Heaven Preserve Us

I need a Boswell who skydives, mostly because I keep forgetting to log my jumps after I do them and then have to do some detective work to find out which dates I was at the DZ. (Thankfully, this is what Twitter seems to be good for.)

I have a gazillion ideas for blog posts, but I never seem to have the time to update, although I suppose that is because I am either falling through the sky or sleeping off my adrenaline crash. The season is winding down to a close for me (alas!) as Bear has started med school again. I am hopeful that we will get at least one more day of jumping in this summer, if things don’t get too crazy too quickly cutting up dead bodies.

Well, if my season is drawing to a close, at least I can review a book about a different sort of season altogether. (Ah ha! Did you see what I did there, oh-so-clumsily?)

Review of THE SEASON by Sarah MacLean

The Season by Sarah MacLean

Sarah MacLean was one of the five lovely authors named Sarah whose event at Books of Wonder I attended last week and whose book I received gratis from a very, very generous stranger. Huzzah!

Lady Alexandra Stafford is not looking forward to the upcoming season: it is the first year she is “out” in society, which means that she is essentially “on the marriage mart.” Her mother, the Duchess of Worthington, is determined to marry off her daughter to an eligible (read: rich and handsome) bachelor, but Alex is less than enthusiastic about her tedious, would-be suitors. She would rather be engaged in intellectual conversations with her best friends Ellie and Vivi or else in the company of her childhood friend (and recent Earl of Blackmoor) Gavin Sewell. However, Gavin’s grown rather infuriating in recent times and Alex can’t quite figure out what her feelings are with regards to him. He is alternately endearing and infuriating, but just when Alex thinks she has things figured out, she discovers that Gavin might be harbouring a dangerous secret…

Man, my ability to write synopses have significantly deteriorated. Regardless, I found THE SEASON to be a charming read. For lovers of young adult fiction and Regency romances, this is a match made in heaven. The love story between Alex and Gavin was deftly handled, with all the awkwardness and tenderness that would be natural between two lifelong friends discovering their attraction to one another. Gavin, thank heavens, is no “alphole” (in the words of the Smart Bitches), and I found him likable and believable. I also thought Alex’s parents were similarly strong and surprisingly three-dimensional. At first I thought the Duchess of Worthington would fall in the Mrs Bennett trap (“Oh Mr Bennett, how could you be so tiresome? You must know that I’m thinking of [Mr Bingley] marrying one of them!”), but she is not a woman to sell her daughter off to the highest bidder. The Duke and Duchess have made an excellent match and she merely wants the same with Alexandra.

My 15-year-old self would have gobbled this right up, although I will admit that my 24-year-old self is less enamoured. THE SEASON, while witty and delightful, also suffers from a plague of anachronistic heroines. I’m all for feminism, of course, but this notion of female autonomy in 1815—I’m sorry to say I can’t quite suspend my disbelief enough to wholeheartedly buy into the premise. Alexandra does not want to get married because she’s afraid marriage with turn her into an uninteresting and dull bore. Her best friends Eleanor (Ellie) was especially vexing; she does not want to get married because marriage will get in the way of her career—as a writer.

Now, MacLean does acknowledge the fact that writing was not exactly a respectable occupation for a young lady, but it wasn’t exactly as though it was forbidden. Jane Austen’s novels were wildly popular with her contemporaries, and while her identity was unknown during her lifetime, it wasn’t because it was improper for a woman to write so much as the novel was considered a disreputable genre. The novel, by and large, was considered sentimental and sensationalist claptrap (please see Samuel Richardson’s Clarissa and anything by Ann Radcliffe) and consumed predominantly by women.

But it wasn’t as though women were excluded from writing; in fact, many popular writers before Austen’s day were women and “out”. The aforementioned Ann Radcliffe, of course, but also Franny Burney, whom Austen cites as an influence (please see: EVELINA). Burney later married. Perhaps I was wrong in reading the text this way, but it seemed to be as though Ellie thinks that it’s all right for unmarried ladies to write, but heaven preserve us if married women took to the quill. Not the case, at least, not with royal patronage.

Which brings me to the largest problem I had: certainly a girl of Ellie’s standing (she is the daughter of an earl) would be expected and pressured to make a good match, but as the daughter of an earl, she would probably at least have a significant dowry to live independently as she chose. Closely connected to the court as her family undoubtedly was, she would probably be able to secure a royal or wealthy patron and write (and marry) as she wanted.

On the other hand, I thought Vivian was the most realistic as a young girl of her time. She was radical in that she wanted to marry for love, which to me seems like an acceptable reason for declining suitors. After all, many of Austen’s heroines held out for The One. Vivian was my favourite: sensible, charming, well-bred, but romantic at the same time.

It’s not fair for me to take such umbrage with feminist heroines and historically speaking, as the daughters of wealthy, titled families, MacLean’s heroines would have financial independence and a little more freedom with regards to whom they wish to marry. I just couldn’t help but find their attitudes a little anachronistic.

Regardless, my adolescent self would have eaten this with a spoon. The dialogue sparkles with wit, especially any of the exchanges between Alex and notorious “rake” Lord Stanhope. I adore Freddie; he is an unabashed flirt with a heart of gold—an archetype that never, ever fails to get to me. If MacLean writes any more novels set in this world, I wouldn’t mind reading more about him. Personally, I am rooting for Vivian and Lord Stanhope to get together—now that’s a love story I could get behind, and I think others would do. I mean, the redemption of the “dissolute” rake is a classic romantic trope and it’s all the more delightful that Freddie isn’t dissolute and Vivian isn’t an insipid ingenue.

Recommended for fans of Georgette Heyer.

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