The Countess Conspiracy
Show Notes
We would characterize Milan’s works as the best possible combination of historical research and alternative realities that serve her characters’ stories. She doesn’t fudge history out of laziness or received wisdom, but in order to tell a better romance and backs up her creative license with research into aspects of history that might go underdeveloped in a weaker author’s books. She says of her settings: “I try to write books that I say are historically possible, but not historically average.” The Countess Conspiracy is the third book in the Brothers Sinister series, which is linked together by two brothers, one the heir and one illegitimate and their best friend, who is their cousin, from school. This book’s hero is the best friend from school and the heroine is his childhood best friend, with whom he shares a deep secret about his career as England’s leading researcher on genetics in botany.
Find Haley on substack.
Books Referenced
The Ruin of a Rake by Cat Sebastian
Proof of Seduction by Courtney Milan
The Duke Who Didn’t by Courtney Milan
Romancing Mr. Bridgerton by Julia Quinn
Emma by Jane Austen
A Hope Divided by Alyssa Cole
Works Cited
“Unpacking the Racist Drama Roiling the World of Romance Writers”
“Romance is publishing’s most lucrative genre. Its biggest community of writers is imploding.”
“Federal Appeals Judge Alex Kozinski Accused Of Sexual Harassment”
“Cyto-Genetic and Taxonomic Investigations on Melanium” Violets by J. Clausen - note about his wife is on page 221
Transcript
[00:00:00.000] - Emma
Welcome to Reformed Rakes, a historical romance podcast that would integrate a belabored pun on your name into a science lecture to prove its love for you. I'm Emma, a law librarian writing about justice and romance at the substack Restorative Romance.
[00:00:10.890] - Beth
My name is Beth, and I'm a grad student, and I write at the Substack Ministrations.
[00:00:15.390] - Emma
And today we're finally featuring a Courtney Milan book in a standalone episode. The Countess Conspiracy has been discussed in at least two of our episodes before, The Taxonomy of Rakes and Pregnancy and Romance. I feel like I'm often bringing her up as a counter-example when I make sweeping statements about what 19th-century Romance is doing nowadays. Milan doesn't write Girl Gangs, she writes Communities. She doesn't write Hot Girl Hobbies, she writes about Labor. Before she wrote Romances, Milan earned a graduate degree in theoretical physical chemistry and a law degree. She clerked for Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Anthony Kennedy, and federal Judge Alex Kozinski before becoming a law professor for a few years before moving to writing full-time. While she initially published works with Harlequin starting in 2011, she has since independently published her work. I would characterize Milan's works as the best possible combination of historical historical research and alternative realities that serve her character's stories. She doesn't fudge history out of laziness or received wisdom, but in order to tell a better romance and backs up her creative license with research into aspects of history that might go underdeveloped in a week or author's books.
[00:01:13.060] - Emma
She says of her settings, "I try to write books that I say are historically possible, not historically average, and I don't care about Almacks' or buying horses at Tattersalls's or the Vauxhall Gardens. I don't believe I've ever written a scene set in any of these places, and I couldn't tell you a damned thing about them beyond, You buy horses there, even though these little show up a lot in other historical romances. Heck, I very rarely write scenes of balls, and when I do, they're often something like, Yuck, a ball. Let's blow this joint." The Countess Conspiracy is the third book in the Brothers Sinister series, which is linked together by two brothers, one the heir and one illegitimate, and their best friend, who's their cousin from school. This book's hero is the best friend from school, and the heroine is his childhood best friend, with whom he shares a deep secret about his career as England's leading researcher on genetics and botany. We have a special guest this episode, our first returning guest, Haley. She's a Countess Conspiracy Stan, and we're so happy to have her. So yay, Haley.
[00:02:12.150] - Haley
I'm so happy to be here.
[00:02:14.640] - Beth
Thank you so much. I feel like if you're in on the Reformed Rakes lore, I think on the Windflower, we were literally like, if we ever did the Countess Conspiracy.
[00:02:21.750] - Haley
Probably. I've also been in both of you all's DMs like, Hey, I don't know. I don't know. The Countess Conspiracy was a great book. Yeah.
[00:02:33.620] - Beth
But thanks for being here. Tiktok may or may not be banned. Who knows? Future me may edit this out. But where can people find you, Haley?
[00:02:43.580] - Haley
Probably the best place to find me now would be on Substack. So I am at haleystewfart.substack.com. Same username as my TikTok, but- We will put a link in that part. I'm also on Instagram, but probably the best place to to follow my brain is on Substack.
[00:03:04.210] - Beth
Yes, which is what we want. And then also Chels isn't here and won't be for the next couple of months. And when we asked Chels where they were, they that they were starting a girl gang where we all belatedly realized we aren't girls.
[00:03:22.280] - Emma
Sorry, we got a bunch of things. We're excited to hear updates about Chels's big project to the girl gang. But they will be back. Just They're taking a break.
[00:03:31.420] - Beth
Yeah, just doing a project.
[00:03:32.640] - Emma
To work on exciting things.
[00:03:33.810] - Beth
We're going to keep upping the ante every episode they're gone.
[00:03:36.580] - Haley
The lies will be increasing.
[00:03:39.890] - Beth
Yes, exactly.
[00:03:42.770] - Emma
Okay, so to dive into the Countess Conspiracy accuracy. I thought we could start off with talking about Courtney Milan. We usually do with authors who are new to single episodes, even though we've talked about Milan before because she's definitely in the Reformed Rakes canon of authors. I have a really unique relationship with her because I knew about her way before I even read Romance. I just wanted to acknowledge to this because that's something I really admire about her. In 2017, when I was applying for law school, Milan publicly accused her former boss, Judge Alex Kozinski, of sexual harassment, leading to his resignation of his lifetime appointment from the federal bench. I followed that news and then was reminded her for speaking out, which she had said she was in part able to do because of her romance career meant that she was no longer practicing law until she wasn't worried about professional repercussions. When another clerk of Kozinski's was my law school professor who left teaching after a Title IX conduct probe that while I was in his class. At the time, I saw Milan on Twitter. She was offering support with her trademark wit and precision to students who were affected by this probe and the firing of this professor.
[00:04:41.050] - Emma
While she was discussing the realities of gendered harassment in the legal field. This was my first year of law school, and it was right after the Kavanaugh confirmation hearing. Both of these events really deeply colored how I viewed my space in my chosen profession. Milan was at the center of it, guiding people and talking about it very openly on Twitter, which I just have always really admired. This is all to say, Even if she didn't write romance novels, which that I absolutely love, I would really admire how Milan conducts herself and speaks online about romance, politics, the legal field, and all of her other interest. She's probably one of my entry points into romance. Again, when I was starting to read romance, I was reminded, Oh, yeah, that author who was so instrumental and this traumatic thing that happened to me in my 1 year was there online, and she writes romance novels. I just wanted to point that out because I just think she's great in lots of ways.
[00:05:26.870] - Haley
That is so interesting. She was also one of my first historical romance authors that I remember reading. The Brother Sinister series was definitely formative. I flew blind as I was beginning to explore historical romance in the mid-2010s. But I do remember Courtney Milan's name frequently mentioned on the list. I was seeking out to get more recommendations. As I become more familiar with the genre, I now know why she's on so many lists. She's also such an interesting person outside of her role as an author. She had such an influential presence in the romance world. Wasn't she the President of the RWA or I've been for many years. She continues to be someone I follow online. Like you were saying, Emma, she has a great online presence as opposed to the hate follows of people that I'm following to get mad. But she is so interesting. She's like you're saying, she's funny, she's smart. I like hearing what she has to say even outside of romance novels.
