This is a story I normally wouldn't read. The fact that the book description contains the tedious and worn-out phrase 'star-crossed lovers' is nauseating. Just as bad, the cover of a novel once again does not reflect the characters who actually appear in the story - it even has the hair color wrong. Did the photographer not care? Did the author not notice? Or was some random stock cover selected without a second thought because no one really cared? Fortunately the last thing I do is judge a book by its cover.
Anyway, this story is of two women. The first is a wannabe astronmer named Lucy Muchelney, a lesbian at a time (1816) when modern readers believe that such proclivities were, if not exactly banned, denied and frowned upon. I think that's nonsense. No one back then cared enough about women to worry over what they were doing when alone together! Too many people believe that Queen Victoria said lesbianism never happened. Victoria said nothing of the sort and she had nothing to do with the religiously-obsessed British law banning homsexuality (between men) in 1885 - the penalty for which was to be locked-up with a bunch of men. Go figure. The fact is that Victoria was far from Victorian. She loved getting it on with her hubby, and lesbianism probably never crossed her mind.
In the story, Lucy's father has died and she's looking for an occupation. Her overly-protective brother is a nuisance, and her dearest love Priscilla has opted for respectable marriage, in which there is no room for dalliances with her female interest. Distraught and looking for escape, Lucy wangles her way into the Countess of Moth's patronage to engage herself in translating a French author's respected and voluminous treatise on Astronomy. She has the experience from working regularly with her father, himself a well-regarded astronomer, and her skill at math - and she speaks French well. The countess takes a chance on her, and as Lucy works on this project, and has daily encounters with Lady Moth, an attraction grows between them.
The novel is set in a very fictional milieu. Superficially it's regency England, but none of the people or societies mentioned in the novel really existed - to my knowledge. Some people who did exist and who ought to have merited a mention, do not appear. Newton seems to be the only historical person of any note mentioned for example. A less well-known but also noted scientist who was a woman, Caroline Herschel, goes unheralded. Although her star burned brightest before Lucy was born, you would think someone as erudite and up on the sciences as Lucy is portrayed, would have heard of her.
I guess the author didn't want to deal with all that, or risk maligning someone for no good reason, and this was fine with me in general, but for a novel that's trying to represent women, this seemed like a curious omissiol. I know the novel is ficiton, and generally I do not care if it's somewhat historically-inaccurate unless there are glaring errors. I detected none of those, but the lack of a shout-out for someone as accomplished as Ms Herschel seemed cruel.
I loved this book: the writing, the story, the whole idea of a woman scientist back then, and I loved how science and art were integrated, so I breezed through it - that is until the last few chapters, where apparently the author decided she had to toss a wrench - or in this case a spanner, since this is Britain after all! Or if I might make a play on words and deliver a little spoiler, a wench - into the works. To me this part was poorly-written. The only feeling of problematic writing I'd had prior to this was that at times the novel seemed to drag a little when it ought to have been striding forward, but that was a minor thing for me. Life did flow at a slower pace back then anyway!
This artificial crisis though was very badly-done and for a couple of chapters I was going to turn my view around and not rate this as a worthy read, but the author picked-up her frayed edges and stitched them into a decent seam before the end, so I decided not to cuff her. Yes, I made a pun. So sew me.... I can't let this go though without making a mention of this nonsensical hiccup to their relationship. It felt compeltely fake and so artificial that it seemed like a joke.
I don't know if it was the author's idea to add a 'ruffled feathers' bit, or if the publisher had demanded she toss in a problem so their life together wouldn't be quite so smooth, but for me there was no need for it. If she or the publisher honestly thought there was such a need, it ought to have been much better done: something more organic and not fake like this was. It needed to be tied to their homosexuality, not to some poorly-conceived misunderstanding that for me made the book seem like a poor Harlequin romance.
For me, the way it was done here made the two women look like shallow idiots who had no history together, and it spoiled that part of the story since it blew up from nowhere. It suggested that neither woman had any invesment in the other and was ready to ignore everything that had passed between them prior to this point. It made, as I said, no sense.
But the writing improved after that, and for me it turned the story around quite handsomely, so overall I feel like I can commend this as a worthy read.
