Long takes the Woman Stows Away On a Ship trope in unexpected directions.
Plot: Violent Redmond is fatally bored. Her entire life is balls and house parties and tedious Society and she has started taking drastic steps to feel alive, like literally threatening to kill herself over some minute argument with one of her many, many admirers. So it is perhaps not surprising that when she meets the new Earl of Ardmay, a British-born, American raised man of mixed heritage who might be trying to hunt down her missing brother, that she jumps at the opportunity to sneak on board his ship to try and get to her brother first. And I know what you’re thinking, but no, she’s not only packed lovely, delicate day dresses, she even packed a gown. And there’s nothing a life-long sailor loves more than a bossy, spoiled lady on a voyage to chase pirates. Shenanigans ensue.
This is a rollicking good fun. Long has this capacity to take characters that we would underestimate and make them shine without changing them. Violet is a gently bred lady. Sure, she’s had a lot more freedom than most women, but she isn’t studious or artistic or athletic for that matter, because none of it ever seemed to be needed for the life she had. But she is clever as hell, a fast thinker, calm under pressure. Violet is precisely the sort of person the expression “A diamond is a chunk of coal that did well under pressure” is referring to (although apparently diamonds aren’t made from coal?). She needed to be challenged to rise to the occasion. She puts me in the mind of a dog that doesn’t get enough exercise chewing on furniture.
Asher is a bit more of the standard hero. He’s brash and strong and deeply lonely, with a tragic backstory and a chip on his shoulder about being called a savage, which actually made me exceptionally happy given how Indigenous women were referred to in the first book in the series. Growth! I imagine this is part of the problem of trying to write books set in a time when people casually said or did things we would think of as terrible now. Indeed, I could have done without the absolutely unreal amount of times the word “gypsy” is uttered because of the needless set up for Violet’s decision to sneak on board a ship with a silk gown packed. Still, for all the silliness, the book is well paced, the characters’ choices make sense, the side characters are funny and unique, and the subject matter is surprisingly serious. The third act complication is in fact one I think many, many people have been facing in the last few years, and I think Long might have some useful advice for folks navigating it.
In terms of warnings, this book deals with topics like the operational side of slavery, casual racism, parental abandonment, and substance abuse.