As I am nothing if not someone who rigorously structures my limited free time and utilizes it wisely, I’ve spent the past month binging on The Vampire Diaries. I don’t even like supernatural shows or books that much, and I’ve already watched the entire series when it aired (except the episodes after Nina Dobrev bounced). I think it’s because in these times of struggle and anxiety, going back to something we know is comforting is a very welcome pleasure. Plus, Damon and Elena are my OTP and knowing they’re end game (or at least as end game as you can be when there are like 18 curses in your friend circle alone and one of you has been in a coffin for a few years) made me want to catch up for the finale.
Another past love of mine is the Wallflower series by Lisa Kleypas, in which a quartet of oddball gals in Regency London band together to find friendship and true love. It’s a very good series at baseline, and while I enjoyed all four books, the third, Devil in Winter, stood out, as it is 1) a tale of a marriage of convenience (A VERY GOOD TROPE), 2) the dude is a serious rake, to the extent that I am shocked he doesn’t have syphilis, and 3) the heroine has a stutter and is painfully shy. I reread it at least quarterly. AND THEN, as I was finishing Marrying Winterbourne, the delightful second book in Kleypas’ Ravenel’s series, it included a preview for Devil in Spring, the book about the OFFSPRING of the characters from Devil in Winter! I LOVE NEXT-GENERATION SEQUELS!
Sebastian, Viscount St. Vincent (such a sexy name, all those S’s and V’s) needs a wife because his rich dummy of a dad, the Duke of Kingston, is blowing through cash and St. Vincent needs some funding to keep up with his expenditures (God forbid he get an actual job). Luckily for him, Evangeline Jenner, an heiress to a gambling club, needs a husband to escape the clutches of her greedy extended family. She shows up, propositions him, and then they scoot on over to Scotland for a quickie wedding.
So far, all totally normal historical romance, right? AND THEN, they fuck and St. Vincent just completely falls for Evie. Like, head over heels, entranced by her vagina, can’t get enough of her. Except he doesn’t actually believe in love, really, so he just wants to fuck her a lot and run her dad’s club and just kind of chill, without any of the emotional burden of partnering your life with someone. Evie, for her part, is just as thrown by their potent sexual and interpersonal chemistry but, given her far more impressive emotional intelligence, quickly realizes that she is going to be absolutely destroyed when St. Vincent inevitably dicks around on her (because, frankly, that’s what dudes who aren’t emotionally engaged in relationships tend to do).
After convincing him to attempt celibacy and prove to her that he can stay faithful, they devote themselves to building back the membership of her father’s club (there’s a bit of a subplot in which her ailing father dies), and then there are some bad dudes, criminal elements afoot, etc. ANYWAY, it’s all quite good, because Kleypas really sells how into Evie St. Vincent is, and while he fights hard against settling down, he eventually realizes that a life shared with someone you love boning is infinitely better than an empty marriage and pointless affairs. It’s a delight. It’s in my top five romances, for SURE.
Thirty-odd years later, the new St. Vincent, Gabriel, is just hanging out and engaging in rather torrid affairs with Americans, when he inadvertently compromises Lady Pandora Ravenel, an eccentric debutante who really just wants to develop board games and start an empire (as one does). This sounds completely implausible, but it truly made sense in the context of the story, such that I was pretty annoyed on Pandora’s behalf that she has to marry this random (hot) dude just because some people happened along an innocent situation that looked a little untoward. Anyway. Society wasn’t (isn’t?) great for women for a while, let’s move on.
So. Given that Pandora is charming and lovely and also a total weirdo, Gabriel is pretty down to marry her, though he’s a little worried that his unusual sexual preferences will freak her out (basically he just likes a touch of tying people up, nothing too wild), but Pandora is not at all about to get married and sign over all control of her business to her husband (women can’t be trusted to own things, you know? Completely rational policy). She requires a good bit of coaxing, and because his parents (Evie and Sebastian from Devil in Winter, of course!) are still wildly in love after decades together, invites her family out to his estate to better facilitate the match,
Obviously they fall in love, and there are some obstacles (including a stabbing and a quite bitter ex-mistress), and it’s all very delicious and absorbing. I’m trying to fall asleep at a reasonable hour these days because I’m pretty pregnant and work is a complete nightmare now without decent rest, but I actually read this from 11pm the night before it was released until 3 am SO. It’s pretty engrossing. Filled with lots of cameos from Devil in Winter and a lovely little nod to It Happened One Autumn, the second book in the Wallflowers series, it’s a must for any fans of the Wallflowers or anyone who enjoys historical romance.
