A refreshing change, the two brothers of the protagonist, Jessamy and Felix, which fall into any terminals repeatedly, especially the "technically inclined" Felix (today we would probably call him a nerd.)
But predictable and almost boring, I found just the main characters. The family beauty Charis, of course, again with gold blond curly hair, melting blue eyes, an amiable character and little brain - this type often encountered with Heyer. Then Lord Alverstoke, handsome, rich, athletic, of good family, accustomed to command, and to get his way; throughout the novel he discovered the joys of responsibility and deeper feelings - even a cliché, which here is quite nice that Alverstoke is changed mainly by Jessamy and Felix and not so much from the woman he learns to love.
Which brings us to the biggest annoyance for me the book: Frederica even a classic Heyer-heroine, but not very pretty, intelligent, self-confident and responsible.. So far so good, but the author is unable to breathe this person lives. It's almost too perfect, too predictable; Even as she turned her dog arrived in a pond behind jumps (passage: "One less courageous woman would not now ..."), her humor with which she laughs along with Alverstoke when he has to rescue them from this embarrassment; with these characteristics one recognizes them as "Original Heyer" and is almost bored.
But wait, it has a special feature that all Heyer heroines is not our own - an almost supernatural humility and selflessness. She thinks only of her family, especially to her beautiful sister, for she wants to thread a best possible match (this you do, after all, a spanner in the works, as they are in the beautiful and kind-hearted, but neither very clever nor wealthy Endymion in love). She wants her sister not let them decide themselves but holds them easily for too stupid, so they simply determined about their lives; they guarded Charis at every turn, but has no qualms about going with Alverstoke walk alone in the countryside or totally unaccompanied in central London; for they are allegedly different standards, since it holds no interest for old and for every man. Similarly casually it behaves with the rest of the family, for which she is responsible for her parents' death - not only do they look for from her older brother is no help or gives him responsibility from, makes him even later accusations that he so would have left alone.
Particularly unnerving is their incessant Emphasize their age due to which they referred to an old maid (she's 24!), So they some social conventions and restrictions simply ignored on the grounds that at her age she should no longer contain this and that ; and again, without bitterness, but almost triumphantly, she insists to be "left".
And above all, never, No, never, it would Frederica in the sense that Alverstoke could have falls in love with it! She's so old, she has more important things in mind than men, and also the beauty's Charis, do not they. The besieged by numerous charming beauties, rich and coveted bachelor Alverstoke is literally fall to the only woman he can not have - they do not want it because they do not get it, he could just find her!
Excuse me, but that is applied too thick decided. Frederica is after all a woman and desires is like any other (they also, otherwise they would not Alverstoke still recognize at the end as their loved ones); and because it is expected to last almost not believe he wants something from you? That's not modest or naive, it is implausible. After a while, it seemed to me almost as if Frederica a berechnendes woman who pretends to know nothing of the interest of a man at her to better wrap him around her finger until it has captured him in a promise of marriage.
Both main characters were me in this book therefore unappealing: Basically, they are a perfect match, both keep their fellows for superior and are convinced that it is their right to always get their way and ignoring the dignity as well as the wishes of others , That was probably not the intention of the author, but at least for me personally, I got that impression, causing me the book was almost spoiled. I have everything still good think about it in particular, if I keep it.
