Customer Reviews

A Foreign Affair

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Murder, intrigue, and treason are but a few of the elements found in Caro's Peacock book A Foreign Affair. To discover the why and who of her father's murder, our female protagonist, Liberty Lane (Libby) must break away from the conventionalities of the Victorian Era, where women were often seen, not heard, and expected to accept fallacious accounts as facts.

A Foreign Affair has given birth to a new heroine, who not only resolves her father's suspicious death; but hinders a treacherous plot to overthrow queen Victoria from the English throne, and replace her with a caricature of a man proclaiming to be Princess Charlotte's son, cleverly saved at birth from the same people accused of poisoning her. This distortion of a king would be controlled by a group of power hungry men seeking their own interests and threatening to launch England into civil war.

In the process, Libby learns that thanks to her father's exceptionally unconventional upbringing, she has the discipline and the wittiness; she needs to survive an uncertain and harsh world. Although at first she yearns for her brother's support in her endeavors, she soon realizes that left to her own devices she is as capable as she is generous and caring as her father had been.

The alluring way, in which Caro Peacock's story captured and engaged me, it made it very difficult for me to put the book down, and when alas I turned to the last page it left me yearning for more, and feeling a sense of loss for my friend Libby.

Length:: 1:58 Mins

A video based on the book, "A Foreign Affair", by Caro Peacock--a vibrant peek into the Victorian era through the eyes of her main character Liberty Lane. What if? What if a plot existed by which Princess Charlotte (grand-daughter of George III, only legitimate child of his son the Prince Regent, later George IV, and therefore destined to one day be Queen of England), and her new-born child were poisoned by her grandmother (George III's wife, Queen Charlotte), who was determined that no descendant of her daughter-in-law (the scandalous Caroline) should ever come to the throne. But, what if the baby was actually rescued from the murderous attentions of his great-grandmother and lived to take his rightful place on the throne twenty years later? What if? Asked by her government to pose as a governess, Liberty Lane moves in with one of England's most powerful and influential families. What she discovers could rock the very foundations of the monarchy--and lead to the assassination of the newly crowned, 18-year-old Queen Victoria. An unbelievably compelling read that I was unable to put down!

After reading A Dangerous Affair by Caro Peacock for the HarperCollins First Look Program and the adventures of Liberty Lane, I decided to pick up the first in the series to see how Liberty's exploits began. Check out my review of A Dangerous Affair here. A Foreign Affair by Caro Peacock is set in England and France prior to the ascension of Queen Victoria to the throne of England. Liberty Lane is staying with family when she receives word from her father that he will be returning home from Paris shortly. Rather than wait for him to return, she runs off to Dover to meet him, but she soon learns of his death.

Liberty's impetuous nature leads her into dark alleys, a morgue, carriages with duplicitous men, and a household full of secrets as she attempts to uncover the truth behind her father's death. She refuses to accept the news that he died in a dual, and she is enlisted by men of influence to spy on the Mandeville household while feigning to be a governess.

Caro Peacock has a way with description. Readers will be thrust into cramped spaces with large, round scary men, like in the passage below:

"The man who called himself Harry Trumper had arranged things so that he and I were sitting side by side with our backs to the horses, the other man facing us with a whole seat to himself. As my sight cleared, I could see that he needed it. It was not so much that he was corpulent--though indeed he was that--more that his unweildy body spread out like a great toad's, with not enough in the way of bone or sinew to control his bulk" (Page 39)

Readers will enjoy how Liberty's relationship in this novel develops into more of a friendship in the second novel, rather than the fatherly relationship we see in A Foreign Affair. Liberty is a Victorian Age Nancy Drew, led by her impetuous and curious nature to solve mysteries. Peacock's use of language unfolds the intricate relationships between the characters and the mysteries in this novel.

England, 1830s. Liberty Lane is a young woman who, as a little girl, has had romantic notions about duels. What could be better than a man or father fighting for a woman's honor? Her father doesn't see things that way and chastised her about the wrongness of duels when she was a child. So imagine her surprise when her father turns out dead, having lost a duel. She sees the unlikelihood of this. So she travels from London to Calais alone to confirm the body. She had run away from her overbearing aunt's house and has no intention of going back, especially now that she wants to uncover the real reasons for her father's demise. What transpires is a story full of political intrigue, one of espionage, secret agents and conspiracy, when Liberty is forced to pose as a governess at the home of a man who may or may not be plotting against Queen Victoria...