[00:06:24.910] - Beth
Yeah. So Milan was on the RWA board from 2014 to 2018. So she was never President, but she was Chair of the Ethics Committee in 2019. And there's this whole thing that happened with RWA that we don't- It's very dramatic.
[00:06:40.930] - Haley
Don't have time to get into.
[00:06:43.120] - Beth
But she called out another author, Kathryn Lynn Davis, for racist portrayals in her book, Somewhere Lies the Moon. And Davis, along with a publisher, filed complaints against Milan because of her tweets. So she filed those complaints with RWA. So the RWA decided to suspend Milan for one year and ban her from leadership positions. And reformed race's favorite, Alyssa Cole, tweeted about this decision and supported Milan. So from there, RWA chapters, agents, former RWA presidents, voice their support as well. They also inform a secret ethics committee without informing the previous ethics committee that they were investigating Milan. It's a lot. I might even post some articles if you're interested. There's been deep dives on this. Like I said, don't need to get into it. But yeah, I I feel like the running thread here is that she does really stand for what she believes in, and she'll put some skin in the game. So I really admire that about her. And then for her actual books, yeah, I think I read her early as well. And I think, when I think of my TikToks that I made about them, I was like, I'm basically a Courtney Milan PR machine right now, just because I love these books so much.
[00:07:54.760] - Beth
They're good. And I'm glad that was a formative experience for when I was getting back into romance.
[00:08:06.350] - Emma
Quite a few romance authors are lawyers. I think the combination of being a pretty good writer and having a lot of debt often motivates people to go write romance novels. But Courtney Milan is like... She's like a different level of lawyer. The things that she achieved in her legal career, as her second career, she did this after she got a PhD. It's not like what everybody else does. When people come for her, it's like, What do you think is going to happen? She has this skillset that she doesn't... I imagine doesn't get to use all that much all the time, but it's something within her and the way that her brain works that I really admire. But it's a different level of lawyering capacity. Not everyone gets to clerk for two different Supreme Court justices. She didn't even go to an Ivy. I think she went to Michigan, which is an amazing school. But the fact that she clerked for a Supreme Court judge without going to an Ivy is, again, speaks to her work ethic and intelligence. She's pretty incredible. All right, so we're going to do a plot summary so everyone's on the same page about the Countess Conspiracy.
[00:09:07.700] - Emma
Violet Waterfield, Countess of Cambury, shares a secret with her child of best friend, Sebastian Malheur. Sebastian is notorious in London for two things. Being a rake and his scientific lectures on genetics, which incite gossip and scandal because he talks about the sexual reproductive organs of flowers and plants. Violet attends all his lectures and supports his work emphatically. But the secret is that it's Violet's work. When she struggled to get her work accepted by scientific journals because she was a woman, Sebastian made an offhand comment about how ridiculous it was. He knew her work was brilliant, and if it had a man's name on it, like his, she would be accepted immediately. Violet glommed onto this idea and had Sebastian submit her early work on Snapdragons to journals. The book opens on one of Sebastian's scientific lectures, which goes off well despite some scandalized audience members. But when Violet goes to congratulate Sebastian afterwards and tell him how brilliant his lecture was, he quietly growls at her, "Fuck you." Violet worries that Sebastian intends to reveal their secret, which she worries would ruin members of her family, having them linked to a lady scientist who talks about reproductive systems.
[00:10:11.310] - Emma
Sebastian goes to Violet's garden to apologize for his language, but he does tell her that he intends to stop lecturing and publishing. The fraud is weighing on him, and he feels like he can't continue. After some time, Violet approaches him with lists of ways she wants to convince him to continue. She wants to maintain the fraud because it is the only way she can conceive of her work continuing to be public. But her bribes land and money don't work. Sebastian's older brother is dying and has told him that he would like his son to be raised by a grandmother, given Sebastian's work schedule and reputation. Sebastian is sitting out to prove to his brother that he'd be both less busy and more respectable. When Sebastian lowers his voice and seems to begin to flirt with Violet, she accuses him of being upset with her that she doesn't fall at his feet, like every other woman seems to. She bitterly and ironically offers him intercourse as a trade, but he responds, Don't be ridiculous, Violet. I don't care what you think of my morals, but I do have standards, and you don't meet them.
[00:11:00.160] - Emma
Violet takes us to mean that she's not beguiling or beautiful enough to tempt him and leaves him. Sebastian visits his brother to try and figure out what he needs to do in order to impress Benedict so that he may be named guardian, swearing to give up the scientific lecturing. He struggles to understand exactly why his brother finds him wanting but is willing to try anything. Sebastian offers to take up trade, which Benedict is suspicious of because as he says, the only thing Sebastian has ever been serious about is Violet. Violet goes to see her sister, Lily, who's married with lots of children. Lily is having an issue with her eldest daughter, not wanting make an advantageous in marriage, and Lily relies on Violet to perform unsavory tasks for her, like this tough conversation with her daughter. Violet enjoys being needed so acutely by Lily. They were raised by their mother after their father died by suicide, and in order to minimize the scandal, their mother had a set of exacting rules for the behavior. These rules were partially published in a lady's behavior guide, but Violet's mother also had a set of shadow rules for private behavior to keep her daughter's even more guarded.
[00:11:53.780] - Emma
Violet has much more sympathy for her mother's position than Lily shows. When Violet is talking to Amanda, the eldest daughter, trying to give her auntly advice that is true to herself but also honors her sister's request, they run into Sebastian after Violet and Sebastian haven't seen each other for a couple of weeks. He's charming and Amanda is awestruck by the rake. Sebastian tells Violet how much he'll miss her if she doesn't come to the wedding of mutual friends, and she softens on him, ending their conversation with, I don't have time for you any longer, which is code between the two friends for arranging their next meeting. Violet goes to talk to her mother about how Amanda is being raised with the explicit directive from Lily to keep the private behavior rules away from her daughter. While there, Violet does a temperature check on her mother to see if she might know anything about her secret with Sebastian, and her mother suggests that she does, but she pleads with Violet to keep it to herself. She would be deeply embarrassed if any of this became public. Violet feels like her mother finds her disgusting, and it breaks her heart that her mother isn't remotely proud of her accomplishments.
[00:12:50.430] - Emma
Sebastian finds Violet in her garden at the pre-arranged time performing her cross-pollinations. He tells her about her meeting. She tells him about her meeting with her sister and describes herself like a blacksmith's puzzle. Made of iron and quick to injure anyone who tries to solve it. She tries to explain the importance of her work to him, saying this is the closest outcome to having children. Sebastian knows that she and her late husband never had children and suspected it made the marriage more difficult, but knows no details of what caused the lack of offspring. He tries to give her comfort by touching her hand, but she recoils in panic. Sebastian offers to talk to a science mentor of his, Simon Bollingal, about how to proceed. During the conversation with Bollingal, this mentor scientist reveals that the arrangement Sebastian and Violet have is not so different than many scientists have with wives who assist them. Bollingal points out that legally the couple is one person, so the ethics are less up in the air than when the pair is married. He implies that his wife, Alice, has a similar role in his work and suggests that Sebastian and his co-collaborator marry.
