Squee from the Keeper Shelf is a new feature wherein we share why we love the books we love, specifically the stories which are permanent residents of our Keeper shelves. Despite flaws, despite changes in age and perspective, despite the passage of time, we love particular books beyond reason, and the only thing better than re-reading them is telling other people about them. At length.

If you’d like to submit your reasons for loving and keeping a particular book for Squee from the Keeper Shelf, please email Sarah!

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I came to romance literature late in life. At the advanced age of sixty-seven in fact. For years I sashayed past the drugstore book racks smirking at the titles and cover art while thinking to myself in decidedly superior tones: Well, at least I don’t read that tripe.

It was only recently that I remembered that my mother-in-law’s stuffed tripe was absolutely delicious.

Then in the winter of 2014, after fifty years of devouring English literature leavened with enormous dry-as-dust tomes of history and political economy, a girlfriend (yes, we septuagenarians have girlfriends) who had repeatedly twitted me about my narrow literary tastes sent me a link to a blog post by New Zealand fantasy author, Tansy Rayner Roberts. It had the beguiling title: The Feminist Rake and Other Bedtime Stories.

Well, hellfire. I was immediately sold. In short order I burned my own eReader white hot as I cut a non-stop swath through the canon for over two years. I started with Heyer, Dare, James, Quinn, Balogh, Chase, Grant, Milan and McLean. Then I went on to just about everything else I could purchase or download from my local library network, particularly works that garnered favorable reviews and featured non-standard heroines and beta heroes.

As Roberts writes, “This stuff is pure corseted crack.” Indeed it is.

I favored historicals from the outset. I did dip a toe in the water of contemporaries, but quickly lost interest due to what seems to me a tendency towards sit-commery and, of course, an overabundance of billionaires. Then there are all those military heroes. Navy Seals, Special Forces? These are utterly anti-catnip for me. I mean, c’mon, you older ladies at least. I’ve participated in countless anti-war demos and actions over the course of my life and let me tell you, the boys in the Smedley Butler Brigade (New England branch of Veterans for Peace) are hot. [Note: These vets understand that war is a racket, as their progenitor, the highly decorated general with the arresting name of Smedley Darlington Butler wrote. His tract War is a Racket  written in 1935 is an anti-war classic. Come to think of it, a character based on the good General would make a cracking romance hero.]

I also tried the fantasy/romance genre. Oh, the world building! I do admire the effort expended in constructing intricate fantasy worlds, but wonder at the time and effort wasted when the real world—right now, today—contains a rich cast of human ogres, demons and vampires ravening with impunity and who deserve to be fictionally vanquished. (Aya de León’s Uptown Thief, a creditable first book in her contemporary Justice Hustlers series, is written exactly in this spirit. I mean, justice hustlers, what more could you ask for?)

I do have issues with historicals as well but as an old history major I am more forgiving in that regard. Still after more than two years of Regency immersion I began to grow more selective about what I would countenance. Now as soon as I download a new title I search for the word “sculpted”. If it shows up even once, the title becomes a DNS, i.e. Did Not Start.

Perhaps I am being overly picky but at my age I’d rather not waste time reading stuff I know will piss me off. And the word “sculpted” as a male descriptor is a complete non-starter for me. Was the entire male membership of the English gentry into body building? I’d wager that the majority of Regency aristo blokes were far more likely to be apoplectic, paunchy and riddled with gout (or worse) from overindulgence in rich and licentious living. They were the one percent of their day after all.

Then late last spring after reaching the literary equivalent of the post-Halloween candy overload phase I took a break and started on the fabulous Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan series. But just as I was sinking into the doings of Lila and Lenù, I had the great good fortune to meet and fall madly in love with a fictional character who I personally consider the ultimate Regency romance hero—Silas Mason, bookseller and seditionist.

All the fictional heroes I had lusted after over the years were instantly forgotten. Sam Vimes, Dr. Francis Arabin and Mr. Darcy, who on earth are they? And I blush to confess that I had no idea what M/M signified when another girlfriend, knowing my proclivities, recommended A Seditious Affair late last spring.

