RogerBW's Blog

The Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics, Olivia Waite 05 July 2024

2019 Regency romance. Lucy Muchelney has lost her lover to a socially advantageous wedding, and her brother has no time for her interest in astronomy (fired by her late father). One of father's correspondents is looking for someone to translate a French astronomical treatise…

And that correspondent turns out to be Catherine St Day, widow of an explorer and botanist, who had expected to sink into a quiet retirement but finds herself thorughly bored with country life. Sparks fly, but each woman has strong opinions and preferences, and the world is not going to be kind to either of them.

There are no Big Misunderstandings here, hurrah; there are onstacles on the path to happiness, certainly, but they seem both like things that these people would reasonably do and like things that they would be able to overcome for the sake of their relationship. I can believe in them as a couple with a future even after the excitement of bedding wears off.

This isn't a sanitised world; there's plenty of prejudice against women actually doing anything other than getting married (if rather less skin-colour racism). But at the same time these are heroines who prevail in spite of that, and in spite of having to keep their relationship secret. A pleasant touch is Catherine's initial happiness that since it can't end in marriage she won't be tied to Lucy, shifting to fear because since it can't end in marriage Lucy won't be tied to her

Definitely recommended, and I plan to read more in the series.

[Buy this at Amazon] and help support the blog. ["As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases."]

Series: Feminine Pursuits | Next in series: The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows

Comments on this post are now closed. If you have particular grounds for adding a late comment, comment on a more recent post quoting the URL of this one.

Search
Archive
Tags 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 3d printing action advent of code aeronautics aikakirja anecdote animation anime army astronomy audio audio tech base commerce battletech beer boardgaming book of the week bookmonth chain of command children chris chronicle church of no redeeming virtues cold war comedy computing contemporary cornish smuggler cosmic encounter coup covid-19 crime crystal cthulhu eternal cycling dead of winter doctor who documentary drama driving drone ecchi economics en garde espionage essen 2015 essen 2016 essen 2017 essen 2018 essen 2019 essen 2022 essen 2023 existential risk falklands war fandom fanfic fantasy feminism film firefly first world war flash point flight simulation food garmin drive gazebo genesys geocaching geodata gin gkp gurps gurps 101 gus harpoon historical history horror hugo 2014 hugo 2015 hugo 2016 hugo 2017 hugo 2018 hugo 2019 hugo 2020 hugo 2021 hugo 2022 hugo 2023 hugo 2024 hugo-nebula reread in brief avoid instrumented life javascript julian simpson julie enfield kickstarter kotlin learn to play leaving earth linux liquor lovecraftiana lua mecha men with beards mpd museum music mystery naval noir non-fiction one for the brow opera parody paul temple perl perl weekly challenge photography podcast politics postscript powers prediction privacy project woolsack pyracantha python quantum rail raku ranting raspberry pi reading reading boardgames social real life restaurant reviews romance rpg a day rpgs ruby rust scala science fiction scythe second world war security shipwreck simutrans smartphone south atlantic war squaddies stationery steampunk stuarts suburbia superheroes suspense television the resistance the weekly challenge thirsty meeples thriller tin soldier torg toys trailers travel type 26 type 31 type 45 vietnam war war wargaming weather wives and sweethearts writing about writing x-wing young adult
Special All book reviews, All film reviews
Produced by aikakirja v0.1