Her Royal Spyness Quotes

“They don't hang dukes, darling. He'd be let off by reason of insanity. Everyone knows the upper classes are batty.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“The words hot, lot, and got were not apart of a ladies vocabulary.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Is he one of us, or strictly NOCD? (Which, in case you don't know is shorthand for 'Not our class, dear'.)”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Ah, but it was your great-grandmother who went around subjugating half the world. Empress of all I survey, and all that. You must have that quality somewhere in your makeup."

"I've never had a change to subjugate anybody yet, so I can't really say," I confessed.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“When I venture to point out the unfairness of this, I am reminded of the second item on my list. Apparently the only acceptable destiny for a young female mem​b​er of the house of Windsor is to marry into another of the royal houses that still seem to litter Europe, even though there are precious few reigning monarchs these days. it seems that even a very minor Windsor like myself is a desirable commodity for those wishing a tenuous alliance with Britain at this unsettled time. I am constantly being reminded that is is my duty to make a good match with some half-lunatic, buck-toothed, chinless, spinele​s​s​​​, and utterly awful European royal, thus cementing ties with a potential enemy. My cousin Alex did this, poor thing. I have learned from her tragic example.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“There is nothing worse than speeches about someone you don’t know, made by someone you don’t know.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“There's nothing wrong with hunting, in its place. But there are many preferable occupations when in the presence of a young woman.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“It was the sort of weather for curling up with a good book beside a roaring fire. Unfortunately my sister-in-law, Hilda, usually known as Fig, was trying to economize and only allowed one log on the fire at a time. This was surely a false economy, as I had pointed out on several occasions. Trees were being felled by gales on a daily basis. But Fig had a bee in her bonnet about economizing. Times were hard everywhere and we had to set a good example to the lower classes. This example included porridge for breakfast instead of bacon and eggs and even baked beans as the savory after dinner one night. Life is drear, I wrote in my diary.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Castle Rannoch is not the most delightful spot at the best of times. It lies beneath an impressive black crag, at the head of a black loch, protected from the worst of gales by a stand of dark and gloomy pine forest. Even the poet Wordsworth, invited here during his ramblings, could find nothing to say about it, except for a couplet scribbled on a sheet of paper found in the wastepaper basket. From dreadful heights to lakeside drear
Abandon hope all ye who enter here And this was not the best of times. It was April and the rest of the world was full of daffodils, blossoms, and Easter bonnets. At Castle Rannoch it was snowing—not that delightful powdery stuff you get in Switzerland but wet, heavy, slushy snow that sticks to the clothing and freezes one in seconds. I hadn’t been out for days. My brother, Binky, having been conditioned to do so at school, insisted on taking his morning walks around the estate and arrived home looking like the abominable snowman—sending his son Hector, affectionately known as Podge, screaming for Nanny.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Georgie: ‘Besides, I want to wait for a man who really loves me.’
Darcy: ‘How do you know I don’t love you?’
Georgie: ‘Today maybe, but can you guarantee tomorrow?’”
(Page 152)”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Its not exactly the height of fashion, darling. You can get away with it, of course, but if I were to be seen in it at Cowes, bang would go my reputation."
I thought privately that her reputation had probably gone bang already.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“We crept to the phone and dialed 999,”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Belinda laughed. “Darling, if only true virgins were allowed a white wedding, church organists would die of starvation.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“When he learned that he’d lost what remained of his fortune, he went up onto the moors and shot himself with his grouse gun, although how he managed to do it has always been the object of speculation, my father never having been a particularly good shot.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“My father in turn had done his duty and married the daughter of a frightfully correct English earl. She gave birth to my brother, looked around at her utterly bleak Highland surroundings, and promptly died.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“I am Victoria Georgiana Charlotte Eugenie, daughter of the Duke of Glen Garry and Rannoch—known to my friends as Georgie. My grandmother was the least attractive of Queen Victoria’s daughters, who consequently never managed to snare a Romanov or a Kaiser, for which I am truly grateful and I expect she was too.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“And this was someone who only yesterday had proposed marriage to me. Like everything else at the moment, it didn’t add up.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Next thing we know you’ll be teaching Podge to say ‘mirror’ instead of ‘looking glass’ and ‘serviette’ instead of ‘napkin.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Castle Rannoch is not the most delightful spot at the best of times. It lies beneath an impressive black crag, at the head of a black loch, protected from the worst of gales by a stand of dark and gloomy pine forest. Even the poet Wordsworth, invited here during his ramblings, could find nothing to say about it, except for a couplet scribbled on a sheet of paper found in the wastepaper basket.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“So none of the young men we encountered during our season gave you hot pants for them?
Belinda! Your language.
I've been mingling with Americans. Such fun. So Naughty.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness