everyone is luxuriating in death, utterly steeped in it and not particularly willing to be otherwise. Margaret, for example, keenly feels the lack of her mother’s attention — though Margaret must be at least thirty years old by now, she’s never formed another social network, so that has remained a powerful influence on her. And I can’t forgive her mother for that neglect. I can’t even imagine what a devastating loss it must be, to lose a child — but I must also think that, when it’s a child you lose at birth and never know, and when there is another child there who needs you, then it must be a recoverable loss. I cannot fathom nor can I excuse that sort of neglect. But Margaret has never shown any inclination not to be ruled by it or by her dead twin’s ghost, either — rather she ensconces herself in the loss, and that is a point of view I also cannot see from.

I also can’t figure out when the book is set, and that just drives me up the wall. I know it’s intentional — the reader’s guide at the back of the book indicates as much. But I just can’t stand it. It distracts me throughout the entire book. Margaret’s part of the story, the “present day” as far as the narrative is concerned, could be anywhere from the 1950s to the advent of the Internet. When a character is mentioned as having gone to war, there’s no indication of which war. The family is so removed from society and untouched by world events that there’s no indication of what decade the story begins in. The twins could be growing up anywhere from Victoria’s last few decades to the 1930s, knowing only that sixty years have passed between the close of that story and when Vida Winter seeks out Margaret. I couldn’t pin it down, because Setterfield deliberately didn’t want me to, and that frustrated me immensely.

But for all of that, The Thirteenth Tale really is well written. Like I said, I found it compelling even as I disliked it, and the technical proficiency is quite high. Winter’s pronouns as she tells the tale of the twins are particularly well-handled, and the weaving of frame narrative and the meat and bones of the story is deft. The twist at the end was unexpected, but still managed to tie up all the loose ends. Setterfield also deals rather smartly with the idea of unreliable narrators — Margaret wonders throughout the whole book if Winter is being completely honest with her, but, of course, we as readers can never know either way, since the book is written from Margaret’s point-of-view, and we don’t know if she’s being honest with us, either. It’s an interesting angle from which to approach storytelling, and Setterfield makes a nice job of it.

So, on the whole, I can’t recommend this book quite as full-throatedly as I have some others — I just know that others may find far more enjoyment in it than I did. If you like Gothic novels, then, by all means, delve into this one.

I was super-excited to get my hands on Ms. Carriger’s latest novel, her first foray into YA fiction. I thoroughly enjoyed her Parasol Protectorate series, and I’m so glad that she’s decided to continue on in this world even though she wrapped that series up. Etiquette & Espionage did not disappoint me.

Sophronia, a fourteen-year-old youngest daughter in the 1850s, is unusual. She climbs dumbwaiters and gets herself into terrible fixes and is generally an embarrassment to her family, a socially-aspirant gentry . Little does her mother know that when she packs Sophronia off to finishing school, she’s actually giving the girl just what she needs. Her unusual new circumstances first become apparent when she chats with Dimity, also headed to Mademoiselle Geraldine’s Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality, and her brother Pillover, destined for Bunson and Lacroix’s Boys’ Polytechnique. As Dimity chatters cheerfully about evil geniuses, covert recruits, Picklemen, and Custard Pots of Iniquity, Sophronia begins to suspect something is odd. When her carriage is attacked by flywaymen, their escort goes into unconvincing hysterics, and Sophronia has to take command of the horses and rescue them all, her suspicions are rather confirmed.

It turns out that Sophronia has landed at a school designed not only to turn her into a lady but to turn her lethal as well. Or, rather, the Academy has landed at her — for it’s a floating school, suspended from enormous balloons. A werewolf named Captain Niall (!) serves as ship-to-ground transport and teaches combat, a vampire covers history and deportment, mechanical staff patrol the hallways as prefects, the students learn poisons and manipulation alongside powders and manners, and the headmistress has no idea that any of it is going on. Sophronia begins to settle in at the Academy and into an easy friendship with Dimity, though she has more trouble with the others in her dormitory. Sidhaeg (!) is prickly and recalcitrant, Agatha a shy wallflower, Preshea a snob, and Monique is none other than their escort, demoted back to debut rank for refusing to give up the whereabouts of the mysterious “prototype” which the flywaymen were after. Sophronia and Monique do not get on at all, and their rivalry drives much of the action in the book. Sophronia also uses her climbing abilities to sneak into the restricted areas, where she makes friends with the sooties who keep the ship running, including Soap, a London-born boy of African descent (and props to Carriger for including a non-white character in an English historical novel!). Sophronia, never having seen a black person before, is startled by him at first but gets over it quickly. The two become friends, and Soap introduced her to Vieve (!), niece to Professor Beatrice Lefoux (!) and a budding inventor. As the plot progresses, Sophronia finds them tremendously useful in her various schemes and maneuvers.

I felt as though the story bobbled a bit at the end of the first act and the beginning of the second. There’s a stretch where the sense of character isn’t particularly strong. It is interesting to have a leading character who is so introverted and private, but it also damages the narrative a bit, at least for me. When the POV character is not particularly reflective or emotive, I (a consummate extrovert) find it harder to engage with her. It was hard to feel emotionally connected to Sophronia, and sometimes her actions seemed very abrupt because there had been little build-up to them. I admire that Sophronia is such a practical and plain-dealing heroine, but I could’ve used a larger window into her soul.

