Seven years after losing the love of his life to death, well-admired Corinthian Sir Gareth Ludlow is ready to find a wife. Not for love, mind you. Love isn't likely to strike his heart again, but because it is his duty and responsibility to settle down and produce an heir. Lady Hester Thale is quiet, sensible, a steady friend and long on the shelf at age 29. Surely she will be more then happy to escape her domineering family and settle for placid security with her friend Gareth. But Gareth doesn More...

Gary tries to help a capable but clueless, lying, runaway teenager. Frustrating first half. Very enjoyable last third.

STORY BRIEF:
17 year old Amanda runs away from home because her grandfather won’t let her marry Neil. Gary (who is 35) happens to see her at an inn and fears bad things may happen to her traveling alone like that. He is a good Samaritan who wants to keep her safe and return her to her home. She won’t tell him her name, but Gary thinks he could locate Neil if they go to London. Ama More...

The one where Gareth, on his way to propose a companionate marriage to Hester, rescues a runaway schoolgirl who's read too many romantical novels.

It's essentially the same set-up as The Foundling: a nobleman, in the process of contracting a marriage he isn't too enthusiastic about, finds himself saddled with a beautiful woman-child whose innocence he has to protect and a hotheaded youth who complicates matters with his impulsiveness. And I love both books, but I can't give either of them the to More...

Review Temporarily Removed.

This is not one of the Georgette Heyer novels which I re-discover on a regular basis. While I have read it on more than one occasion in the past, I have never considered it to be one of my favourites.

Listening to the novel on audiobook over the past couple of days, I wondered why I've not appreciated it more. Sure, it's rather silly. Sir Gareth Ludlow, handsome, rich and honourable, decides to protect the headstrong and shockingly untruthful teenage girl, Amanda, who has run away from home with More...

Final Rating 3-½ stars

If this story had been less about Amanda and her escapades, and more about Hester and Gareth, this would have rated 4 stars, for the ending alone. I love the way Heyer writes of mature love, deep attachment between two people who have known disappointment, and are too “wise” to think they will find true love again.

As for Amanda, she got to be quite annoying with her crazy antics. I despaired that the story would ever wind up to the hoped for conclusion. But, when Hester arr More...

The trouble with reading this immediately after reading Sylvester, or the Wicked Uncle, is that I am now confusing the two stories based on their remarkably similar premises. Eligible but unromantic bachelor goes to offer for a woman he is not in love with, finds himself rebuffed, must chase runaway(s). Even though the cases are completely different and the heroines widely dissimilar. Sprig Muslin contains Heyer's level-headed older hero, a hot-headed and melodramatic very young woman, and the l More...

I confess it true: I am such a noddycock that this is the first of the estimable Miss Heyer's trashy novels that I e'er did peruse. Dash it all, how was I to know she was a veritable caryatid of culture, a purveyoress of fine wordsmithing, an artiste?

Yeah, so she invented the Regency romance, or close enough to it. Yeah, she was an English homemaker. And by today's "so what did you smell like after you murdered those teenagers, Mr. Dahmer?" celebrity standards, she was a complete nonentity. Neve More...

Sprig Muslin is a light and funny Regency novel that showcases Georgette Heyer’s wit. I really enjoyed it and it made me laugh out loud several times! Sprig Muslin was first published in 1956, but the novel is set in 1813. The main action of the novel takes place in London, Chatteris (in the Fenland District of Cambridgeshire, England) and the roads in between.

This novel tells the tale of Sir Gareth Ludlow. His high spirited fiancée died in an accident many years previous to the start of the nov More...

A Regency romance with all the pathos and comedy that Heyer provides. Sir Gareth has finally comes to terms with his loss realizing that he must have an heir now that Arthur has been killed in the Peninsular War. Although he can never love anyone again, he does care for Hester Theale and so he sets out to honor her with his proposal.

Sir Gareth is considered a prize in the Marriage Mart so he doesn’t consider that he may meet with rejection. After all Hester has been on the shelf for years now. H More...

2.5 stars. First I will admit, I laughed a lot reading this. But it wasn't much of a romance. A secondary character, Amanda, an enterprising, shameless prevaricator creates confusion, difficulty and danger as she executes her 'plan of campaign' to run away from her strict general grandfather and marry her beaux. She also steals the spotlight from the lovers to be.

Amanda's collateral damage includes ruining a) the Corinthian hero's proposal to the shy, whimsical spinster heroine (Hester refuses h More...

This was a fun, fast read. It's written in the 1950's, but in the times of Jane Austen. It has a lot of humor in it, and I loved the language, she uses a lot more slang--phrases and terms I'd never heard of that were fun. Some of the characters were more developed than others, but the plot was good. Apparently, Georgette Heyer wrote several books in this style, and then also some more current mysteries. I enjoyed it enough to plan on reading some of her other books too.

I like Georgette Heyer's stories, and taking the time to insert one among heavier reading is like having dessert in the middle of a meal. This one has the flavor of P. G. Wodehouse in the sense that characters who embark upon deception of who they are and what they are doing or how they perceive what others are doing, create a tangle that makes the reader wonder if things can possibly get all straightened out in the end. It was masterfully engaging in this story. I felt there were more of the hu More...

Sir Gareth is a good man who lost the love of his life many years ago and now decides to marry though not for love (he doesn't believe that feeling could be repeated) but from respect and contentment with a friend like Lady Hester. Lady Hester is so surprised to learn that Sir Gareth would even consider her and resolves to turn him down. She'd rather be an old-maid. Sir Gareth arrives at her fathers door with a young beautiful woman named Amanda. Amanda was a run-away determined to make her gran More...