The novel is entertaining. The backdrop of political espionage during the Victorian era is interesting and insightful in some areas. The characters, though caricature at times, are also great, especially Liberty and Sir Herbert Mandeville. The suspense part of the story is well done and it kept me guessing all the way through to the end. So why am I giving it two stars? I thought Liberty is too modern for a nineteenth century-set heroine. The novel's language sounds too twenty-first century as well, and it threw me off while I read it. The historical aspect seems well researched, but the actual execution in its language and feel of the time fails miserably. I found it difficult to picture Liberty, a Victorian heroine, roaming the streets of Calais alone, looking for hotels her father may have stayed in. Not only was this difficult to imagine, but it set the tone for me for the remainder of the book. And so, even though the plot is actually interesting, I couldn't get into it, and reading it fell like a chore, but I stuck through to the end. A Foreign Affair would've been wonderful had it been a little more... Victorian. Sadly, that is not the case.

I reluctantly chose this book from a shelf of several paperbacks in a beach house I am renting in La Cruz, Mexico. I never read Victorian novels, but I'd read all the few good books they have here and the others were either yellowed and musty "inspirational" theses on how to reach inner peace, cheesy crime airplane books, or silly bodice rippers, so I decided to give this one a try. Well, here I am in this tropical paradise with the waves crashing at my doorstep and a mile long sandy beach in front of me, and guess how I spent my day yesterday. I couldn't tear myself away from the story. It was that compelling. It is an intelligently written, exciting, colorful drama with a fully realized protagonist, an assortment of melodramatic Victorian characters, and to my complete surprise, it quickly drew me in. Who knew?? Don't read this book at the beach when you've only got 2 weeks there. Save it for a rainy night at home by the fire, and be prepared to spend the night with it.

I picked up this book on a whim, browsing through my local used book store. As usual, I was seduced by the nice book cover, but after reading only 2 pages into the book, I was completely hooked. For me, most historical novels teeter on two things: either too much details and it gets boring, or not as much details and I can't "see" what they're talking about. This book is perfect to me because the writer is really great at writing about details just enough for me to see what she's saying, but at the same time, keep the story going. I promise, the story never got boring once and every page egged me on to the next. The plot is really great, the characters are wonderful and the heroine is someone you want to cheer for and read more of. Give this book a chance; the writer respects the reader's intellect and at the same time, rewards us with an absolutely entertaining novel.

In 1837, Liberty Lane travels from England to visit her father in France. However, upon her arrival in Paris, she learns her dad died in a duel over a woman. She rejects the prevalent theory because her father would never fight a duel. Liberty vows to learn the truth, but her inquiries are cut short when two "investigators" try to kidnap her.

Pledging to her later father not to give up until the truth is known, Liberty flees back to England to regroup. Home Office secret agents ask her to go undercover as a governess at Mandeville Hall as they believe her father's death and a seditious plot to kill the newly crowned young queen are tied together with Sir Herbert Mandeville at the center of treason.

This early Victorian espionage thriller with gothic overtones hooks the audience once Liberty makes up her mind to learn the truth as she knows her father would never try to kill anyone. The story line is fast-paced from the onset as Liberty makes friends (not all human) while adversaries want her dead. With Mandeville Hall being a perfect dangerous gothic setting, fans will relish Liberty's first account of spying for her country and for her late father.

I enjoy reading about the Victorian Era. This story had a lot of mystery and intrigue, a real page-turner, always trying to guess the name of the murderer and surprised at the end.

A Foreign Affair is the first in a series about the adventures of the resourceful Liberty Lane. It's 1837, and Queen Victoria has just ascended the throne of England. However, Liberty isn't concerned about the coronation of the Queen; she's much more interested in how her father died, apparently in a duel, while in France. Her investigation leads her to a dangerous plot that may jeopardize the English crown and possible England itself.

I thought this was a pretty lively, exciting, and fast-paced novel. Although the characters seemed to be a little too modern at times, I enjoyed this book and the sort-of gothic Mandeville Hall. It had just the right combination of murder, mystery, and treason, with a little bit of romance mixed in. Caro Peacock used to work as a guide at Croft Castle in Hereford, the family home of Sir Richard Croft, the medical expert who was present at the birth of Princess Charlotte's son in 1817. From that story sprung the idea for A Foreign Affair. Reading this novel, you can tell that Peacock has assiduously done her research. Aside from the dialogue, the period details ring true.

A Foreign Affair is the first in a promising series; the next is A Dangerous Affair, coming out in January. I look forward to reading it.