Boring

With the "Footmen's Club" Valerie Bowman has created a nice little series one can hear in the background while doing something else.

However, this volume might not be the most captivating of the lot. I heard it directly after book 3 (in which the hero and the heroine are secret agents hunting down a traitor) and found myself unexpectedly so bored with book 5 that I seriously considered stopping listening to it.

The main reason was that there is very little outer action apart from the heroine teaching the hero how to behave in polite society and visiting a few social entertainments with him. So, about the first twenty chapters or so are mainly static, lengthy reflections on Regency conventions in general and the emotional reasons why the two cannot marry in particular. Admittedly, there are a handful of minor characters who try to bully the heroine and one or two compromising situations which finally force the two main characters into marriage, but they remain marginal and seem to have no real impact on the heroine and her determination not to marry. The true retarding element is the heroine herself. Everyone - the hero, the other characters and the reader - just have to wait until she comes to terms with her childhood trauma and then everything quickly dissolves into happiness. That all their friends and relatives tried to bring them together all along and that a certain Lady Elspeth spun an antagonistic intrigue which also furthered their relationship is claimed afterwards but not worked into the plot very well.

There is a love scene which is typical for this series: Although the heroines are usually innocent, rather ignorant young women of their era, they seem to rush into sexual relationships with a man and giving him a bl*j* with less feelings of guilt, doubt, shame or let alone revulsion than many modern women would.

The slow, overly pronounced lisp of the narrator does nothing to make the plot appear more dynamic. The narrator has a beautiful voice with a great potential to interpret different voices and feelings, but in this production she aspirates and lisps just a bit too much.

On the whole, I had the impression that the author either tried to do something different which I just didn't quite understand or that she just had to keep the deadline to publish her next book. To my mind, the first three books of this series are more conclusive and entertaining.

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