My Take in Brief: I am so sorry this is a category romance that has the typical lifespan of a gnat, because it deserves a wide audience.

Wine Pairing: In an effort to disclose subjective elements that may have shaped this review, I feel compelled to report that, in order to get in the mood for Parisian romance, I imbibed my first glass two bottles of this year’s Beaujolais Nouveau while reading this book.

Setting: Paris, July 1789, French Revolution, specifically the week that includes the formation of the 50,000 strong National Guard, armed with pikes, spears and whatever they could find, the storming of the Bastille, and the beginning of the “Great Fear”, as peasants revolt all over France.

Heroine and Hero: Pierce Cardew, Viscount Blackspur, former privateer captain, spy and smuggler, he’s handsome, honorable, brave, and kind. Melusine, recently widowed Comtesse de Gilocourt, a commoner married off by her imperious, cold father to a much older man, she is tired of serving as a pawn in men’s games and determined to become an independent woman.

Plot: Englishman Pierce (who speaks fluent French thanks to a French mother), poses as Pierre, a footman, to gain entrance to Melusine’s household. He is desperate to find and root out the blackmailer — perhaps Melusine herself– whose actions threaten his parents and siblings with disgrace or exile. Melusine learns early on that she is the subject of rumors, specifically, that her husband died, not in the course of a robbery, but during a duel fought with Melusine’s lover. She becomes determined to clear her name and discover the truth about her husband’s death in the process.

Series?: No. This is a Mills & Boon historical, published in 2007. It is not available in the US.

Distinctive Features: Two things set this book apart, other than how well it’s written. One, the setting. And two, the examination of class issues.

Word on the Web: Read Tumpkerkin’s excellent, if less enthisiastic, review here.

The Racy Romance Review: When I think of “category romance”, I think of contemporary. Laura Vivanco suggested I try a historical, and sent me this one. I am so glad she did. I thought it was great.

Here’s an excerpt from very early in the book. As a footman, Pierre must attend Melusine pretty much all the time, and I love romances in which the hero and heroine are together a lot. The footman’s duties include, FYI, doing hair:

“Men are callous, hypocritical beasts! Well, say something! Aren’t you going to say something?” She shoved his shoulder with the flat of his hand.

“Not all men, ” he said quietly.

“Oh no. You are here because you have to provide for your mother and sister. Have you got a husband all lined up for your sister? Someone to take her off your hands so you can return to your lover with a clear conscience?”

Pierre gripped her wrist in his hand. “Madame, the Duchesse was not my lover. Tell me why I should believe you don’t have a lover when you persist in believing that I do, despite the fact that I tell you it is not so?”

She caught her breath and then bowed her head. Her hair tumbled in disorder around her shoulders. He could see pins sticking out at odd angles. He released her wrist and began to gently untangle the pins, beads and remaining feathers from her hair.

She jerked her head up and gave a small squeak of pain when her hair pulled. “What are you doing?”

“You’re moulting,” said Pierce.

“Oh.” She lowered her head again and let him continue his ministrations. Once or twice she seemed to sway slightly towards him, almost as if she wanted to lean on him, but the movement was so subtle he couldn’t be sure his senses — or his own impulses — were not deceiving him.

There are several elements of this scene which I love:

1. Pierce has never done hair before — he’s a former smuggler and nobleman –  but rather than mine this for humor (the alpha male doing a feminine task, hardy har har!), Thornton keeps him in character: this guy is a perfectionist, whether it’s spying, mystery solving, dueling, lovemaking, or hair.

2. Humor — despite the dire personal and political circumstances, occasional injections of humor lighten the tone. They don’t take themselves too seriously.

3. Honesty — they speak to each other like the adults they are. This helps propel their relationship forward at crucial points throughout the book. These two get to know each other and slowly fall in love, facing new obstacles at each level of development, rather than butting up against the same old impediment over and over and over and over and over.

4. Reflection — Pierce doesn’t know how how to interpret her body language, and recognizes his own desires may be influencing him. These are reflective people — without being navel gazers — and we are treated to their genuine, tension producing uncertainty in interpreting their own and others’ motives.

This book works on many levels:

The relationship: Melusine, always protected and sheltered, has a lot of growing up to do, and does it. Pierce’s character arc is shorter but also important: he has to come to terms with his love for Melusine and the possibility that he may really be marriage material.

The mystery: I am no cracker jack mystery solver, it is true (I was the one who, three days after seeing the Sixth Sense, kept asking DH, “He was really dead?”). But I found the mystery compelling and its resolution tension-filled and satisfying.

The historical backdrop: I’m sorry to keep making cinematic references — I’ll have to read a lot more romances before I can stick to genre references — but the way the love affair and mystery were interwoven with these historically huge events reminded me of Casablanca.  Actually, I can make one genre reference: Outlander.  As the reader, you are put very much in the middle of events: Melusine looking out of her townhouse window, at crowds gathering in the square, Pierce going to the Bastille to interrogate a witness and being caught up in its storming.

Even psychologically, it’s connected: One example is that Pierce and Melusine both wonder if the intensity of their feelings has something to do with the extraordinary circumstances unfolding around them. In another, quite poignant, example, Melusine jurneys to her husband’s family’s country estate as the peasant uprising begins, and rips down some tapestries that represent her subordinate position to the men in her life.

I tend to think one important mark of literary greatness, even within genres, is longevity: there’s a reason we are still reading Jane Austen, Georgette Heyer, and Patricia Gaffney, for example. I may have to revise that assessment given how wonderful, but how ephemeral a cultural artifact, My Lord Footman proved to be.

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