The Reluctant Widow

[cimorene]

My voyage through Heyer continues with The Reluctant Widow! A more thorough review will be forthcoming when I have finished it, but I had to take a break because of sheer overwhelming delight. This book is filled with some of the best and wittiest Heyerian dialogue I have read, besides a somewhat suspenseful adventure plot, secret passageways, French spies, and a dog named Bouncer. The heroine (Elinor), the hero (Carlyon), the sidekick (the hero's youngest brother Nicky, rusticated from Oxford for capers involving a performing bear), and the villains (gouty Lord Bedlington and his son Francis) all number among the most delightful Heyerian characters I have yet encountered. Francis puts me in mind of my favourite Heyer character of all, Randall, from the murder mystery Behold, Here's Poison.

"Observe!" he said. "I should not say so, for it is an inspiration of my own, but really I am quite lost in admiration. Silver tassels, dear boy, not gold, thus delicately preserving the mourning-note. I shall wear black pantaloons for the ceremony, of course. I hesitated for long before I permitted Crawley to help me into these gray ones, for one would not wish to betray the least disrespect, but I think the relationship just remote enough to allow of my wearing them, do not you? I do flatter myself that my black neckcloth strikes precisely the correct note, however. Or do you think it makes me look like a military man?"

"No," said Nicky frankly. "Nothing could!"

"Ah, how delightful of you, dear boy! Really, you have so much relieved my mind!" Francis said, beaming upon him.