Heyer's regency romances are brilliant novels that will inspire you to laugh at her witty characters and charming storylines. If ever there is a day that I find myself cooped up in the house then picking up one of these novels will always perk me up.
I particularly liked the male protagonist in this novel, Sir Gareth, as he is older than his years and considers the female protagonist, Amanda, as one would consider a naughty child. In truth he is not that much older than her, but they are worlds a More...

The premise as reviewed recently on Dear Author caught my fancy: an eligible batchelor proposes to an old friend out of a mix of pity, resignation, and readiness to procreate; she rejects him as she loves him deeply and will not accept the imitation: http://dearauthor.com/book-reviews/ov... Heyer-style hijinks ensue and hero and heroine are thrown together, forcing the hero to reevaluate the true worth of the heroine.

Great premise.

Alas, I was almost 80% through the story per kindle before any re More...

I whooped with laughter, grinned the whole way through, and only yawned once reading this farce. Our hero Sir Gareth is on is way to propose to a nice Lady Hester who lets him weep over his One Lost Love, when he comes across a young lady in trouble. He brings Amanda along to his proposal - Hester refuses him - Amanda escapes from his interference - he has to save Amanda - Amanda escapes from his interference - he has to save Amanda - almost ad infinitum until each character meets his/her approp More...

I enjoyed this a lot -- it combined two of my favorite things from Heyer books, a charming young hoyden who gets into all sorts of innocent mischief, as well as a hero and heroine who are a little older and sadder and wiser, plus an intended marriage of convenience that turns out not to be a marriage of convenience afer all. One of the things I enjoyed about this is while we get all our madcap misadventures, Sir Gareth winds up falling in love with his old friend Lady Hester, who he relies on to More...

I think what I love most about this book is the outrageous manufacture of stories: fake histories, fake identities, shameless borrowing from novels to provide fake troubles.

7/4/2012: Undoubtedly my tastes will change over time, but as of right now, this is my favorite Heyer romance.

This is the first Georgette Heyer that I've read. I wasn't expecting it to be so funny, and like many other reviewers, I laughed out loud a few times. I thoroughly enjoyed the developing love story between Sir Gareth and Lady Hester, but quickly tired of immature Amanda's antics. I wanted the book to be more about Gareth and Hester. I enoyed the beautifully written descriptions of the countryside, room settings, and the supporting characters. It took a while to settle into the nuances of her sen More...

I'm not sure how accurate to the Regency period the text is, but it certainly feels more like reading Jane Austen than Sarah MacLean (The Season). Because of that, it took me a while to get into the groove of reading the story. I was also annoyed at first at how I thought the story was going to end up. But as I kept reading, I saw that it probably wouldn't go that way and so I was happier to keep reading.

I'm interested in checking out some other of Heyer's books, but they aren't necessarily the More...

The phrase that come to mind is " a comedy of errors". I can easily picture myself sitting in a theater watching these events on a stage.

Sir Gareth is on his way to propose marriage to Hester. He comes across Amanda, who has run away from her grandfather because he won't allow her marry a younger son, who happens to be a soldier.

Confused yet? Sir Gareth "drags" Amanda along for the proposal because he is trying to get info from her to get her back to her grandfather.

Amanda is full of schemes and More...

raudio
tbr busting
summer 2012
pub 1956 (what a good year)
regency romp
dandies/fops
fluffy
chick lit but not trash
3 M's



started 3/6/2012
Finished 4/6/2012

Read by the very lovely Siân Phillips and she is the very reason I enjoy Heyers on audio.




Clarissa is dead and after seven years the search is on for Gary to find a worthy and placid replacement in the betrothal stakes. Into the parade rink comes Lady Hester (29 y.o. *gasp*) and a much younger interloper. Farce ensues.


3* Regency Buck (1935)
3* The Talis More...

Surprisingly enough I have finally found a Heyer I did not enjoy! The audio book in itself was enjoyable because the person reading it made a great many voices for the various characters which was most amusing, except for Hester's voice which made her seem very insipid which I didn't like because she seemed to me more sensible then all the rest put together and esp in contrast with Amanda. Who it has to be said constantly got on my nerves with her ridiculous schemes. I suppose we were meant to e More...

Funny -- this has precisely the same plot as Charity Girl, the last Heyer I read. Two possible romantic interests, one a distractingly pretty, naive young girl of spirit, the other an aged lady of about 27 years old whom the hero regards as a friend but not so much a romantic prospect.

I liked this more than Charity Girl because Amanda (the naive young girl) is a lot more interesting than Cherry, and there was more development of the romance between the aged lady and the hero than there was in CG More...

The one complaint I have about Georgette Heyer, and it's fully exemplified in this book, is that she expends thousands and thousands of words on a story, only to end the tale with a stingy few. That always leaves me feeling cheated, and makes me feel as if the time spent reading her books, which I had previously enjoyed, was a bit of a waste.

Especially in this book, where you really wanted a highly in-depth resolution to a drawn-out affair, and you get a measly paragraph. And not even one kiss! More...

A remarkable book, Ms Heyer introduces you early on to the male character who you assume is the hero of the story and then to a young, beautiful female you take to be the heroine of the story. Just like in most Regency romances, you say? Quite correct. You follow the young heroine through increasingly unbelievable antics until about three-quarters through the book you find yourself getting fed up with her shenanigans only to have the older female you had cast in a supporting role steal the lead. More...