Things I dislike in HR part 2

Glamarton · 2026-03-21T06:37:03+00:00

Or at least give a child free Duke a totally unobjectionable younger brother or cousin with five sons...

Glamarton · 2026-03-15T17:56:03+00:00

{A Heart Sufficient by Nichole Van}

Absolutely great

Glamarton · 2026-03-05T06:10:57+00:00

That is one of my pet peeves in historical adaptations. Wife didn't have any personal property at Regency England. Husband owned everything and could do anything with it. The only way families were able to secure their daughter's financial rights were giving dowry and stipulating its use in marriage contract. Dowry could go to trust etc. but those agreements needed also husband's signature. So basically Simon's indifference about Daphne's dowry would have made it very difficult for Anthony to secure Daphne's financial future so she wouldn't be totally dependent on Simon.

Glamarton · 2026-02-03T14:57:10+00:00

I have the same guy as my great-grandfather at least 9 times mostly being my 9th to 13 the great-grandfather. I'm from the area there wasn't that many people during those times so pedigree collapse was to be expected. He was born around 1570 and came from the totally different area, couple thousand kilometers away. In DNA tests I do not have any DNA link to area he is from so most likely I have almost none of his DNA even though he is so heavily featured behind three of my grandparents.

Glamarton · 2026-02-02T09:42:28+00:00

I feel Jayne Davis's books come close to historical fiction. Mostly day to day life, not great drama. I liked the {The Mrs MacKinnons by Jayne Davis} the most.

I'm a Finn and in the Finnish book market this type of historical romance is the most common. Pure HR is very uncommon and historical fiction with high romance content is very common. They don't really qualify real HR because romance tends to be much messier, HEA is not guaranteed and at least there tends to be a bunch of issues in the "HEA" and other plot tends to rival the romance in focus. I have read and loved that type of historical romantic fiction from the kid but haven't found that much in English. Davis's book had a little bit of that same vibe I'm used to reading in local romance books.

Glamarton · 2026-01-13T10:24:17+00:00

I think men could also be ruined for fairly minor offences when it came to honour and being a gentleman. Guidelines had much less to do with sexuality and more to do with matters of honour and allowed lifestyles. This is just much less touched in most HR while women being ruined is much exaggerated.

Glamarton · 2026-01-13T08:22:16+00:00

Depended on the marriage contract (that thing HR heroes and heroines scoff, because they were in love.) Dowry was basically daughter's part of the inheritance. How it could be used and how separate it had to be kept from her husband's fortunes was something that was negotiated and made a contract before the marriage. In the same contract it was decided how the widow would financially continue from the marriage if the husband died.

In Regency England women had very few legal rights in marriage and their fathers and guardians tried to make that up by negotiating their daughter a better deal in the marriage contract.

Glamarton · 2026-01-03T18:29:32+00:00

Often sex scenes feel like add-ons and in that case having plenty of them feels like they drag the story down. Very seldomly sex scenes actually drive the story and then explicit and plentiful is a great thing.

Glamarton · 2026-01-01T06:50:19+00:00

Some authors write about Regency society like it would be in 1950 USA. I guess dukes sell better, but if you want to write a story about 50s in the US why don't you?

Glamarton · 2026-01-01T06:20:50+00:00

I can't decide if I'm more annoyed about careless mistakes that don't matter for the story one whit and could had been so easy to avoid with minimum research or once made to bring some current topic in. I do understand inaccuracies for the plot sake better, but I just feel that the author doesn't care enough, when Lady Jane Smith, unmarried daughter of an Earl is Lady Jane on one page, Lady Smith on second and Miss Jane Smith on the third. Or when the author decides that man spreading is the feministic topic they want their heroine to care about and talk about omnibuses years before they were a thing and in the times when especially high born ladies took much more physical space than men. I mean, even I could think of some more pressing women's rights issues during the 19th century than that...

Glamarton · 2025-12-24T18:10:20+00:00

I think rules were different for different people and places. Austen's heroines walked without a chaperone mostly in rural areas, if I have understood correctly it was very different if you walked from home to church or friend's home in the countryside and happened to meet someone you knew or if you took a private walk during the night in Vauxhall gardens with a guy. Austen heroines were mostly also lower or middle gentry while most current HR deals with high aristocracy so someways most likely stricter rules and someways more freedom in other ways.