The other problem that I had was that when Sophronia first arrives at the floating school, she has absolutely no idea what’s going on, and no one will tell her. Maddeningly, nothing gets explained for a very long time. After a while, this starts to frustrate me as a reader — and I recognise that not everyone may feel this way. It’s a valid literary trope and one frequently used in YA, but I personally struggle with it. I hate being left totally in the dark. It tends to make me rush, hoping I’ll get to the explanation, but then I end up having to go back and re-read chapters in case I missed something. I understand delaying gratification and teasing the reader, but some information in this book gets played a little too close to the chest.

There are still a lot of questions left unanswered at the end of the book, and I’m hoping we’ll get more information on them in future installments — I want to know why this extraordinary pair of schools exists. Right now, the answer seems to be “just because.” I find that unsatisfying. What need does England have for an elite cadre of female assassins and a coterie of admittedly evil geniuses? What role in society are they fulfilling? For what purpose? If the Headmistress has no idea what’s going on, who does? Who drives this whole thing? Who founded it? For what reasons? I love Carriger’s world-building, but I wish we’d gotten just a little bit more on this front at the outset.

I did think, though, that I saw a glimmer of potential for change in the school’s directives, one that I hope we’ll see expanded in future books in the series. Right now, the school seems quite competitive, designed to set these ladies against each other. Sophronia, though, sees more benefit in bringing her cohorts together, drawing on their disparate skills to achieve a communal goal. I would like to see that theme develop further. So much popular opinion, especially when it comes to teenage girls, likes to promote their potential for cattiness, sniping, and backstabbing; I would love to see more YA fiction promoting healthier ideas on what they’re capable of.

The second half of the book improves greatly, though, as a few things do finally get explained and as more action enters the narrative in the final act. Sophronia deduces that Monique must have hidden the prototype at Sophronia’s family home while collecting her, and so she determines to retrieve it with the help of her friends (and new pet, mechanimal dog Bumbersnoot). Sophronia’s skills really get to shine here, and the sense of action and excitement is wonderful fun.

For anyone who wondered why I (!)ed a few times in this review, it’s because there are several connections in Etiquette & Espionage to the Parasol Protectorate series. This book is set some twenty-odd years before that series begins, so there’s a lot of potential for crossover cameos. Even the MacGuffin of the book, the prototype, is a component of technology that becomes crucial by the time of the Protectorate series. Carriger also takes a few moments to poke fun at the steampunk world in general, through a clique of boys at Pillover’s school, the Pistons, who sew gears to their clothing for no reason but fashion, smudge their eyes with kohl, and like to crash parties and spike the punch. It’s a good-natured and, let’s face it, well-deserved ribbing.

Overall, I’m quite pleased with Etiquette & Espionage. There were a few bumps that kept it from perfection, in my opinion, but — that’s true of the first couple Harry Potter books as well. For a first foray into YA fiction, Carriger’s done a lovely job. I absolutely devoured this first installment, and I’m excited to see where the rest of the series goes.

What Happens in London

I feel like I liked this book better when I first read it, although sometimes just the sheer excitement of having a new JQ novel can do that to me. On revisiting — well, I don’t hate it. I actually like half of the premise quite a bit. But the other half is odd and silly and never pans out properly, the whole thing takes quite a while to get going, and then when it does get going, the last act sort of comes out of nowhere.

I do like the characters, and they’re probably the reason this book gets even a middling rating. Sir Harry Valentine is a son from a troubled home who escaped his embarrassing drunk of a father and his emotionally deadened mother by going into the army. Thanks to a ferocious Russian grandmother, he’s quite proficient in languages besides his own, which made him valuable to King and Country. Even with the wars over, he continues to work for the War Office, mostly translating documents — and somehow these circumstances lead to rumours swirling around him possibly having murdered his fiance? It’s very odd, because nothing ever explains how those rumours came about, nor why Olivia becomes so fixated on them that she feels compelled to spy on him after he moves in next-door. The eventual confrontation over that is the part of it that comes to nothing — it just sort of feels like an odd plot device that belonged somewhere else. The better part of the story involves Harry feeling the need to protect Olivia from the attentions of a visiting Russian prince, Alexei, whom the War Office has asked him to keep an eye on. Except even there there’s a bit of a muddle, because the potentially dark and serious plotline gets totally derailed by ludicrous literature. Harry bizarrely ends up reading Mrs. Butterworth and the Mad Baron to the Prince, and then his cousin Sebastian and younger brother Edward start up a staged reading, and it all goes distinctly odd from there.

All of these details and plotlines and detours sort of get in the way of Harry and Olivia’s love story, though. Which is a shame, because they’re both pretty interesting characters. Olivia is forthright but charming; Harry is observant and snarky. Each is a lot of fun, individually. But they sort of go from outright disliking each other to serious involvement in rather a hurry, and while I’m perfectly willing to believe in love stories that move at lightning pace, I need to at least feel it happening — and I couldn’t, here, and I think it’s because of all the other clutter in the book. The story elements never quite fit together in the right way. It’s as though they’re all jostling for attention, and as a result, anything deeper gets totally lost.

In the last forty pages of the book, Olivia gets kidnapped by the Russian ambassador — a villain who I don’t think ever even gets a name, which should give you a good impression of his general importance to the plotline. This could have been better done. We needed some hints beforehand, beyond the vagueness of Harry’s instructions to watch the Prince. He’s not much of a convincing red herring, especially since there’s nothing really to red herring for. The ambassador just wants his cousin to fork over some cash. That’s it. That’s all. Despite having a hero in the War Office and introducing all sorts of exciting foreign elements, JQ doesn’t really do anything with them. There’s no espionage, no scheming, no sinister plots. Olivia just gets kidnapped out of the blue, and I found it quite odd and jarring.

So, on the whole, this was a pleasant enough read, but it never really came together in a way that I found satisfying. Not one of JQ’s worst, but not one of her best, either.