Cotillion

by Georgette Heyer

Reviewed by Margaret Donsbach

Cotillion is among the best of Heyer's classic Regency novels. Its heroine is a sheltered young woman who recklessly grabs for a smidgen of happiness after her miserly guardian launches a humiliating scheme to marry her to one of his nephews. When she was an orphaned child, the wealthy but pennypinching Mr. Penicuik, in an uncharacteristic fit of altruism, took her in and raised her. While not a blood relation, she has since been treated - and regarded herself - as a cousin to Penicuik's nephews. She has a weakness for only one of her cousins, the one who refuses to countenance Penicuik's scheme.

Although Heyer launched the "Regency romance" genre, her romances have little in common with so many today which revolve around a love interest's physique and sexy banter. Heyer's emphasize comedy over romance. If the finale of Cotillion is heartwarming enough to make readers reach for their handkerchiefs, the novel's chief delight is the tangle of potentially embarrassing scrapes Kitty gets herself into. Under the influence of a couple of small glasses of spiked punch, she inveigles one of her cousins against his better judgment into helping her spend a month in London. The scheme involves a certain amount of - well, dissembling, though Kitty hasn't a streak of unkindness in her character. Knowing nothing of city life, she is too naïve to realize what class of people one does and, in her circles, does not befriend, and she has too much heart to refuse help to a friend. The result is a web of misbegotten romantic attachments only a novelist with Heyer's plotting skill could shepherd to a happy ending.

Heyer knew the Regency period inside and out and lards her characters' dialogue with its slang. "Nice gudgeon I should look," one cousin protests. Readers who struggle with archaic language may find Cotillion is not for them; those who delight in it will find the novel delicious through and through. (1953, 355 pages in the recent Sourcebooks edition)

More about Cotillion at Powell's Books, Amazon.com or The Book Depository


Other Regency romances:

May 1812 by M.M. Bennetts (2009), about a man who must marry the bride designated in his late father's will or lose his fortune. See review or more info at Amazon.com

Seducing an Angel by Mary Balogh (2009), about a young woman wrongly branded a murderess and driven into destitution who comes to London to find a wealthy man she can tempt into taking her as his mistress; explicit sex; #4 in the Huxtable series. See review or more info at Powell's Books

The Duchess and the Dragon by Jamie Carie (2008), a Christian-themed Regency about a woman torn between two men. More info


Nonfiction about life in Regency England:

Georgette Heyer's Regency World by Jennifer Kloester (2005). More info

An Elegant Madness: High Society in Regency England by Venetia Murray (1999). More info

The Mirror of the Graces; or, The English Ladies Costume by "A Lady of Distinction" (1811). More info


Online:

Nancy Mayer, Regency Researcher, a site devoted to Regency rules, customs and culture

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