It took me awhile to really get into The Spinster’s Guide to Scandalous Behavior by Jennifer McQuiston. I’m not sure if that was totally the fault of the book or the fact that my brain is exhausted from my day job and I’m slowly crawling out of a reading slump. The book is brimming with awesome feminism and a beta-hero I loved, but it felt a little like the beginning dragged.
Miss Lucy Westmore is a very improper woman. She has no interest in her upcoming Season, she sometimes wears breeches, and she’d rather delve into charitable pursuits than romantic dalliances. All of this puts her at odds with her family and makes her feel like an outcast. When she inherits a cottage in Cornwall from her Aunt Edith, a woman Lucy hardly knew, she sees the property as a key to her independence. The problem is, her father sells it without consulting her.
Lucy runs off to Cornwall (in an incredibly poorly thought out manner) to keep the property from being sold to Lord Thomas Branston. Along the way, Lucy starts to read the diaries her Aunt Edith left her and is inspired by an unconventional woman who chose to live in solitude (sort of) in Lizard Bay rather than marry.
I liked a lot of things about this book, especially its hero. Thomas is a beta-hero, and a scientist at heart. He spent his education learning about flora and fauna and rocks — not exactly a course load that’s super beneficial to being a marquess. He’s also a recovering alcoholic. His sister became pregnant out of wedlock, took her own life, and his then-fiancée gave him back the ring at said sister’s wake. Honestly, that’s a pretty compelling reason to turn to the bottle. Aunt E sobered him up, and as a result, he’s got emotional ties to the cottage too.
There’s also the fact that the cottage represents Lucy’s freedom from social convention. She has this actual, physical thing that is her ticket to everything she thinks she wants–but it’s hard. The cottage is rat infested, in disrepair, and Lucy has to face the fact that she doesn’t know how to start a fire or do laundry, much less live independently. She realizes that the life she dreamed of will require her to sacrifice and put in some serious work. Going back to London and following the path her family laid out for her is the easiest choice and not necessarily the wrong one.
McQuiston doesn’t preach that Lucy has to follow in Aunt E’s footsteps. She doesn’t suggest that the correct choice is setting up shop on her own. Instead, McQuiston highlights that sometimes we find out that our dreams are harder than we expected them to be and that it’s okay to be scared by that. It’s also okay to reevaluate what we thought we wanted. Lucy avoids being a TSTL heroine by admitting that she needs help in some areas.
I also really liked Lucy because she tells it like it is:
How, exactly, am I supposed to see myself? When I look in the mirror, I see someone who is supposed to be perfectly happy with her lot in life, pleased to have drawn the short straw of the sexes. I see someone who is expected to be thrilled at the ridiculous circus of a Season being pressed upon her, eager to give her dowry to a complete stranger. I see someone who is expected to change herself, her thoughts, her life, to become nothing more than what a man would make her.” She lowered her arms and drew a deep breath, bowing her head as she exhaled. “Well, that may be what is expected,” she said bitterly, “but that’s not me, Lord Branston. It will never be me.
[… ]”Lucy,” he said softly. “Not every man expects a woman to change to suits him. You can trust me on that.”
Lucy’s feminist dialectic brings all the boys to the yard.
The reason this book didn’t get an A is that it felt a little imbalanced to me. There is a good portion of the book where Lucy traipses around the town of Lizard Bay, learning about her aunt and what she meant to the community. Then at the end, quite a lot happens quickly. I felt like the pacing needed to be evened out a little.
There are also a lot of supporting characters. A lot. Lucy’s family, the butler, the townspeople, random orphan waif children, stray cats…. That’s fine but we spent so much time with them that it detracted from the main couple. I also wanted more Thomas. He’s a great sexy, slightly nerdy hero with a tragic past, but I felt like sometimes he (and Lucy) were overshadowed by the story of how Aunt E came to Lizard Bay.
I would definitely recommend this book to someone sick of the Regency ballroom scene or to a reader who has “scientist, beta hero” as her catnip (COUGH, Carrie, COUGH), but fans of faster paced romances might want to be cautious.
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Thanks for the review! This one will definitely go on my list. I’m always looking for more booksmart beta heroes and feminist heroines!
This looks like a real treat – I’m always a fan of Regency tales that feature feminist heroines, but so often their feminism is written poorly into the context of the time period. I also love a smart, nerdy, not-rapey hero – just downloaded this from Amazon, and I’m looking forward to the read!
Feminist-y historical + beta hero = gimme
I had put this book on my Wish List before I started my holiday reading marathon. May have to move it up. Your review had me at beta hero.
Totally agree with your review. I had a hard time getting into it but did enjoy it at the end. This is one of those books that I wish an author would rewrite later because I loved the idea but some things just needed to be tightened up. For example, I would have loved Lucy more if she had thought about her plan a bit more before just running off to the castle.
I mean cottage, silly autocorrect.
I read this a few weeks ago and for the most part agree with the review. The book was hard to get into. I loved loved loved the hero, Lucy not so much. She drifted between the mean girl and stubborn to a fault. At times she reminded me of the type of horror flick heroine that goes running out of a safe house in the middle of night because there’s an ax murderer lurking in the neighborhood. That kind of stupid stubborn.