These Old Shades

 

by Georgette Heyer (read by Cornelius Garrett ) c. 1926

an annual -re-read

 

 

 

   

 

 

"I bought him body and soul."

The Masqueraders and These Old Shades have been my two most favorite Georgette Heyer titles since I first read them as a teenager. While the rest of my Georgette Heyer top-10 list is constantly changing its order, the top slot has always been shared by these two books. I stubbornly refuse to choose one over the other and I stubbornly refuse to allow any other GH title to take their place.

So why These Old Shades?  Call it a young girl's romantic fancy. Mr. Talk, Dark and Dangerous and all that rigamarole. These days I read and re-read the stories for the language, the characters and for the insight into the author's time period not just the romance.  Yes, I read fluff, but that doesn't mean I can't have standards.  Every time I read the book I find another gem -- a bit of description, a character name that makes me laugh -- or even worse, makes me think.

Revenge is a dish best served cold and Satanas ( our hero's nickname) dishes it up with ice cold accuracy. He has a grudge against the Comte de St. Vire  and when he "buys" young Leon Bonnard from his jealous and abusive older brother and his wife, he has found the tool of his revenge.  Young Leon becomes the hero's page and the plot to topple St. Vire is underway.

This is a very early Georgette Heyer; she was 24 when this, her sixth book, was published. It was her first "bestseller."  I think that with this book, Heyer has finally found her storytelling voice. She always has been a storyteller, but now she has technique. Her first book, The Black Moth, was stories the teenaged Heyer would tell her invalid brother to entertain him. But, It took a few years and a couple of stories to find her talent for character development, for caricature and to find her sense of humor. Her books are definitely the happily ever after kind and for many of her readers, their "go-to" when they just need to escape the everyday world.

This is four star Georgette Heyer.

 

 

Cover comments: Cover on the first copy I ever read. Audio edition cover. Paperback I currently own. 

The Nonesuch

 

Georgette Heyer (read by Eve Matheson)

 

 

 

There is no one like him

This is one of those love stories that turns on a misunderstanding. The already rich and famous, though self-effacing Sir Waldo Hawkridge, The Nonesuch, has inherited a wreck of a mansion and has come to the country to inspect it. The love interest is the chaperone to a young termagant of an heiress. They meet, they get to know one another, he falls head over heels for the chaperone who slowly realizes she is in love with him. There is a misunderstanding just to spice things up and in the end they live happily ever after -- without the heiress, who is sent back to her guardian.

Folks, this is a four star Georgette Heyer -- delightful, enjoyable, fun to read, fun cast of characters thrown into all sorts of scrapes and folly.

The Masqueraders

 

By Georgette Heyer (read by Ruth Sillers)

A favorite comfort read for over 55 years

 

Set just after the Jacobite Rising of 1745, The Masqueraders is a rollicking romantic comedy along Shakespearean lines. After almost 30 years abroad, the banished black sheep of the family now heir to the family title returns home to claim it. He brings along his two children to witness his triumphant return. Well, actually, he sends them along ahead of his arrival, which is actually an issue because both father and son, were involved in the Rebellion -- on the wrong side --and there the story begins.

This has long been one of my favorite books. I don't care if the plot is unbelievable. The book is fun; you aren't supposed to take it seriously. Heyer's writing is a pleasure to read. She has a way with characters, especially the secondary characters, that can have you laughing out loud and she knows how to write a romance. Yes, there is a certain amount of formula to her writing and certain social prejudices that today we find unacceptable -- but if you are going to read books written in the middle of the 20th century, you are going to find that a lot of what was written then is unacceptable today -- so get over it. We can't change the past and we shouldn't erase it.

This is a four and a half star Heyer!