The Grand Sophy by Georgette Heyer
The Grand Sophy is in keeping with the rest of Georgette Heyer’s novels, a genre-defining Regency romance. If you like Regency romance, this book will likely please you. It pleased me. There’s something amusing and refreshing about spending time with people for whom “what shall I wear to the ball” may be the most important decision they’re ever called to make. It has a comedy of manners, and the language is delightfully obtuse. These people never use a single word when they may instead opt to opine on the matter at hand by using a bouquet of synonyms introduced into their genteel discourse.
Best parts: Sophy has a delightful wit and charm, being “edgy” in that she’s not quite as incompetent as her class and gender suggest is proper. Also, she’s tall (scandalous!) The rest of the characters have well-defined personalities, and even though it ends up pretty much where you knew it would from the beginning, the plot takes some interesting twists and turns to get there.
Worst parts: like eating organ meats, Regency romances require a certain amount of willful ignorance. You have to pretend that living in a society where one has to ask permission to speak plainly, where any man in your family might feel he has the right and duty to tell you which street you’re allowed to drive your carriage down (in case you are so foolish you don’t know) and where “what shall I wear to the ball” is pretty much the only autonomy you are allowed in your life, wouldn’t completely suck balls (even if you’re crazy-rich.) Also, cousins marrying first cousins? Teenagers marrying adult men? Ew.
I listened to this as an audiobook, and it’s quite short, perhaps 6 hours. If you like Regency romances, you’ll like this, and if you don’t, you probably won’t.
