I discovered Lauren Willig while browsing through a bargain bin and unearthing a hardcover copy of The Masque of the Black Tulip. The story summary appealed to me, so I bought it and looked it up online, only to find that it was the sequel to The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, which meant compulsive old me could not get started with Black Tulip, as I wanted to read Pink Carnation first.
After months of unsuccessful mooching, I found a trade paperback copy of Pink Carnation in another bargain bin and thus moved both books up the TBR pile (#172-173 for 2009).
These two novels by Lauren Willig make up an interesting set of genre-bending books, combining chick lit, historical mystery, and adventure. The Pink Carnation series runs on two storylines, one featuring present-day London, where Harvard grad student Eloise Kelly is doing research on English spies in the Napoleonic wars. This leads her to uncover the second storyline in each novel: tales revolving around these swashbuckling heroes.
In the first book of the series, The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, Eloise traces an elusive spy that follows the trail of the dashing Scarlet Pimpernel and his successor, the Purple Gentian, leading her down the bloodline to the present-day Selwicks, descendants of the Purple Gentian himself, Richard Selwick.
At the Selwick estate, Eloise uncovers documents detailing the romance between Richard Selwick and Amy Balcourt, which could possibly reveal a shocking historical discovery… that the Pink Carnation was a woman!
The Masque of the Black Tulip continues the story, this time featuring Richard’s sister Henrietta and his best friend Miles Dorrington.
Following the events in the first book, France sends the Black Tulip, a notorious French spy, to England with a singular goal: to kill the Pink Carnation. Henrietta and Miles know the true identity of the Pink Carnation and must take the necessary measures to keep the Black Tulip at bay. What they don’t know is that the Black Tulip is watching their every move, proving to be a tricky adversary for the Pink Carnation.
Interspersed with the Pink Carnation storyline is Eloise Kelly’s blooming relationship with Selwick heir Colin in the process of getting to know the Pink Carnation.
I normally prefer my chicklit to be straightforward contemporary novels, and the Pink Carnation books were a pleasant surprise, although I have to give a disclaimer — these books aren’t meant to be taken seriously.
When I first bought the books, the plot summaries mildly caught my interest, but a few chapters into the first book, I was hooked. I enjoyed it so much that I read the two books in succession.
While not particularly historically accurate (and they don’t claim to be), they’re highly entertaining — a cross between a contemporary chick lit novel, historical romance, hammy comedy, and pulp fiction. The books are light and fluffy, rife with espionage, dastardly villains, secret codes, chase scenes, mistaken identity, abductions, dashing rakes, bumbling fops and impertinent chits, the fripperies of the Ton, and yes, some steamy romance.
She’s no Austen, but I got the feeling Lauren Willig was really having fun writing the books, and that made the books much more enjoyable for me, the perfect read for a particularly stressful week.
I was delighted to find there are four other books in the series: The Deception of the Emerald Ring, The Seduction of the Crimson Rose, The Temptation of the Night Jasmine, and The Betrayal of the Blood Lily (for release in January 12, 2010).
I haven’t enjoyed this much fluff in a long time, and I certainly look forward to reading more of this series!
***
My copies: The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, trade paperback; The Masque of the Black Tulip, hardcover with dust jacket
My rating: The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, 3/5 stars; The Masque of the Black Tulip, 3.5/5 stars
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