A review by roseice
The Black Moth by Georgette Heyer
4.0
This was... kind of delightful. Unexpectedly delightful. My first impression was this: This writing style is so strange. One thing I dislike is how the narrative constantly uses different titles to refer to characters, and then other characters do as well. So Richard Carstares is Carstares, Richard, and Dick. At least for the narrative keep things consistent! But alas, mid-paragraph we're constantly switching between povs, so you're never 100% sure whose head we're in, and usually this annoys me, but the narrative is so distant to begin with it isn't a huge problem here.
Fortunately, my early hesitations didn't bear the dry and slow book I was expecting. This book is delightful. Charming dialogue makes for colourful and interesting characters. There's basically no story here; it's just the characters. Just the sort of thing I love. The dynamic between characters is flawless executed, and almost all the interactions are interesting, if not ridiculous and thus entertaining. I love well-written dialogue, and even if they're just talking, I found the way things were worded so clever and enjoyable that I got lost in the conversations all the same. Cripes, I love the way the characters speak here. And in many historical novels.
I liked how the character interactions came together, too. At first, Lavinia and Richard are nauseating, but they come to such a satisfying end that I found myself falling in love with them. Oh, man. Jack and Diana are as cliched a couple as they come, but I didn't hate them. Don't get me started on Tracy. He was a super cheesy villain, but he spoke so well that I found myself forgiving all that.
Yes, this was a ridiculously delightful read.
It always frustrates me when I hear an author wrote a book like this when she was in her teens. Fifteen! Wow. Compared to what *I* was writing at fifteen, this is a masterpiece. How decidedly irritating.
Fortunately, my early hesitations didn't bear the dry and slow book I was expecting. This book is delightful. Charming dialogue makes for colourful and interesting characters. There's basically no story here; it's just the characters. Just the sort of thing I love. The dynamic between characters is flawless executed, and almost all the interactions are interesting, if not ridiculous and thus entertaining. I love well-written dialogue, and even if they're just talking, I found the way things were worded so clever and enjoyable that I got lost in the conversations all the same. Cripes, I love the way the characters speak here. And in many historical novels.
I liked how the character interactions came together, too. At first, Lavinia and Richard are nauseating, but they come to such a satisfying end that I found myself falling in love with them. Oh, man. Jack and Diana are as cliched a couple as they come, but I didn't hate them. Don't get me started on Tracy. He was a super cheesy villain, but he spoke so well that I found myself forgiving all that.
Yes, this was a ridiculously delightful read.
It always frustrates me when I hear an author wrote a book like this when she was in her teens. Fifteen! Wow. Compared to what *I* was writing at fifteen, this is a masterpiece. How decidedly irritating.