You did it! We figured this one out! It is a truth universally acknowledged (by me for certain) that the Bitchery pretty much knows everything, and really, it's true. Scroll down to see the solution for this HaBO - and many thanks!
Bitchery Reader Kaetchen writes:
I have been searching in vain for a book that I read when I was in 8th or 9th grade – so about 1985. I don’t believe that the book was new even when I read it, though. I spent the summer with my granny, and found the book at her house, and boy, was it a doozy (this said with Granny’s bathroom read of, “The Blow Job” taken into account – I am not shitting you!).
The plot, as best I can remember (and greatly reduced – this was a *hurkin’* great book):
Young girl is ravished by Prince Regent. Ends up marrying BIG dupe, and “adopting” her own baby by PR. Dupe Husband gets turned on when Young Mother lactates for the baby (you’d think that he’d have gotten clue from that?), thereby getting it on with mother, and providing twin half-brothers for little girl baby.
No, wait, it gets better.
Shit happens (financial ruin?) and Dupe takes off to America, not returning quickly enough for Dimwit Young Mother, who takes the now 12-or-so-year-old girl, dresses them both as lads (sigh), and buys them passage to America in search of Dupe. More shit happens (discovery, pirates, storms), and eventually girl winds up in Africa, as bride to tribal king’s son. Happily preggers, she ends up getting beaten by rival tribe, losing baby, almost dying, yadda, yadda, yadda.
Slavers come and steal her whole tribe, and she ends up… (here it’s fuzzy)?? In a harem?? YES! That’s it! She ends up in a harem, because she finds her mother there. Whatever. Several hundred pages of more shit happening, all the while determined to find her male family again.
I do know that she eventually ends up in the good ol’ USofA, falls in love with Random Guy. Despite this, she goes back to England, where Prince Regent falls for her, too (ew). There’s a third guy, too, I think in all of this, one of those ‘husband back from the dead’ sorts of things. WAY too many men to remember.
But the girl finds her twin brothers eventually, by way of a red-stoned ring that one of them has. Much rejoicing, and eating of Sir Robin’s minstrels ensues.
She eventually has to choose amongst her vast number of lovers/suitors (why, I don’t know), picks Random Guy (I think), moves to America, has surgery to repair uterine damage done by tribal beating (how convenient that she had birth control for all those years and all those men!), and promptly pushes out many sets of twins and triplets.
Now, even as a quite young woman, my shitemeter was way off the charts for this one. But the author actually claimed in her afterword that the whole story was true, taken from a bible and a diary that were found in the false bottom of a cradle that she found in the attic of an old house. Uh-huh. Riiight.
I could have sworn that the book was named “Elise” after the heroine, but I’ve searched that name and come up with nothing. If any at the bitchery could help, I’d dearly love to see if this book is as gawdawful as I remember.
Holy cowpokes, Batman. That’s just tripe inside a crunchy taco shell of holy shit. Somebody know what this book is?
Elise by Sara Reavin
http://tinyurl.com/2h2f56
How do you people remember these things?
I was going to say that it surely had to be by Bertrice Small, but no? It must be her long-lost twin.
Now I have to go read this, preferably with a drink at hand.
And my word is “came54”. *snerk*
Lara stole the words right out of my mouth – I was utterly convinced this was going to be a Bertrice Small book.
oh and btw ‘shitemeter’? Love it.
Not Bertrice Small? Color me stunned.
I think the HaBO synopses are far more entertaining than many entire books. Especially this one.
“Several hundred pages of more shit happening…” really cracked me up because what writer hasn’t wanted to put this in a synopsis?
I think I want the Bitchery to write my next synopsis, because God knows, ‘several hundred pages of shit happening’ is about as far as I’ve got.
Oh…my verification word is ‘perform69’. No, it really is.
Almost unanimous, sounds similar to the last/only Beatrice Small I read.
And I was thinking Bertrice Small too. So that means there is more than one author writing this kind of – well – tripe?
Holy Scheiße.