[00:13:42.380] - Speaker 4
Sebastian's interior thoughts of the meeting make it clear that not only have the secrets of the fraud been weighing on him, but keeping the secret of the extent of his feelings for Violet. When Sebastian tells Violet about the suggestion, she laughs it off and he is deeply hurt, though she interprets his entreaties to stop making a joke out of the prospect as evidence that he finds the idea patently absurd. She points out his standards comment, and he sees how hurt by it she was, and he explains, One of his standards is not engaged in intercourse when only one partner is in love. When Violet retorts that she isn't in love with him, he responds, Isn't that what I said? Only one of us is in love, and it isn't you. He explains he never told her because she was married and then she was in mourning, and he's always interpreted her coldness to his flirting as disinterest. He explains his affection for her, centering on her utter belief in his ability to pull off the fraud, to at least appear incredibly intelligent, something no one else in his life seems to think about him. During his confession, Violet emphasizes her inability to have physical passion for someone, all while having the feelings of that passion towards him that she's terrified to act on.
[00:14:39.160] - Emma
They resolve carry on as they have been and go to a pair of mutual friends' wedding. At the bachelor party, all three brothers, Sinister gather for a game of cards. Though Violet was an honorary member when they were children, Robert and Oliver didn't feel the need to invite her. When Sebastian notices her absence, he refuses to stay unless she is invited and storms off when Robert and Oliver take it as a joke. Robert and Oliver go to find Violet and invite to play cards for marbles, which will represent favors amongst the brothers. Sebastian returns, and Violet wins handily giving most of her won marbles to the other brother's wives, though she lost one of her marbles to Sebastian, meaning she owes him a favor. When Sebastian and Violet retreat to their rooms, he calls on the favor, asking her to stop being afraid. They discuss her late husband's instilling fear into her, and she returns the marker for the favor. After the wedding, Violet visits her sister again. Lily makes an unthinking comment about how easily she gets pregnant, apologizing weakly for pointing out Violet's lack of children. Lily encourages Violet to continue the conversation with Amanda, but at that conversation, Violet gives Amanda a hidden copy of a book called The Higher Education of Women by Emily Davies, encouraging Amanda to pursue an education and not marry her aristocrat.
[00:15:42.170] - Emma
Sebastian visits his brother to show off his developed trade enterprise, where he has looked at the data about chips returning late to gamble on their returns with almost guaranteed success. Despite his return for a quick profit, Benedict is still disappointed in things coming so easily to Sebastian. Sebastian is embarrassed to have once again not impressed Benedict, though Violet takes his side. A couple discuss Sebastian's success of presenting Violet's work, which she insists he could not have done without superior intellect of his own. Sebastian makes a reference to his lack of respectability, obliquely referring to his rake status, though Violet purposely avoids asking any questions about his lovers. He breaks an awkward pause by telling her he has done some scientific experiments of his own, though they failed. She's interested in hearing about that, but he balks. Sebastian leaves Violet's garden proud that he didn't embarrass himself. Read: try and kiss her. Her compliments on his intellect and reliability make him think about taking her to bed. So on his way to his own garden in the private alley between their back gardens, he starts to get himself off. But then Violet appears in the alley and watches him finish.
[00:16:38.610] - Emma
She didn't ask about his lovers. How many has he had? He says, Too many and not enough. She then asks, How many would be enough? And he responds one more. She says she is sorry, and he asked her not to apologize since she's happy with her friendship as it is. But she responds that she is not happy. At their next meeting, Violet tells Sebastian about why she started to work with snapdragons. Her father had been obsessed with trying to breed pink snapdragons that could to reproduce more pink snapdragons. She helped him in the garden until he started failing, producing white and red and half and half snapdragons, and then was banished from helping him. Violet studies in genetics show that a pink snap dragon cannot breed true. She uses this as a metaphor to suggest that Sebastian is seeing something in her that doesn't actually exist, but he insists that he doesn't view being her friend as a consolation prize. She pushes back saying she's worthless as a woman, and Sebastian wants to make her tell him more details about her relationship with her husband. He recognized how often she was ill when she was married, but never knew the details of it.
[00:17:32.460] - Emma
Violet says her husband never hit her and then leaves the conversation. Violet speaks with her sister again, and her sister has discovered Amanda's subterfuge, feminist readings, and is furious. Violet doesn't admit to giving Amanda the copy, but seeing Lily's anger makes her see her her in another light. She braves a rainstorm and visits Sebastian, discarded. She admits her physical desire for him, but when she tries to have sex with him, he rebuffs her because she's in such an emotional state. She admits that she's not barren. In fact, she got pregnant 19 times with her husband in a decade of marriage, but she always had miscarriages, and it was weakening her body. Her husband refused to stop having sex with her, always convincing her to try again, even when she was terrified. This explains her fear of wanting any other partner. After Sebastian calms her down, he sends her back to her own home with an umbrella. He visits her the next day, helps her with her work, and then leaves. She goes after him, Why haven't you kissed me? He points out that Violet told him last night that when her husband had sex with her, it made her feel like she was nothing, and he doesn't want to duplicate the experience.
[00:18:27.090] - Emma
He tells her he imagined that if he also made some scientific discovery, she would be so impressed with him and understand how he felt. But his work is incomplete at this point. Violet suggests he gave a lecture on the interim work at a weekly seminar, more casual than the formal lectures he usually does. At the lecture, the first one that Sebastian has ever given that Violet doesn't know the details of, she watches them acutely. He opens with, This is a talk about Violet. She initially thinks he's going to reveal their secret, but instead he begins to talk about the crosses he performed on the species of the genus of Viola. But instead he begins to talk about the crosses he performed on the species of the genus Viola. He discusses the tenderness he feels for the subject in all its variants, the beautiful Violet, the resilient Violet, the sweet Violet. He's looking for the animating principle on why some species will cross with each other and others once, and he hasn't landed on it yet. He ends the speech with, I'll keep looking because I would rather fail at Violets than succeed at anything else.
[00:19:18.640] - Emma
At the after-party for the speech with the brothers Sinister and their wives, Violet pulls a fashion magazine out of her bag where she keeps her scientific articles that she can read surreptitiously. The other women are talking about synthetic dyes being used to dye their gowns. Heres. She ends up reading an article by Simon Bollingal and tells Sebastian she needs his wife, Alice, the photographer. Violet has an idea how to use synthetic dye to dye cells of a Violet to view the division of cells. Violet's outburst in front of everyone has revealed her secret to her friends and their wives. Violet and Alice are able to chart the number of chromosomes in each Violet cell, and it tracks with those that could cross with each other and which could not. Violet decides she wants to continue her work under her own name. Sebastian is proud of her, but when he tries to kiss her in an earnest moment of passion, she balks and flees. He checks on her in her room later, and this time she kiss him. He's confused with understanding, and she ends her discussion with, I can't have intercourse with you, and you love it.