And by proclivities I mean political proclivities.

So Silas Mason. He’s a foul-mouthed guttersnipe bookseller of radical political philosophy on the high road to fifty. Happily, there is no way he could ever be described as sculpted. In his spare time he writes radical or “seditious” pamphlets pseudonymously. Sedition seems such a quaint word, little used in these parlous times. I suppose today Silas would be labeled dismissively as a social justice warrior or, worse still, put on a watch list and booted off airplanes.

Silas Mason has done time. His back is heavily scarred from floggings by the authorities. His knees hurt. He’s feeling his age. But for all that he’s not only a street fighting bravo (he owns a cudgel!) but also an autodidact with a lively, inquiring mind and deep interest in politics, philosophy and literature, most particularly William Blake whose poetry Charles weaves beautifully into the narrative. Silas has been dedicated non-stop to the fight for the radical cause since he was sixteen using both his fists and pen. And despite imprisonment, torture and defeats Silas still can growl, “We haven’t won yet, but the cause ain’t lost. Never will be.”

Be still my heart.

Silas has convictions. He has principles. To someone like me, an unrepentant child of the sixties, having principles and actually sticking to them over a lifetime is beyond sexy. These days, according to Oxfam, just sixty-two individual living human beings own assets that equal those held by the poorer half of the entire world’s population. (3) That’s about the number of people who were guests at my daughter’s wedding. And we fit them comfortably in a large parlor and dining room barely any jostling at all, even during the raucous knees-up.

Moreover, that number was just as scandalous at 338 in 2010. That’s a precipitous drop in just six years. The concentration of wealth these days is approaching the levels in Regency England, which should have resonance with historical romance readers and authors.

So here comes Silas Mason, bulling his way into the narrative, advocating universal suffrage, workers’ rights, gender equality, sexual freedom, the abolition of both slavery and the monarchy and sharing the wealth that the aristocracy has monopolized into their own hands. He writes scathing political tracts that he prints in his bookshop basement. He watches out for the poor folks in his street and wields his cudgel on their behalf. He has been imprisoned for his principles. His scarred back is proof that he has put his principles on the line. And the Home Office is hot on the trail of Jack Cade, Silas’ nom de plume.

But Silas has fallen inconveniently in love with Dominic Frey, gentleman Tory. After a year of trysts which included not only hot bedsport but equally hot political and literary argument they still have not exchanged personal information. Naturally, Frey works for the Home Office which was roughly the Regency equivalent to the FBI slash NSA. And in addition to trying to bring down Jack Cade, the HO and is engaged in a COINTELPRO style operation against a radical group with whom Silas is loosely affiliated.

Frey’s colleague has cooked up a sting operation against the Spencean Radicals using an agent provocateur, a method beloved of intelligence agencies through the ages. Frankly, I did not find it particularly plausible that Dominic was ignorant about the goings-on in his own department so his prissy chagrin at discovering such “un-English” behavior seemed a little contrived. But needs must when the plot drives.

Speaking of needs, Dominic Frey (Dom to his friends) has needs. Needs that drove the pompous, moralistic love of his life away in disgust and sent Dom into the back alleys seeking the sort of release he cannot do without. Lord Richard bloody Vane (as Silas calls him) is Dom’s boyhood friend and ex-lover and the pair of them still moon after one another, silently bemoaning their lost love. Poor Dominic is wallowing in Lord Richard-induced guilt, feeling that he is the cause of the grand affair’s failure because of his “filthy needs”.

Lord Richard, for his part, is the eponymous head of the Ricardians, a select group of rich gentlemen who like gentlemen who are also rich. An alpha one-percenter, Lord Richard has wealth, physical size and an overabundance of authoritarian pomposity that makes him their unquestioned leader and protector. In one of the best (of many) scenes Silas has, he accuses Lord Richard to his face of having hagridden Dom for years, making him ashamed and insecure. The Ricardians witnessing this scene fairly blanch at his audacity.