…
That is one cool granny.
Wow, that sounds like someone condensed the entire 11 or 12 volumes of the Angelique series into one.
Great synopsis.
I am tempted to read this book myself, very tempted. I know it will induce headaches but the laughter may be worth it. Maybe Beatrice Small wrote it under a pseudonym?
Wait, it had an author note that “the whole story was true”? You sure it’s not a Cassie Edwards?
Um, how is she getting ravished by the Prince Regent (born in 1762, Regent in 1811) and then moving to the American Revolution (1776)? He’s only 14 by the start of the American Revolution, and I know he was precocious, but really….historical accuracy much?
Jumpin’ waffles and grease, have you read the synopsis from the link?
Dang.
I cannot believe that someone beside Ms. Small did this to us.
“Raised in the shelter of a great English estate. Ravished into womanhood by the Prince Regent himself. And thrust with no defenses but her beauty, body, brains into a world of upheaval where a woman alone was a prize to be savagely seized. Here is a saga that moves from the corrupt courts of Europe to the primitive passions of darkest Africa, from the scented seductions of the Caribbean to the burning fervor of the American Revolution, from the terror of Paris running red with blood to the pleasures of a lovers’ paradise safe for a brief blessed time from the surging waves of violence. An unforgettable heroine who wanted it all, dared it all, and did it all—Elise.”
There’s the blurb from YesterdaysMuse.com. My brain hurts! Nice one-shot-kill, Egads!
Really? That’s the only part that’s tripped your historical accuracy button? 😀
That’s just tripe inside a crunchy taco shell of holy shit.
You do have an excellent turn of phrase, Sarah. You should write a book. Oh wait…
They sure don’t write books the way they used to. Or if they do, I don’t want to know about it. Uterine surgery in that age??? She’s lucky to have survived herself let alone reproduced! My great-grandmother used to read HQ Presents and guarded them jealously. Oh the books I missed out on in my youth!
“Ravished into womanhood by the Prince Regent himself.”
Pass the sick bag!
You women crack me up.
But the girl finds her twin brothers eventually, by way of a red-stoned ring that one of them has. Much rejoicing, and eating of Sir Robin’s minstrels ensues.
The poor Minstrels! Or; Oh those lucky Minstrels! (This made my morning it made me laugh a bunch)
False bottom of a cradle?
>>Much rejoicing, and eating of Sir Robin’s minstrels ensues. <<
A++ for seamless use of Monty Python reference.
As for the book… words fail.
… wow. With a side order of holy whafuck, Batman! And the icing on the cake came from the official blurb itself—“a woman alone was a prize to be savagely seized”! Sweet savage tripedreck FTW!
Day-umn! The Bitchery rocks.
Thanks, Egads. I would have sworn on my mother’s grave, if she had one, that that damn book was called ‘Elise,’ but I couldn’t find it anywhere.
And Elizabeth, I don’t know that I would have called my granny cool – if she’d been rich, she would have been called eccentric – as it was, she was just nuckin’ futz, but in a good way. I mean, what other little girls had dress-up clothes like this at their grandmas’ houses?
http://www.pinkgirlvintagelingerie.com/product.php?key=1000294
Mine had more ruffles, though. Sexxxxy… kind of…
I HAVE to read this book…
longer 73
I thought Angelique as well. Those Golons could write.
Remember the wolverine?
OMG, I swear I’ve read at least some of that book – either that, or some other book with big chunks of the same plot – that stuff about being ravished, adopting her own kid, the dupe husband getting hot for lactation and fathering twins, mother and daughter dressing as boys and going to colonial America, looking for missing brothers, and bearing lots of twins and triplets at the end – reading this was like having a romance novel acid flashback. Except I have zero recollection of the African stuff, or the harem, so now I’m wondering if maybe there’s yet *another* book with the same over-the-top plot elements! Or maybe I just couldn’t bear it, stopped reading, and skipped to the end! LOL I just found this site, btw, and it’s awesome!