Although I love penning Georgian and Regency romance novels I refuse to abide to a rose-tinted perspective of historical periods in which men of means acquired mistresses at will, and libertines were rife. Nor do I ignore the facts of parish church registers relating to marriages and births, which declare six and seven month pregnancies were higher during the period of the Napoleonic Wars than the post-Restoration years of Charles II and his libertine reign. Whilst it is true to say, it takes two to tango, by that maxim a lot of young Georgian and Regency misses lost their virginity long before they were marched down the aisle by a father who may, or may not have held a pistol to the bridegroom’s back afore hand. Thus I am bold enough to present stories of a realistic bent in which passions of a romantic nature oft start innocently enough, until a potent kiss stirs feelings and needs that override good sense in the heat of the moment. Hence my novels and novellas range from sensual to steamy; as and when the characters feel the need to express more than mere sentiments with spoken words.
It is also a myth inspired and perpetuated by authors of Regency romances that most, if not all young ladies of good breeding had chaperones. Jane Austen frequently walked alone in places where she lived, not least in the City of Bath, thus her heroines' reflect that same freedom to come and go as they wished and without parental supervision or companionship of a maid, maiden aunt, or other. The reason adult females accompanied a young miss on her first outing to Almack’s/Almacks – either form of the latter is correct, if one looks at differing time-frames on invitations signed and dispatched by the patronesses – the same rule applied to the opera or the theatre, all places where it was considered unseemly for unsupervised young ladies to attend in the company of adult gentlemen.
A secondary myth abounds to do with Almack’s/Almacks, in which young gentlemen could secure an invitation for a young lady to attend at functions. No, that is utterly incorrect – not even if the young gentleman was her brother or cousin could he obtain an invitation: the only exception being if that gentleman was her legal guardian. Aunts and married female cousins could elicit an invitation from the patronesses if the aunt or cousin had access to or a close connection to a patron of Almack’s/Almacks inner circle.
If you feel inclined toward realistic and earthy accounts of Georgian and Regency romance and love stories that are often linked in some way, you may have discovered from reading some of mine, that characters from one book often reappear in another. I sincerely hope readers enjoy discovering who fraternises with whom in the years spanning the Georgian period and the Regency era!
