Earls Trip
Warning to anyone thinking about picking this one up – don’t expect much in the way of historical accuracy. That doesn’t mean Earl’s Trip is not a fun ride. It’s funny, it’s breezy, it’s quick-witted: in short, it’s what you expect from a Jenny Holiday romance, just packed into a Regency. The ahistory is not an insurmountable problem; the greater one is the uneven tonal balance between light and dark subject matter. Yet the love story and central relationships here carry everything through, and the result is a pleasant romance.
Archibald Fielding-Burton, the Earl of Harcourt, and his best friends, Simon and Effie, live for their annual get-togethers in the country. Archie is the athletic one (the jock) of the group and is headed out to meet them for some fun to take his mind off his worries related to his dementia-suffering mother when he receives an urgent message from his childhood friend Clementine Morgan. Clem begs Archie to help her rescue her sister, Olive, from eloping with Mr. Bull, Clem’s ex-fiancé, who had enamoured both sisters. Little does Clem know that Olive is running away from something else entirely.
Archie springs to the rescue and finds himself mightily intrigued by the grown-up Clem, but she is a confirmed spinster and plans on remaining single. But she does want to get it on before drifting off into loneliness, and she asks Archie to tutor her in the ways of the bedroom. Can this bargain survive lust, love, and a whole lot of complications?
You know what you’re getting into with this one. You have your modern-minded, scholarly, tree-climbing bluestocking heroine – who is such a vegan she cries at hunts and even refuses to eat eggs (Holiday’s explanation that veganism existed back in the 1800s may feel a bit preachy for the non-veggies among us) – and your sensitive and too-perfect Earl. There is a character called Mrs. MacPuddles. There are chapter subheadings with titles such as “Clem Shoots Her Shot” and “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” The language is all too modern, and so is most some of the behavior.
And yet the love between Clem and Olive, between Archie and his friends, and between Archie and Clem all work well and that carries the book. There’s also plenty of general fun to be had among this group, and they’re decently likeable. It’s a light-hearted romp in the grand abstract; it’s loaded with antics – someone gets hot in a non-fatal place, turtles are raced, and the moldering pile Archie, Simon and Effie have rented for their holiday may or may not be haunted. And yet it gives us a look at some very serious topics, reading disabilities among them. But the juxtaposition of the serious with the romp-y sometimes feels uneven to the point of being distracting and also contributed to lowering my overall grade.
But while Earl’s Trip isn’t perfect, it’s definitely a fun ride. About the journey – and the destination – and the bumps in the road.
Recent Comments
Kinda makes me think of Bridgerton. Who watches it for historical accuracy? This sounds fun!!
Some people like to know how historically accurate historicals are!
I read some HR by Jenny Holiday some years back – I might even have reviewed some of it here. From what I remember those books were pretty decent, with at least an attempt at period appropriateness.
This, however, sounds awful, and I shall not be touching it with a bargepole. Thanks for the warning!
I’m now curious about whether Clem avoids dairy products, honey, anything containing gelatin, silk, leather, wool, beeswax candles, tallow candles, etc.
But I’m not curious enough to read the book.
So do I!! Some years ago a posting here led me to Chef Walter Staib and his TV show, A Taste of History. I have an interest in food history and have read quite a bit about it and when visiting stately homes, etc. in the UK, always have a good look at the kitchens. I am stumped how one could have done much more than boil a few vegetables on primitive stoves without fats when olive oil was considered medicine and oat milk, etc. and other sources of modern “manufactured” vegan alternatives were a long way off in Europe. It would also be interesting to know more about the health of those who did pursue a rudimentary form of veganism prior to the 20th century. A high fibre diet before the common use of the flush toilet must have been distinctly unpleasant in most homes.
Agreed. I realize I’m bringing way too much realism into this, but I wonder whether the heroine is risking iron deficiency or vitamin B12 deficiency. Also, are their kids going to be brought up as vegans?
I can take a certain degree of historical inaccuracy but sometimes it just makes me want to throw the book across the room if it descends into absurdity!!
Now I kind of want to see a vegan historical heroine who goes all the way. Won’t play the piano because the keys are ivory. Won’t use lantern oil if it comes from whales. Won’t sleep on feathers. Won’t use bone china. Won’t wear red if it’s dyed with cochineal. Won’t use paintbrushes made with animal hairs. Won’t ride a horse or use a horse-drawn carriage. It might actually be fun, in a completely wacked-out way!
What a great idea! No corsets: whalebone. No sitting on a sofa: horsehair fill. No silk dresses: silk worms. No shoes, of course: leather. No primitive birth control either: condoms made from animal intestines. No amber or cameo jewellery either: poor trapped insects and sea shells.
And on it goes.
She does avoid dairy products but I can’t recall anything about anything else.
Honestly, it’s not too bad at all IMO! I liked the relationships, but yeah, if you’re very wed to period apropos behavior it shan’t be your thing.
It’s not about being wed to anything – it’s about the deliberate disrespect to my culture. If this had been a book set in pretty much any other part of the world you can be damn sure the author would have taken great pains to be accurate for fear of being called out. But England? Nah, we don’t have to bother to get anything right there and can write any old rubbish as long as the characters wear pretty clothes. Ugh.
Well, I would argue it is the calling out that is the problem.
Like at this point we have the Bridgertonification of the historical market, I’ll take anything that gives me good characters because I’m Suffering.
I’ve only read one trilogy of Holiday’s (the one with the weddings), but this sounds exactly like my memory of it: well-depicted genuine friendships and a nod to serious issues within a story too lighthearted for them.
Yep, that’s the long and short of it – I like her more as a contemporary writer because of this. It’s a good though not a great one.