A Woman Entangled
By Cecilia Grant
Publisher: Bantam
Release Date: June
25, 2013
Kate Westbrook
knows that she is beautiful, and she intends to use her beauty to see that she
marries someone who will give her the life she is entitled to as the
granddaughter of an earl. From the time she was thirteen, Kate has been focused
on the goal of reclaiming what should be hers. Her father, a younger son, was
disowned by his family when he married an actress, whose profession placed her
beyond the pale despite her beauty, accomplishments, and virtue. Kate knows
that her parents enjoy a happy marriage and that her father, who has found
professional success as a barrister, has no regrets about his choices. Her
family may be content with their comfortable, middle-class life, but Kate wants
more—not just for herself but also for her younger siblings. She even harbors
hope that she can be instrumental in reconciling her father and his family and
perhaps even see her mother accepted by them.
Nicholas
Blackshear, second son of a respectable but untitled gentleman, is also
ambitious. He hopes to win a seat in the House of Commons, and he believed he
was making progress until a scandal in his family not only made a political
career an immensely more difficult goal to attain but also affected his current
work as a barrister. Solicitors were reluctant to refer cases to a man whose
brother had married a courtesan after a duel with her protector (A Gentleman Undone). His sister, married
to her viscount (A Lady Awakened)
could ignore society’s strictures and continue her relationship with their
unrepentant brother. Nick didn’t have that luxury. He rejects all contact with
his brother, but even that is not enough to stop the hemorrhaging of his
career.
One of the few
bright spots in Nick’s present life is his relationship with the Westbrook
family. One of the young barristers Mr. Westbrook befriends and mentors, Nick
has been welcomed into the Westbrook home and treated almost as a member of the
family. Three years ago, Nick, like many a young man before and after him, was
stunned by Kate’s beauty and thought himself in love with her. But when he
summoned the courage to tell Kate of his feelings, she made it impossible for
him to speak, clearly communicating, without ever directly acknowledging his
intentions, that he lacked the qualities she considered essential in her
husband. Despite the blow to his pride, Nick accepts his role as family friend
and brotherly confidant.
Kate has been working assiduously to win the approbation
of Lady Harringdon, wife of her father’s oldest brother and the current earl.
When her work finally pays off and she receives an invitation to pay her aunt a
call, Kate is elated. Hoping that Lady Harringdon, who has successfully settled
her own daughters in appropriate marriages, may be tempted by Kate’s beauty to
do the same for her, Kate is dismayed when she learns that her aunt’s idea of
help is to find Kate not a husband but work as a lady’s companion.
It is Nick who encourages Kate to turn the balls and card
parties she will be attending as part of Lady Harringdon’s training her as a
companion into a husband hunt, teasing her that she can surely capture a duke.
Kate assures him that she will settle for a duke. Teasing aside, taking Nick’s
advice soon brings Kate to the attention of a baron, the same lord who is
considering hiring Nick to tutor him in argument and public speaking, a
position that could serve as the first step on the political ladder Nick longs
to climb. But as Kate’s long cherished plans have their best chance of reaching
fruition, she comes to realize her heart is leading her in a different
direction.
A Woman
Entangled is a quieter, less dramatic
book than Grant’s earlier offerings, but it has the same level of complexity,
the same layered characterization, and the same rich prose that characterized
her first two books. Kate and Nick may be more ordinary than the leads in the
other books, but they are complicated, contradictory, flawed characters
nonetheless. Kate’s social climbing ambition makes her a less than appealing
character at points in the story, but underlying her desire to win acceptance
from her father’s family is a conflict addressed by no less than Jane Austen,
as Grant indicates with the Austen allusions.
Two passages are central to understanding Kate’s point of
view. One comes early in the novel when Kate considers how unalike she and her
sister Viola are:
Kate…loved
her sister. Indeed she loved her whole family. But was it so unreasonable of
her to crave a life in which people valued courtesy, consideration, and
etiquette, and recognized that there was more to be thought of, when delivering
a letter, than whether the person on the other end could afford to pay the
postage? Was it so wrong for her to want to not be nothing to people who shared
her name and her blood?
…if
she were ever to write a novel, it would be the opposite of a love story. Her
hero and heroine would choose duty over their hearts’ desire, that their
children need never be taxed for a romantic indulgence that was none of their
own.
…
A beautiful woman did well to be heartless. And if she hadn’t quite attained
the state herself, at least she could make such a show as would convince all
the rest of the world.
Kate considers herself a pragmatist. She wants a “good
marriage,” one based on sensible, rational choices, rather than a “happy
marriage,” one based on feelings. She clearly demonstrates her understanding of
the different kinds of marriages in a conversation with Nick.
Kate: “I’ve pinned all my hopes on making a good
marriage.”
Nick: “You have stringent ideas of what constitutes a
good marriage. Myself I know of no better union than the one to which you owe
your existence.”
Kate: “My parents have a happy marriage. That’s not the
same.”
If
Kate seems shallow, Nick seems hard and unforgiving. He loves his brother Will.
He admits that he and the rest of the family lived with fear while Will was
risking his life on the battlefield. Yet in self-interest, he cuts Will out of
his life in the same way that Westbrook’s family cut him off. But Nick is not a
bad man. He is a good man who is forced to make a tough choice and chooses
professional and social survival over family feeling. He wounds himself as well
as his brother by his choice, and he feels guilty. Both Kate and Nick grow and
change as the story moves toward its conclusion, as readers want their heroes
and heroines to do. Only imperfect beings are capable of growth.
I
would be remiss if I failed to add that Grant uses secondary characters to
enrich and expand the world of her novel. The Westbrook family is particularly
delightful, especially Viola, a disciple of Mary Wollstonecraft and an aspiring
author passionate about her work in progress,
an update of Wollstonecraft’s A
Vindication of the Rights of Woman. Viola
deserves her own story. I also had great admiration for Baron Barclay and
Louisa Smith, the aristocratic wallflower who befriends Kate. I’d love to see
more of them as well.
Romance
fiction is filled with tales of aristocrats who marry outside their class and
somehow avoid the usual consequences of that choice. I have delighted in many
such stories, quite willingly suspending disbelief. Many of these books are
cherished keepers. But I think it’s worth taking note of a novel that shows a
more realistic view, including the effects on the generations that follow of
marriages that may be happy but may not be “good.” I highly recommend this
book. It’s a beautifully written novel, a darn good story, and a different
slant on an old trope.
~Janga
http://justjanga.blogspot.com