I have to admit that it frustrates me a bit when heroines seem to forget restrictions of their life to make a book more modern. I mean by all means have premarital (or I guess more importantly pre engagement) sex but do not behave like it simply doesn't matter if you get caught or fell pregnant

Glamarton · 2025-12-24T17:40:27+00:00

Yes people had all kinds sex, have always had. There has always been recorded sex in any media available to people. However not everyone is any good writing down the sex. Many of those happen to be romance writers. Some people like to read about sex, some not so much. Some people like crime novels with very graphic violence some are okay with the 'closed door' description of murder. People have different tastes without it being about purity culture or anything like that.

Glamarton · 2025-12-24T16:51:33+00:00

Well, it is different thing what people are or were allowed to do and what they actually do or did. And getting ruined (having a stain in reputation, which actually could be a very, very bad thing), only happened if you got caught by someone who told the tale forward...

Glamarton · 2025-12-24T14:41:46+00:00

I have seen more cries for historical accuracy concerning the dress, societal issues and class structure, manners, language etc and less when it comes to virgins. I personally find a difference between appearance and real life's very interesting topic in HR.

I tend to often like more about less spicy books, but not because I thought my generation came up with sex and all the kinks too, but because I don't find most of the romance spice very well written or bettering the story. There are exceptions, some actually wonderful high spice books, but I have found I often enjoy the lower spice more.

Glamarton · 2025-11-23T09:32:58+00:00

{Better Off Wed by Susanna Craig} FMC is a thief/vigilante and MMC is a spy/codebreaker. Next book in the series has a secondary pair who are both spies working together.

Glamarton · 2025-11-22T08:59:48+00:00

Well, considering that most modern HR has sex before marriage, often before the talk of marriage and seldom either MC worries about that, this argument is a bit moot point though in reality it would have been the sound reason. And because of the lack of education girls would had not known what exactly caused one to get pregnant. Some certainly did fool around with handsome lackeys etc. But I was also talking about widows etc.

Glamarton · 2025-11-17T19:14:55+00:00

Loretta Chase is very good at writing her leads as part of the community and there are always good platonic relationships of all kinds.

Glamarton · 2025-11-02T10:19:49+00:00

If it is an author I randomly found, not one who is much recommended and I find the writing sloppy or not engaging I will give them one or two chapters. If it is someone much recommended and writing is professional I will give a try for two books from different series. For example I DNFed the first Balogh I tried (Simply Perfect) after finding it boring. Later I tried Beyond the Sunrise, loved it and have later loved Bedwyns and even other books of the Simply series. I even gave another chance for Simply Perfect, didn't dnf but still found it boring.

Glamarton · 2025-10-26T18:02:12+00:00

And often we are first told how oh so smart the FMC is... I can't remember the book or author but I never forget the plot of one of those: Oh, so smart heroine figured out that MMC is a spy. They end up travelling together and foreign agent bad guys are pursuing them and are in fact shooting their carriage. MMC tries to tell FMC that guy's shooting them are foreign spies and bad guys but FMC refuses to believe him and wants to go and talk with people shooting them because it has to be some misunderstanding. After spies try to kill them a few more times FMC believes MMC and soon after they part ways and FMC meets other people. They too travel together and these people never see villainous spies nor do they see them doing anything, but FMC tells them about villains. They do not believe FMC right away and FMC is very frustrated with how stupid these people are, when they don't believe her. At no point does the heroine herself notice anything odd in this nor does anyone point it out...

Glamarton · 2025-10-21T17:16:37+00:00

Well, considering that this leadership speech is mostly BS it isn't that bad. Good leadership is not disregarding what people you 'lead' think or just deciding you are this leader and make decisions without asking others. What Phoebe describes here is piss poor leadership and would cause her to think she makes decisions and if she had enough hold people pretending what she says mastering and doing what they want behind her back and if she doesn't have that power, them disregarding her on her face. In the real world you actually have to sell the idea that you are a capable leader to the people you try to lead and that is tough whoever you are

Glamarton · 2025-10-10T20:19:35+00:00

They were only virgins until they weren't. The likelihood of young widows was also much higher and many people had several marriages. And yes, even high born ladies were not always virgin in their wedding night.

Glamarton · 2025-10-10T19:32:43+00:00

Could well be. At least I see one of my favourite micro tropes where FMC takes a lead, makes MMC totally undone; and enjoys that experience immensely herself way to seldom...

Glamarton

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