[00:20:06.430] - Emma
He promises that things will be easier than they seem in that moment and lets her go to bed. Violet visits her sister again to emit her role in the scientific discovery. Lily calls her selfish for putting herself before her family, which can be ruined by association. Lily says she's disgusted by Violet's behavior. Violet then discusses the fallout with Sebastian and begins to distract her with a seduction, which Violet points out she knows what he's doing. He talks about all the other ways besides intercourse that he and his affair partners have enjoyed each other's company. This time, he gives her a back rub. Violet is planning to give the lecture of her own work in a few days, and Sebastian and she discuss all that needs to be done, including coming clean to her own mother. Violet is moved by his tenderness just towards her in willingness to wait for any physical contacts, so she gives him a blowjob. Sebastian reciprocates and tells her he loves her. The next day, Violet goes to her mother's house to confirm the scandal that she suspects her mother already knows what's coming. During the conversation, it becomes clear they're speaking about two different things.
[00:20:57.620] - Emma
Violet's mother is incredibly proud of her daughter and her accomplishments. She points out there's no point in cultivating a perfect reputation if you can't claim something like this. Violet also surmises that the scandal that her mother was talking about was being responsible for Violet's late husband's accidental death. Her mother knew how many miscarriages Violet was enduring and felt like if she was going to lose her daughter if her son-in-law continued to live. Violet presents her research the next day after an introduction from Sebastian. After a successful lecture on chromosomes and reproduction, a constable arrives for her arrest for uttering loot statements and disturbing the piece. The court is unsure if they're able charge her the felonies since she's a countess. They had intended to arrest Sebastian, so she's released for the night. Sebastian and she go home together and make love with a vulcanized rubber condom, and she tells them she loves him. The next morning, Sebastian is intending to take the blame/credit for the speech, but Violet declares herself not guilty and is taken to prison. She stays there for two weeks in better circumstances than most other prisoners since she's a countess. But when she leaves, throngs of people, mostly women, are calling for her release.
[00:21:54.730] - Emma
She's become notorious. Her imprisonment has made her a heroine. Sebastian meets her at home with multiple offers for positions at universities that she has been given. He couldn't be at the prison when she got let out because he was visiting Benedict. Violet leaves to go do something without telling him what it is. She goes to see Benedict and gives him a talking to about his treatment of Sebastian and how special and kind Sebastian is. Sebastian overhears part of this in the embrace. He suggests that she ought to propose to him, and she does. They live happily ever after.
[00:22:21.280] - Emma
Milan's first book, Proof by Seduction, was published in 2009. This puts her as a peer to Meredith Duran, who wrote Duke of Shadows as her first book in 2008, and Sherry Thomas who wrote Private Arrangements in 2008. These are two Reformed Rakes favorite authors, but those two authors no longer publish historical romance. I don't think Milan writes old-school books. They feel pretty firmly in the time that she's writing them, but I do tend to vastly prefer this 2010 style compared to the stuff coming out now. The fact that Duran and Thomas and Milan are all right there. Those are, to me, are to me are once in a lifetime type of authors. What makes Milan work for you, especially something like the Countess Conspiracy? I can imagine my eyes rolling over at this plot, this over the top, fraud being happening, and even the feminist messaging that she manages to weave in the plot. I can imagine that in a book being published in 2025, and just rolling my eyes at it, because I think a lot of authors are a lot less deft at including both these over-the-top things and the political messaging.
[00:23:19.880] - Haley
Yeah, I love what you said at the top, Emma, about Milan not writing girl gangs or Hot Girl Hobbies. I think that's what draws me to her. Her heroines are so memorable to me because they're so unique. Milan is making characters for the story and not the audience. I started mentally categorizing authors as secure and insecure, and I feel like Milan is a very secure author. She just does not care. She's not pitching these characters to you. She doesn't need you really to buy in. You can participate or not, but it's not... I don't know. It doesn't feel like she's pandering ever. I feel like Duran and Thomas are also like that, too. Whatever they are doing, they're just going to go for it. I feel like a lot of these more contemporary historical romances that I'm reading, I often just put them down, because it's like they're begging the reader to love me, and it just turns me off. But with Milan, the story, and Duran, actually, and Thomas, all great. My favorites. The story and characters have enough flesh and bones to stand on their own, and these authors trust the reader to be able to understand and connect with the characters that they have created.
[00:24:42.140] - Haley
And like I said, I feel like the insecure category is these progressive dukes, your favorite topic, Emma, and the preachy suffragettes who can't be cowed by anything. They're like, conventions be damned, and they're just going to go do whatever. But what's the point of even writing... Sorry, this is a sidebar. What's the point of even writing in a historical setting if you're just going to be like, none of these conventions matter. I don't know. And fighting against them in a way that is not even really possible or realistic in the setting. I think we might get into this later, but the way that Sebastian and Violet navigate the social settings in a way that is pushing against it. They're definitely subverting things, but it seems like it's within the bounds of how somebody might actually exist in that time, which I think was really interesting. But anyway, that's more than I meant to say.
[00:25:45.660] - Emma
Yeah. I think the combination of Violet being a scientist and that being such a big part of her personality, the way that she thinks is through science, and also being mean and prickly. She's not wide-eyed, she's not innocent, and she's not just curious about the world, the way that it would manifest in a hot girl hobby. We use this phrase a couple of times now. I'll explain it to any new listeners who've not heard me say it before. This is what I call when... It's the phrase that I came up with to describe when a heroinea historical romance novel is invested in some enterprise, but the thing that she's doing ultimately has no bearing on her livelihood, and it's not her career in any way. I mean, sometimes it could be science, sometimes it could be... Like, astronomy is a big one, like paleontology. They're doing this as a hobby, but ultimately, at the end of the book, the money problem is solved by them burying into the aristocratcy usually. It's usually just their perfunctury, I think, to show off the author's historical research into this hobby. It's like, this is what paleontology was like in the 19th century.
[00:26:45.590] - Emma
I like reading a lot of books that have these in them, but I do think when something is limited to this hobby, leisure activity and is not connected to a career or labor or work, you're losing an avenue of storytelling that Milan explores pretty acutely. Here we see Violet's work and personality are inextricable from each other. She is her work in this way that the hobbies in so often are interchangeable. She could be a paleontologist or she could be an astronomer. It doesn't really matter to the plot of the book. Milan isn't afraid to make Violet seem potentially less appealing in order to make her interesting. There's also the work that Milan does of putting institutional sexism into the plot of the romance. The realizations and conversation about what will or won't be tolerated as gender behavior are connected to something going on in the book. We don't just get these speeches coming out of nowhere to explain, yes, sexism is bad, and the hero should do something about it. Because they're committing this fraud based on institutional sexism, the conversations that they're having about it make sense in the book and are organic. Also, they have to figure it out together, like Haley was saying, that I think it's more believable to believe that Sebastian, as a 19th century man, is thinking about institutional sexism because he's had to experience it with Violet by his side for the past five years, or however long they've been doing the fraud.
[00:28:04.620] - Emma
I think it may be closer to a decade. But he's been experiencing it and seeing someone he care about experience the problems of it. It's not like he just has this in a vacuum, progressive belief that we don't know where it comes from.
[00:28:16.830] - Haley
Well, and just to follow up on what you're saying, the way they even get into the fraud is she's submitting these papers and getting rejected immediately. He's like, Oh, if you had a man's name, they would have taken it. She's like, Go ahead and do it. So it's like he is recognized. I like that she doesn't teach him about sexism. It's like just everybody's already aware of it. It's not preachy. I I trust you as the reader to understand that this is a problem. I don't need to explain it to you. It's secure. Right.