Actually, to my mind any scene Silas appears in is riveting. I subsequently read the other books in the Society of Gentlemen series by Charles and they are all extremely well crafted and certainly engaging, But I had been spoiled; the only parts that really lit up for me were when Silas barges in for a cameo. His thoughts, dialog and actions enliven the prose whenever he turns up. The rest of the Ricardians are pretty much…well…navel gazers, tortured by what I believe are today called “first world problems”. [Note: I lived many years in the third world, speak a language spoken in many third-world countries fluently and can confirm that most of the problems of the first world can’t hold a candle to those faced every single fucking day in the third.]

Because of Lord Richard’s inability to empathize with his ex-lover, Dominic has careened wildly off script, much to the dismay of Lord Richard and the rest of the Ricardians. In order to engineer a safer and more acceptable way for Dom to satisfy his needs, Lord Richard sends Cyprian, his crafty valet/fixer, to arrange matters for the desperate Dom.

And so it comes about that Silas is recruited by his friend Jonathan Shakespeare to “take a turn” at the needy Tory in the relatively protected milieu of Millay’s, a men’s assignation house which is run by Jonathan’s sister, Zoe. Silas shrugs and agrees to have a go.

Here I must say that I would have loved to see Jonathan and Zoe, old friends of Silas and the children of an ex-slave, along with Will Quex (born Susannah) who runs Quex’s gambling house with Jonathan, play much greater parts than they were given. Like Silas, Mistress Zoe steals the scenes wherever she is featured. When the police raid Millay’s she deflects them with hilarious quick thinking to Dominic’s considerable chagrin. Along with Silas, they were by far the most interesting characters in the book although I have a grudging affection for the aristo Julius and his acid tongue. I live in hope that Charles might favor us with future books featuring the three non-aristocrats.

As the Silas/Dominic relationship unfolds it is clear that it is Silas who has the superior capacity for empathy as well as acute political analysis. Frey is a hide-bound prisoner of his class. Their private actions in the bedroom qualify them for the pillory or gallows under the laws of the day, yet Frey never wavers in his unquestioning support for the might of his class and the State apparatus as well as the inviolable dignity of the “fat slug” of a Regent. Silas feels that what people do in private is no business of the State, telling Dominic flatly, “I don’t bow to unjust law.”

Once again, be still my heart.

As Dominic continues to fret, he is coming to understand that his attraction to the Radical is precisely because of Silas’ unquestioning acceptance of him as he is. Over time, their weekly assignations are deepened emotionally by a shared love of books, literature and spirited arguments over the ideological divide. Their Wednesdays together become an occasion that they look forward to with an anticipation that is not entirely sexual, much to the puzzlement of the other Ricardians. Silas and Dom soon realize that they cherish an unarticulated love for each other. True to character, Silas finally makes the first move in that regard.

K.J. Charles develops their relationship beautifully. There is a silent joke or perhaps social commentary threading throughout the book over Mr. Dominic Frey’s nickname. Although Dom is most definitely not a dom in the bedroom, outside of the boudoir the power of his wealth and class make him absolutely dominant over Silas in every way as the story makes utterly clear.

The social and sexual tension caused by this dichotomy is intensely erotic at times and at others quite tragic. The juxtaposition of their respective social classes is what, within the framework of the romance genre, allows Charles to deliver a vivid picture of a political and economic reality that uncomfortably mirrors what is happening these days.

Silas is entirely non-judgmental in sexual matters, unlike Dom’s priggish ex, and he is happy to run the show in the bedroom. Although Dom’s preferences were not entirely to his taste at first, he has learned to like them for the sake of his lover and, deep down, possibly enjoys a frisson in making a member of the ruling class dance to his tune. Possibly the sexiest snippet of dialog in the book is when Silas snarls, “On your knees, Tory.”

