Mid Victorian romance with an American journalist / typesetter / publisher who inherits a London print shop without realising it's collateral for an uMid Victorian romance with an American journalist / typesetter / publisher who inherits a London print shop without realising it's collateral for an unpaid debt, and aspiring novelist / lightly ruined lady. He has ten weeks to make a hundred pounds, she wants to be published, they agree to collaborate on the production of penny dreadfuls and fall in love while doing so.
I absolutely loved the penny dreadfuls aspect, it's a fascinating area of publishing and I'd have liked to lean in a bit more and have more fun with it though I felt a bit ??? about some of Belle's decisions, like resisting having cliffhangers instead of individual short stories (why did a man who isn't a writer have to tell her that?). I really enjoyed the print shop elements, and it's also very satisfying to see MCs who work for a living, and indeed who work together.
Ethan is a solid hero and the plot moves along at a good lick, but I wasn't entirely caught up in the romance. This may be because I was distracted by the need for Britpicking (London doesn't have a 'city centre', nicely brought up women did not casually toss around 'bloody hell' in 1848 et al) but also the book slightly wants to have its cake and eat it in terms of caring about/breaking social rules, Belle's family's social status etc. I kept quibbling things, and it took me out of the story, which just goes to show that being a quibbler is its own punishment....more
Overview of the British taste for true crime and crime novels. I say British: Worsley makes a big deal of how it's a super special national obsession Overview of the British taste for true crime and crime novels. I say British: Worsley makes a big deal of how it's a super special national obsession while not actually drawing comparisons with any other countries' taste for true crime and detective novels to indicate what makes it 'British'.
It's also a bit sloppy with a taste for random assertions and odd turns of phrase. My copy is dog eared with ??? notes. Points for the reference to 'William Coleridge', though at least it's not paired with Samuel Taylor Wordsworth. And mostly it just rubbed me the wrong way with the extremely dismissive attitude towards the subject matter. Worsley makes it clear that melodrama was shit and we clever moderns would now see it as absurd, public murder obsessions were creepy, most of the Golden Age writers weren't very good, etc etc, like we have to be told that she's more intellectual than this nonsense.
A shortish but very detailed account of the murder of Lord William Russell by his valet, and how it tied into the Jack Sheppard craze. I suspect your A shortish but very detailed account of the murder of Lord William Russell by his valet, and how it tied into the Jack Sheppard craze. I suspect your response to this will be entirely predicated on whether you just went "Amazing!" or "Who?" I found it fascinating, with absolutely masses of detail and specificity, but I am a Victorianerd, so I would. (I am also grateful that it acknowledges and even explains just how bad Jack Sheppard is because I've never been able to get past page 3, jfc.)
BTW the author goes on at some length about how hot Harrison Ainsworth was (not her opinion, that of the time) and I did a google image search and all I can say is: disappointing....more
A really interesting overview of some radical Victorian thinkers and activists, many now forgotten (publishers, vegetarians, anti vivisectionists, proA really interesting overview of some radical Victorian thinkers and activists, many now forgotten (publishers, vegetarians, anti vivisectionists, pro cremationists, socialist vicars) or half remembered (Besant and Bradlaugh) along with Josephine Butler, Keir Hardie and Francis Galton (radical ideas aren't always right, see also Florence Cook the spiritualist). Strong focus on women, pleasingly. It's revelatory as to the extremes of radical thought--many of those here would currently be considered rather left-wing and socially radical by the average US Democrat.
Well told with a few cracking jokes, though really needed a more thorough edit. Strongly recommended to everyone who bleats about "anachronism" in Victorian historical romance whenever they see women demanding jobs, votes, power, or satisfying sex (including outside marriage)....more
Solidly researched and written tale of Erebus, the ship used by James Clark Ross on his Antarctic expeditions, and then John Franklin on his doomed efSolidly researched and written tale of Erebus, the ship used by James Clark Ross on his Antarctic expeditions, and then John Franklin on his doomed effort at the North West Passage, plus its companion ship the Terror. It's a well presented and detailed serious narrative history, done something of a disservice by the over-promising blurbs that claim it's full of zizz and laughs. ...more