[00:28:52.140] - Beth
Well, I like what you said, that Milan is secure. And I think, to tie together with what Emma is saying with hot girl hobbies, it's like, I think sometimes authors add these traits because they want to add depth to the character. Here, they are interested in fossils, and it's supposed to be an attempt at characterization, but it's not adding that much depth at all, which is very frustrating. I also feel like sometimes it goes to authors having their series where each character has a thing. So this is the scientist character, the suffragette, which Milan she does that. The next book is the suffragette scandal. But I think she is much more interested in exploring, Violet is a scientist. What is the consequences to this decision that she's trying to go up against institutional sexism.
[00:29:47.270] - Emma
Yeah, I think that makes us where the... When it's just interchangeable. I think the way that Violet speaks to other women in this book, the way that she's friends with the two- Like the previous heroines. The two wives from the first two- Yeah. Yeah, the previous heroine. Heroines, and also the way she speaks to her niece, the way she speaks to her sister, her mother. There are lots of conversations with other women that make it clear that Violet is not removed. She feels removed from these other women based on her interest in science, but it's not because she's better than them or more interesting than them. It's because she has this compulsion because this is her calling, and she's really worried about it coming back and hurting her. It's not that she's smarter or different than women who are interested in needlepoint, which is sometimes the undercurrent of the interesting heroines who have interesting hobbies is that they do something other than something that they would get paid for or actual labor. Nobody's hot girl hobby is being a scullery maid. But they're like, Oh, it's about labor. It's like, Well, it's only ever labor if it's something that's interesting and fun and clean, then it's not really about labor.
[00:30:47.730] - Beth
Well, it's labor that makes the person look good, too, right?
[00:30:51.340] - Emma
Right. Smart and interesting. Yeah. So yeah, I think point of that. Violet is only able to do this because she's of the leisure class. She is able to have all these science experiments because she's independently wealthy. I
[00:31:07.230] - Emma
feel like we could have talked about this in our miscommunication episode, especially as I was rereading it. I don't know if I think about it as a miscommunication book, but it has a couple of scenes that are classic miscommunication plot where it's literal words are being misinterpreted. Most tragically, when Sebastian says, I don't care what you think of my morals, but I do have standards and you don't meet them. He then interprets this to mean that she's not beautiful or soft or feminine enough to tempt Sebastian, the rake, even though what he means is that he he won't sleep with someone who when only one person is in love with the other one because he's been in love with Violet since he was a child. Even when he explains this to Violet, she interprets it first as meaning that he assumes that she's in love with him, leading his first revelation to her where he says, I'm in love with you.
[00:31:44.390] - Emma
But Milan is even smarter than just having miscommunication here. Sebastian knows how Violet will interpret his words. He's not saying this in a surreptitious way where she walks away thinking one thing and he's like, What did I do to upset her? He's purposely choosing words to hurt her in that moment. He's threading a needle of not lying to her, but also he's frustrated with her talking down to herself, assuming that if she were his mistress, she could seduce him into continuing the fraud. She also sprinkles further miscommunications throughout the book with each partner, assuming that the other one thinks less of them than they do. She's doing something different, and maybe that's why I don't think of it as a miscommunication book, because it's not that the message has been misinterpreted. There's a reason why everyone is saying what they're choosing the word specifically because they're hiding things from each other, but it's still that literal misinterpretation of words.
[00:32:32.520] - Beth
Yeah, I like what you said about how Sebastian knows the way Violet will interpret what he says, and that's intentional. Communication is complicated, and I definitely see this as Sebastian trying to get a reaction out of Violet while also creating a new interpretation for what he says once they figure out their stuff and they can revisit that. And he's got a way out of what he said to her. I hate how people treat miscommunication and romance. You It's just put in 10 communication points and then you will get the correct reaction and your relationship will move forward. It's such a boring way to view communication. There's so many layered ways that we talk to each other. I feel like you can that blocks someone just by a look. Do you know what I mean? It's just the end of it can be explored so thoroughly in romance, and then it's the strength of the genre. So yeah, I like that Milan is doing this complicated interpretation here.
[00:33:32.040] - Haley
Yeah, I think it is an interesting case of miscommunication, and also not miscommunication, because the communication is very intentional. But she's playing, like Milan is playing with talking around a subject in multiple instances, in the main plot and even in the subplots. Everything around is people talking around something. So like, Sebastian and Violet speak in code to each other publicly to preserve their partnership, but privately as well. Sebastian is saying things that outwardly mean one thing while meaning something else. And Sebastian has also been speaking and behaving almost in his own personal code towards Violet, that she slowly begins to understand over the course of the story. And there's the entire thing with Violet's mother and sister, where her mother had the shadow, was the shadow rules or something like that, where it's this set of rules that's both external and internal. And even then, none of them are having straightforward conversations with each other. Everyone's saying one thing and meaning something else.
[00:34:48.540] - Emma
Yeah, it's interesting that Lily, this is Lily's Violet's sister. She calls upon Violet to have conversations. She's like, Talk to my mother, talk to my daughter, because I don't want to do it. I don't know if Violet thinks this about herself, but Violet has characterized in the book. I don't know if she's the person that I would pick to have a heart-to-heart with someone and have that communication be there. It's more like she's willing to be hurt by people. And so Lily knows that she will put up with a intolerable conversation or being the bad guy in a conversation. But Violet struggles to push people beyond the surface. When she's talking with her mother, I mean, that's the other miscommunication that I pulled out that's central to the plot. It's a straight miscommunication where Violet's talking to her and she's trying to figure out if her mother knows anything about her and Sebastian's fraud. They're talking in code with each other. Because Violet has such low self-esteem, is interpreting everything her mother says as an indication that her mother not only knows about the fraud, but thinks very poorly of her daughter for it. Well, once you realize what has happened is that her Violet's mother is talking about the murder she committed of Violet's first husband.
[00:35:53.560] - Emma
Actually, there's so much more affection in those words that once you know that, you see it. But Violet cannot interpret it in any other way, where she just feels like such a loser in her mother's eyes. You just have to get the sense that Violet is doomed to miscommunicate with anyone because she will always interpret people as being disinterested in her or looking down on her or being disgusted with her. It's not until she's able to recover that with the help of Sebastian that she's able to communicate more easily. But I think that serves her relationship with Lily. Lily takes advantage of that position that Violet's But also when people complain about miscommunication, I think Violet's internal thoughts here make it clear why miscommunication happens. If Violet has this low self-esteem, she will read everything in bad faith. It's very easy to do that if you just don't have any faith in yourself or other people's affection for you.
[00:36:47.720] - Beth
So I also was caught up on the murder part. She did nothing wrong, though. Just for Violet's mom.
[00:36:55.320] - Haley
I was like, Emma, don't call it a murder.
[00:36:59.200] - Beth
It was an accident, okay?
[00:37:01.190] - Emma
Yeah, it was an accident. Neglient homicide! i've read a couple of books where someone falls off a balustrade or something, and it's like, what's it? Does someone push them? And it's like, well, they They they they they sucked. So we're not going to investigate. That happens in a couple of Mary Balogh books. I mean, if the mother didn't do it, he probably would have died on a horse, right? If you're a shitty husband in a historical romance and you need to die, do not get on a horse.