Silas does a lot of growling and snarling. This is an absolute delight to an old lady who does a fair amount of snarling herself.

Nevertheless, Silas is firm on his own boundaries, particularly with regard to scourging devices. Memories of his incarceration and torture cannot be subdued and together the two men work out how to get on in and out of bed in a way that satisfies them both. Silas soon finds that Blake’s “mind forg’d manacles” are just as effective as any sex toys provided by the estimable Mistress Zoe.

The famous Blake poem “The Clod and the Pebble” is a recurring motif throughout the narrative.

“Love seeketh not itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care,
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell’s despair.”

So sung a little Clod of Clay
Trodden with the cattle’s feet,
But a Pebble of the brook
Warbled out these metres meet:

“Love seeketh only self to please,
To bind another to its delight,
Joys in another’s loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heaven’s despite.”

Like all good poetry, Blake’s succinct description of relationship dynamics can be applied in multiple situations, be they relational, sexual, emotional, economic or social. Silas turns Dom on to Blake (as we used to say back in the sixties) and Dom eventually finds himself reciting Blake at Lord Richard who recoils in horror and begs Dom to cease quoting “that lunatic” at him. Lord Richard, you see, is one of nature’s own pebbles, seeking only “self to please and bind another to its delight” and thereby creating hell for poor Dominic. (Lord Richard has major pebble issues in his own book, next in the series.)

When the plot arrives at a crisis with a Home Office raid on Silas’ bookshop, Dom frets to Richard that he is sure that Silas won’t inform on them, but his words seem hesitant. He hasn’t quite developed the complete personal loyalty to Silas that Silas has for him, in spite of his political affiliation. Whereas when Silas growls, “I don’t inform….some of us have principles,” you bloody well believe him.

Moreover, the Silas-Dom relationship is enriched immeasurably due to the way it is situated squarely within an era of political turbulence and, quite frankly, open class warfare. I absolutely adore socio-economic context but too often the genre skirts these depths, using instead fashion, balls, come-outs, Almack vouchers and wafer thin slices of ham at Vauxhall as poor substitutes. To my mind, those things are stage dressing, pretty enough and lots of fun too, but they do not constitute context. To be sure, a good deal of research is required to incorporate meaningful socio-economic and political elements effectively into the story. Charles makes the effort and it shows.

A word about the Ricardians. Since sodomy was a hanging offence in the late Regency, their banding together as a sort of protective affinity group is quite rational. But membership in the Ricardians is drawn from a single class, the upper one. Even after the final crisis, Silas is excluded from Ricardian gatherings. Lower class sodomites were on their own in the face of the harsh laws of the time. No comfortable identity politics greased with wealth were available to save them from the drop of the gallows trapdoor.

Kurt Vonnegut once wrote that “there is no reason good can’t triumph over evil, if only angels will get organized along the lines of the mafia.” The Ricardians are themselves a virtual mafia within the larger mafia of the aristocratic one percent. They take care of each other and when danger strikes and Silas is entrapped, the group swings into action to first and foremost protect “their own” — that is, Dominic Frey and Lord Richard’s newfound nephew Harry Vane (who was pretty much raised by Silas), both who could be implicated by Silas’ prosecution. Silas’ ultimate rescue is merely a byproduct of Ricardian measures to protect card-carrying members Dom and Harry. The utter incompetence and failure of the plot devised by the desperate, infiltrated, rag-tag band of Spenceans, who most definitely do not qualify as a mafia by any stretch of the imagination, stands in stark contrast.

And Silas, bless him, once he is sprung by the Ricardians (who, he observes, “lied like a pack of knaves”) grumbles and snarls and looks forward to the day when he can reconstitute his bookshop and get back to writing for the struggle. Dominic tries mightily to dissuade him but finally accepts that the essential Silas is not going to change.

This brings me to an observation about the genre that I have arrived at thanks to Silas. Don’t get me wrong, I love the genre but let’s face it, it has a tendency to be enamored with the one percent, whatever the historical period. Mesmerized by wealth. The billionaires, industry magnates and aristocracy with their money, their ease and all their accoutrements.

