A Summer to Remember

Randomly picked up this book with little to no expectations because I wanted a silly formulaic palate-cleanser - and it was such a pleasant surprise to read! A very well crafted Regency romance that ticks pretty much all the right boxes while also deftly avoiding the pitfalls of having been written in the early 2000's (I'm looking at you, Bridgerton).

Kit Butler, Viscount Ravensberg, is a notorious ex-army officer determined on ruining his position and respectability in London society. In an act of defiance against his family for beginning betrothal discussions without his input, Kit decides to pre-empt them by finding a prim, proper and dullest bride he can possibly court and win amongst the ton of society. His eyes fall upon Lauren Edgeworth, recently jilted at her own wedding by her ex-fiance, and as much of an ice queen and a role model of propriety that a lady of society could be.

The two main characters here, Kit and Lauren, were actually compelling. Neither of them felt obnoxiously annoying or unrealistic. They had actual backstories and fleshed-out histories. They had actual complicated relationships with characters aside from each other, and these dynamics played a part in the overall plot and in how both of them came together in the end. Most importantly, the chemistry between Kit and Lauren wasn't instant - sure, there was a bit of insta-lust but certainly no insta-love. Balogh took her time and gave her characters space to get closer over the course of the book. Their romance felt unrushed, genuine, and - importantly - believable.

I also liked that, despite being written in 2002, a time where a lot of romance novels were still quite iffy about issues surrounding consent and an inequality of power between the couple, Balogh side-stepped these pitfalls expertly. There was clearly a conscious effort to make sure Kit and Lauren stayed equal on the playing field, and that every plot point and decision made was mutually consensual and respectful. I really appreciated that and this was what most pleasantly surprised me in the book, having read and been disappointed so many times before by other romance novels written from the same time period. From Chapter 1, we get a scene where Kit is brawling with three other men who were catcalling and harrassing a milkmaid:

“It is a simply fact of language. Yes means yes, no means no.”

Although Lauren's continued insistence on not marrying Kit by the end of her visit to Alvesley was just bordering on a little annoying and stubborn, I could sort of understand where she was coming from in that she had had her plans formed and was on the verge of accomplishing something truly out of the norm, like living as a free and single woman in Bath on her own means, beholden to no one. So when she eventually relents and agrees to marry Kit just because he tells her he loves her... it felt like it came out of nowhere? Her whole reason for not wanting to marry Kit in the first place was never explicitly about whether he loved her or not, but more because she wanted independence and freedom. So I don't know why his confession changed anything about her goals, unless she was always kinda teetering on the fence and it simply pushed her over to agree to the marriage, in which case I don't know why she didn't show more outward indecision in the first place. I think the ending would've been vastly improved if Kit had, in addition to telling her that he loved her, also explained that their marriage would not deprive her of whatever independence and freedom that she wanted, that even if they were married, she would continue to be free to set her own establishment (independent of him) in Bath if she so wanted. I don't know, something that actually acknowledged and accommodated her goal of wanting to be independent all along would've made a lot more sense to me.