[00:37:27.630] - Haley
I think actually Duran, doesn't she have a couple of endings that I remember being like, what? It's like a major crime happens and everybody's like, don't worry about it. It's okay. They were mean.
[00:37:43.780] - Emma
Sometimes she just needs to get rid of someone. There was that month last year where I read two different books where two different evil people were eaten by dogs. And I was like, What? It was wild.
[00:37:53.990] - Beth
And then what else?
[00:37:55.200] - Emma
The Silver Devil, and then the Vanessa Reilly book. And it just was
[00:37:59.670] - Beth
You got two nickels for that. It's weird.
[00:38:02.430] - Emma
Totally, it made sense in the Silver Devil. The Vanessa Reilly book, it took me by surprise. I was like, that person just got eaten by dogs.
[00:38:08.150] - Haley
Like a pack?
[00:38:08.640] - Beth
That's crazy. Yeah.
[00:38:12.240] - Emma
Someone sticked them on them and it was like, Okay. I mean, they needed to die for the plot to move forward, but it was very dramatic.
[00:38:21.990] - Emma
Talk a little bit about Sebastian. We have talked about him before on our Taxonomy of Rakes episode. Though I was listening back to that episode. I was like, I wonder if I would classify him differently now that I've reread this book a couple of times. We classed him as a reformed rake because we defined a reformed rake as we don't see him raking on page. We're told that he's a rake all the time, but he doesn't have a mistress. He's not like, flirting with a bunch of women. We have this reformed rake, but I feel like maybe we could call him something different now. Then, of course, Violet and Sebastian have a conversation in the book where they talk about different types of rake. They give them like Latin-ish scientific names, or Sebastian is coming up with them and Violet is correcting his Latin grammar. He calls himself a rakeus perfectus, which is what he says happens when a rake is in love with one woman he can't have, so he dedicates himself to giving other women pleasure because he hopes that another man is out there in the world potentially going to do the same thing for his love.
[00:39:14.500] - Emma
Sebastian is mostly motivated to turn over a new leaf because he wants custody of his nephew after his brother passes away. But he doesn't see anything strictly wrong with his behavior, either as a rake or a scientist, but he does want his brother to trust him as a guardian. To me, this is a great example of Milan being a fan of the genre, but not limited to the same old scripts and integrating classic tropes into her novel plots. Sebastian's rakeishness serves the fraud committed by him and Violet. Violet is actually interested in him continuing to rake. She wants him to keep this reputation up with sexy and mysterious because that helps the science that's also sexy and mysterious when it comes to reproductive structures. I think structurally, another classic plot that Milan plays with is Friends to Lovers. I looked over a list of classic Friends to Lovers in historical romance, and they were almost all childhood friends to enemies to lovers, like the Kerrigan Byrne, one that's like this, the Highwayman. That was top of the list. That's Sarah MacLean that's got the pink cover that I can't remember now. I should have come up with the list.
[00:40:11.320] - Emma
But they're childhood friends. The hero goes away and commits crimes and then come back, and then they're enemies to lovers. Then there's a major break happening between the couple at some point. Then the counter examples that I saw that were friends to lovers, particularly don't have the hero doing the pining. The top example for that that I saw was Romancing Mr. Bridgerton, which I don't think there's any love lost between us and the plot of that book. I wrote "Blegh!"
[00:40:37.780] - Haley
And I wrote Boo. This book, The Countess Conspiracy, is the book that I came back to after I was disappointed, but unsurprised by Bridgerton's flaccid attempt at Friends to Lovers. I don't think I could use stronger language there. The Countess Conspiracy, actually, I think maybe broke me ruined the Friends to Lovers' storyline because I think it is executed so well. But I think this book actually starts with a break, right? The first chapter is Violet in the audience of one of Sebastian's lectures, but following the lecture, he's swarmed by people And the topic of botany, and specifically the reproduction thing, it's pretty scandalous. So some people are founding over him, but also some people are furious. And Violet is attempting to get his attention and is rebuff in a way that shocks and upsets her. And then this break, though, is quickly repaired by Sebastian apologizing because they are good friends, and he values Violet. And I like that their friendship being important to both parties is never questioned. In other Friends to Lovers books, like you mentioned, the fight that they have leads to full separation, even resentment, even over the course of years.
[00:41:51.810] - Haley
And that's what has to be overcome in the relationship. And I think it's so much more interesting to have these friends stay in the relationship and let it be messy. And then as it's knit back together, Violet, in particular, is uncovering deeper feelings and more feelings than she initially expected. And then as far as raking goes, the scene that just gets me every single time is when Sebastian has declared himself unambiguously to Violet, but with no expectation. And he tells her their relationship is going to be the same, and it is. And that's what is shocking Violet into realizing that he does love where he is not going to do anything that she is not totally okay with, and he's still her friend. And so the pair have spent the evening together going over Sebastian's plans to share his investment idea with Benedict Society. And then he leaves Violet's house, very turned up, very desperate. And then he's recognizing that she's not necessarily indifferent to him, she's just guarded and closed off. And so they have this little alley that's connecting their houses, and he gets himself off in the alley and then realizes that Violet is there, and she says that she wants to know about the other women he's been with.
[00:43:09.500] - Haley
And do you want me to read the section? Because I love this.
[00:43:12.100] - Beth
Yes, please do.
[00:43:12.940] - Haley
Okay, okay. Let's see. He hears a noise and he turned, but he already knew who it was. There were only two people who had access to this place. It was dark, but not that dark. Sebastian shut his eyes and did up his trousers. Violet, and it was Violet standing there, not 10 feet distant. Her distant didn't say anything at all, not for a long minute. He wasn't going to apologize to her. He didn't feel ashamed. He just wished. Wished? He wished for something he could not express in words. He wished for it with all his body, and he knew he was never going to have it. I do want to know. She finally said her voice low about the other women. He leaned back against the brick and looked up into the sunlight. What do you want to know? She didn't say anything for a while. Do you have one now? No, it's been months. She took this in, considering for a few moments before speaking again. How many have you had? How many lovers? He could have given her a straight answer. Dozens, or more specifically, 37. 37 if you counted mutual versions of the conduct he just engaged in, and Sebastian did.
[00:44:13.930] - Haley
But what he finally said was too many and not enough. Her face was in shadow. He couldn't tell if she was disgusted by him or if this was just a matter of idle curiosity for her. She exhaled, How many would be enough? He smiled sadly, One more, Violet. He looked over at her, at her arms folded around herself, and her head turned from his, as if that would be enough to distract him from the ferocity of his want. I've only ever wanted one more.
[00:44:40.400] - Beth
One more.
[00:44:41.420] - Haley
Like that, I mean, every single time I'm like,.
[00:44:48.630] - Beth
My favorite part is when they talk about... So he's two years younger than her. So Violet got married at 18, so he was 16. And what she thinks is a joke, he's like, We should run away and get married together. And she's like, Aha, whatever, Sebastian. And later, he brings up that conversation. He was like, I wasn't joking.
[00:45:12.060] - Haley
I was like, I know
[00:45:15.050] - Beth
It gets me every time. Poor Sebastian. If he had just been two years older, he could have gotten Violet. He could have gotten the girl.