Servants and the lower classes, if they appear at all, usually hover in the background and are rarely fleshed out to my satisfaction. I have a running argument with those girlfriends who accuse me of being a wet blanket with my nagging political critiques. “But it’s supposed to be fantasy,” they counter, “why ruin it with chatter about, you know, injustice, the poor, and issues?” (That last word is usually said as if it is being picked up with tongs.)

And besides, they continue, the genre has progressed and now does a great job of portraying strong female characters! It has moved boldly away from what I understand is referred to as Old Skool format and deals openly with all sorts of problems— racism, learning disabilities, eating disorders, physical disabilities, PTSD, LGBT, spousal abuse, women’s suffrage and so forth. Indeed it does and this is all to the good.

But those classifications exist not in a vacuum but in a greater societal and economic context which I personally would like to see referenced more organically in setting and plot construction. Real, gritty context is my catnip. But too often in the genre—outside of the ballroom, boardroom and estates—the social context tends to be thin on the ground. K.J. Charles has struck a blow with my beloved Silas and yes, I suppose Dominic too, although quite frankly I don’t think he deserves Silas.

I have found some tales outside of the one percent. Rose Lerner has created some great pairings at the fringes of the Ricardian classes. The shabby genteel widow Phoebe, irritable in her leaky flat, churning out moralistic potboilers, hooks up with physically disabled war veteran Nick disowned by his aristocratic family. Mr. John Fussypants Toogood the butler and Sukey the slapdash housemaid are unforgettable as they work all the hours in the week for a measly half day off and torrid nights on a pallet.

Beverly Jenkins’ hardworking heroines and heroes struggle and triumph in spite of the considerable historic weight of racism and slavery. Now here is an enormous hunk of economic reality that has underwritten (literally) the history of the “West” for more than three hundred years and is rarely referenced in the historical romance genre although slavery powered the economies of the Regency, helped to fund the excesses of the aristocracy and, augmented by ongoing colonial plunder, was the prime driver of the enormous accumulation of capital that occurred in Britain and the United States between 1600 down to the present day (cf. The Half Has Never Been Told by Edward Baptist for some extremely difficult yet eye-opening reading in this vein).

Hell, British slave-owning families were even compensated when the trade was finally outlawed. Billions of taxpayer pounds by today’s value were paid out by the government to compensate families for losing the privilege of kidnapping, selling and exploiting other human beings. This is some heavy and important context, not often referenced in historicals and the genre is poorer for it.

So many congratulations to K.J. Charles proving that it can be done. Romance can incorporate meaty socio-economic and political context into the story-telling. And the resulting tale can be riveting and most definitely hot.

Postscript: I have just finished K.J. Charles’ A Private Miscellany (coda to the Society of Gentlemen series, written to “tie up the loose ends”), a short work which is composed of a series of letters between members of the Ricardians, as well as by gang outlier Silas Mason. True to all his appearances everywhere in the series, my dear Silas dominates. No pun intended.

Postcript 2: Oxfam updated its global wealth-to-poverty stats shortly after this review was completed. They now tell us that during the past year the number of people who control assets equivalent to the poorest half of the world’s population has shrunk drastically from 62 to just eight men, a full six of them Americans. That is just eight lousy pebbles which can be fit easily in a golf cart, as the Guardian reporter notes. Think on it.

Grade: A in spite of a godawful cover. Who is that young preppy dude on the bed? It’s clearly neither Silas (who I see as a sort of Bob Hoskins with hair and a five o’clock shadow) nor Dominic (possibly Alan Bates with a perm). But both of those wonderful actors are dead now, which dates me completely.

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A Seditious Affair comes from JAM’s Keeper Shelf! JAM is a retired systems analyst who falls squarely in the top age group (less than 4%) in the recent reader survey SBTB conducted. In other words – and in her own words, “I am a cranky old lady.”