[00:45:20.860] - Emma
Well, there's the part, too. He's talking to his brother. Before it, I think the reader even knows that Sebastian's been in love with Violet because Milan hides it from the reader. Sebastian's not thinking about it actively. You can pick up on it, but he hasn't thought to himself, I'm in love with her. But he's talking to Benedict, and he's like, You're never serious about anything. And Benedict says, Well, except Violet. Obviously, you've always been serious about Violet. And it's like, that's the first moment where you're like, Oh, this is She means something more to him than he's letting on. It's like he's not... I guess at this point, we've known him for two books, and he's the jester of the group, the Robert and Oliver, both very serious. One's a Duke, One is the bastard child who needs to make himself legitimate. He's a lawyer. They're both very self-serious. Violet says they're in each other's pockets. They're always fighting and focused on each other. And Sebastian comes in and plays Peacemaker, and he's the jester of the group. But it's very early on, Benedict clocks him and is like, The one thing you're serious about is Violet.
[00:46:20.590] - Beth
Yeah. I love that scene that you read, Haley, because I feel like it perfectly encapsulates the dynamic of their relationship and also what Milan is going for. Emma talked about how lots of friends to lovers, it's like friends break and then they see each other again. And so you can skirt that. The friendship is broken and it gives the time apart gives them an easy way to be like, Hey, you're actually hot now, or just like, you see each other differently than how you saw each other before, which is fine. I still really like that structure. Our Anne Mallory book that we read, The Ghost Book, is that structure. I I think that's great. But I do also love the friends who keep being friends. And I compare all that story, like Friends to Lovers to Emma by Jane Austen, where I'm like, Okay, how does it stack up? And I think this stacks up really well to that. To me, it has similar stakes where you have characters who are committed and devoted to each other no matter what. So changing the dynamic of the relationship is hard. You already act in a certain way, so those actions are typically right as friendship.
[00:47:28.340] - Beth
So trying to have the other person read them as a relationship is terrifying, in my opinion. Why rock the boat? Why change anything? But I think that's also why we love Sebastian, because he isn't trying to change things other than maybe just her knowledge of his feelings, but he's not Like you guys mentioned, expecting anything from her. And I think that's the thing I really like about romance, because a lot of actions are motivated by a changing emotion that isn't like, this is a good decision or a bad decision. The stakes aren't if. You If you choose A, the bad thing happens. But if you choose B, then good thing happens. It's more like, how much do you want this thing? Can you stand to keep things as they are? And then going back to Sebastian's rakeishness and how it's viewed more neutrally, which I liked. I feel like this is mostly because he has a lot of partners, and I don't even think he's a rake rake, where he's drinking excessively, gambling, and treating people badly. He reminds me of, of course, From A Ruin of a Rake by Kat Sebastian, the Courtney is the rake in that book.
[00:48:36.070] - Beth
He's also that way. He doesn't think he's doing anything bad. And honestly, the only reason he gets flak from people is because he's just open about his behavior where other people will hide it. So yeah, I see Sebastian as he's just the same guy in every situation. He's just an honest guy, and that's just who he is, and he doesn't apologize for that.
[00:48:58.430] - Emma
I said this during our Ruin of Evangeline Jones episode, but I stand by it. There should be more masturbation scenes in romance. There aren't enough. It's like these people are super frustrated and not having sex, usually at that point. It's like someone masturbating. I think it should happen more often. And This was a very clever, very traumatic masturbation scene, and it worked so well in the book. It's like, why even write a private alley if someone's not going to get off in it? I think.
[00:49:24.370] - Haley
I've always said that.
[00:49:28.570] - Emma
Oh, To talk a little bit about the science and the history aspect of it, because I mentioned before that Milan, the way she writes historically possible books is how she phrases it. Milan does a lot of work to make this happen. I read We read her author's note, which I'm sure I read before, but I was really surprised at the level of effort she had to get the piece of the cogs to work together of the plot and the history. Milan has Violet arrived to the discovery of chromosomes through an alternate route, so that one that could have happened with the science at the time of the book, even though chromosomes weren't discovered until later. Basically, she's linking the discoveries of Gregor Mendel and Charles Darwin's work together a decade after each actually happened. She's taking established science of the 1860s and putting them together. In Milan's author's note, she writes about the violets, providing the answer being fortuitous, that she had just had Sebastian research them because of the name connection. In her research, she had found an article by Jay Claussen, who was a 19th century scientist about the genetics of violence, and he wrote in his author's note, It had not been possible to get through that without the kind and very accurate assistance yielded by my wife, through Anna Claussen.
[00:50:36.510] - Emma
Artificial pollinations, backcrossings, fixations, baggings, and harvesting were made almost exclusively by her, and she assisted me also in the enumeration of segregated types. Milan points out that this is most of the work of the experiments, and yet there's only one author on the paper. Science and innovation comes up in a lot of books, but this is probably the one that I've read that takes it the most seriously. How do you feel about the integration of the science with the romance? It does feel like it stands apart from a lot of other books that have this perfunctury science plot.
[00:51:04.210] - Haley
No, I agree with you. Thank you so much for asking me about my special interest. It's not necessarily biology, but it is science and technical representation in romance. This is another instance of this book, Ruining Things For Me, because I agree that it is one... It's probably the one that I've read that takes it the most seriously. I think maybe the only other book I can think of that's comparable is Alyssa Cole's A Hope Divided, which has a medical-minded heroine. But both of these books treat the heroine's scientific interest as legitimate rather than freakish, since this is the hill that I die on. I take issue with the way a lot of technical careers are portrayed in fiction. It's a sensitive topic for me, I think. But frequently, we're seeing these heroines who have medicine or science or engineering, and the way they're characterized feels more akin to the way you would talk about a dog that can skateboard than a person in a specialized field. It feels disrespectful a little bit to me. But that's not the case with Violet. The main reason she's quiet about her study is because of the social ramifications. But neither Sebastian, in particular, nor her friends in general, once her secret is revealed, ever act like Violet is some bizarre sideshow, which is what she thinks in her mind everyone's going to...
[00:52:17.250] - Haley
They're going to hate her because she's doing something socially unacceptable, but they're also going to think she's a freak, and nobody does. Nobody thinks that. The one friend, I can't remember which one, one of the other wives is like, Violet, we want to know this stuff because we love you. And she is just baffled by that. And her friends are enamored by her intelligence. Certainly, they're blown away, and she's never denigrated for it. In contrast, I read a more recently published historical romance, that will remain unnamed.
[00:52:50.240] - Beth
Handled us similarly- You can name it if you want. We're not afraid, unless you're afraid.
[00:52:54.050] - Haley
I actually can't really remember it. I could talk a lot of crap about it. I did before on TikTok, Brit. What? I can't remember. It's like a lady's guide.
[00:53:01.720] - Emma
That's what they're taking away from us.
[00:53:02.660] - Haley
This is what they're banning, me yelling in my office about something. And it has a beaker on the cover. So she's a similarly scientific minded Heroine. Also, it's weird. Her name is Violet in that book, too. It was strange. I was so frustrated with it because of the way that they treated her. She was an idiot in every other way except her science experiments. She meets a girl. It's It's like a girl gang of scientists.
[00:53:31.670] - Beth
It's- Of course. You can't just be friends. It has to be better than friendship. She runs a Hogwarts of girls doing experiments.
[00:53:42.990] - Haley
It's the most annoying thing I've ever read.
[00:53:45.470] - Emma
It's like Karlee Kloss' Coding Camp. Do you know about this? Yeah. Okay. It's like summer camp for coders. It's like, okay.
[00:53:55.430] - Haley
Let's get together and be hot and do science. All Okay. But that book was almost humiliating to read because the hero is her bodyguard or something.
[00:54:08.410] - Emma
Why does she need a bodyguard?
[00:54:09.870] - Haley
Someone's attacking her. Kind of blow up her stuff.
[00:54:15.390] - Emma
Because of science? Okay.
[00:54:16.990] - Haley
I think so. I can't remember. It was terrible. But in the way that Sebastian is her partner, and he's even noticing Violet's quirks where she's She gets locked in and doesn't come up for air for hours at a time. And he's just working around her. The part where he's just handing her pots is so cute to me. He's like, I'm not going to... I don't care. In that other book, she would get absorbed. And oh, particularly in the Countess Conspiracy, Sebastian knows that Violet is going to forget to eat if she's absorbed in whatever she's doing. So he has noted to bring food that is okay to eat at any temperature. Literature, which is such a loving gesture of like, Hey, I'm just going to bring you some snacks. I'm going to set them here. And then when you're ready, you'll get them. But the other hero did something similar, but he seemed so annoyed. He was like, You've got to eat. I don't know. It was just so patronizing, and it's a terrible book. But Countess Conspiracy, no. I never feel like Milan portrays Violet as anything but admirable, if a bit lost in her own head.
[00:55:26.970] - Haley
I also really like how Milan addresses women's hidden work in sciences, but doesn't moralize about it in the text at all. It was such an opportunity to be preachy and heavy-handed. But again, she's secure. She's trusting that her audience is intelligent enough to connect the dots and get to the conclusion on their own. There's no belaboring of that point, which I appreciated.
[00:55:48.030] - Beth
Yeah, I like what you said. I think Milan tackles that really well. And what makes Violet unusual, I think, is just that she wants the credit for her work. Like, Hey, I did the work. But more for practical things. I think she does want the credit for it because that is also nice. But I think just practically, she's like, I want to keep doing this, and it just would be easier if everyone knew it was me and not Sebastian. After she's over her worry about how the ramifications of her being known for this work will affect her family. I don't know a ton about women's contributions to science, but I feel like in literature, you had feign this modesty when you published a book. So I feel like that's what Violet is violating, essentially, is that she's not trying to feign this modesty at this point in the book. Then back to your question, Emma, about how like, Milan changed the history and science in her book to suit her narrative, which I think just fits in with the tradition of historical fiction. I'm surprised if authors don't change things. There's a whole YouTube channel.
[00:56:57.590] - Beth
What's his name? Or You just will literally look at an adaptation and see how it stacks up to the history of it. And I'm like, Yeah. Because like, every... Like, someone's life story or just history is not a neat narrative. But when you're telling the story, you have to combine some things. So, yeah, that just makes a lot of sense to me.
[00:57:22.970] - Emma
Yeah. And I think what Milan does, and I think I get it this way in a second, but Milan does like, world building. That's the thing. Is If you're going to change things, you have to do this world building. I feel like as someone who has railed against wallpaper romances in the last year, and this has gotten me the most attention of my writing people, I'm anti-wallpaper. I don't think I'm anti-wallpaper. I'm not an anti-wallpaper reader. I love wallpaper romances. But when you change things and you're not relying on just the history as your world building, you have to do the world building, and that's hard to do. That's a hard thing to pull off. The fact that Milan has... She finds this paper about violets that has the actual historical paper has someone acknowledging their wife, and it's this neatness there. She can't make that history happen. She just finds it because she's able to research and it works well on all these levels, and she's able to integrate that into her books. If you're doing things like a wallpaper romance where things are just different than the way I'm expecting when I enter the Victorian period, you have to explain it to me.
[00:58:23.540] - Emma
That's why when you talked about Anne Mallory, she wrote a ghost romance. It's like, I believed that there were ghosts. It made sense in the Regency there. She built that world where I'm believing that there aer ghosts. I think maybe that's something that romance could learn from other genres, especially historical romance, where I think we... This is also an issue I have with contemporary romance. I feel like sometimes contemporary romance authors don't feel like they need to do world building because it's just now. I still want to know where these characters are, what's going on with them. But for World Building, I think there are a couple of other authors, Jeannie Linn and Beverly Jenkins, are two that I think that we've talked about that have this justification in their historical notes. We've talked about the heightened demand for authors of color to do this when they're writing about characters of color. But I do really enjoy those authors' notes, and I wish that it didn't feel like a bigger ask for them. I just wish that maybe more authors included authors' notes like this. But it gets us something that we love about historical romance and also get frustrated with in Wallpaper Romance, where there's this big speech about the rights of women made by a Duke.
[00:59:22.430] - Emma
In Milan's research, she finds a woman who is intimately connected to the research she's using to justify her historical set dressing. She doesn't have to fabricate totally new to justify a heroine who 2012 audience will tolerate or have fun with. But she also isn't opposed to more removed plots from history as well. I was thinking about her latest series, her Wedgeford Trial series, that takes place in an invented town that is half populated by Asian immigrants and their offspring. It's a town in England that is mostly populated by Chinese immigrants. I think there's some people who are not immigrants from China because everything's in Asian, and so there must be a reason why it's more broad. But the book that I read was Chinese immigrants. But it's still grounded in some truth because there are immigrant neighborhoods that exist and create communities. This is a thing that happens, so it makes sense. I compare it to something like Tessa Dare's Spindle Cove, where there's an invented town. That invented town exists as a suburb of Huydans who don't realize how beautiful they all are and all have hot girl hobbies. That's not a thing that ever happens, so there's nothing for me to hold on to.
[01:00:18.910] - Emma
But there are immigrant communities, and this is the thing that happens, that people come together and stay together with a shared language and shared culture. Even if that didn't literally happen in Regency England, there's something going on that makes sense of why Milan would want to explore it, opposed to something that's totally wallpapery made up. I'm interested in where she continues to go with her more removed history, because I think she pulls it off the continued world building.
[01:00:48.820] - Emma
When this episode goes live, I'm going to post a selfie that I took when I first read the Violet speech for the first time. I sent it, I think maybe to Chels and Beth or maybe my roommate because I was like, I've never felt this way during a book before. I thought on reread that I might find this speech a little hokey. I still cried. I cried again. Something about it gets me so bad. Everything I love comes back to how well Milan integrates things. Details come back and have new meaning to and threefold. Each of the speeches in the book, Sebastian's first lecture, when he gives before he breaks the break with Violet, the Violet speech, which makes me cry so much, and then Violet's own lecture at the end on chromosomes, are these big punctuation moments for the transitions in the relationship.
[01:01:28.800] - Emma
I thought we could talk here about the pace of the relationship that we're coming to. We're coming to the relationship in the middle of it. They already have all this history, and we get these hints of history, not quite in flashbacks, but in memories. Then it doesn't really have any big breaks outside the first one. For all the emotional turmoil, I always feel like Sebastian and Violet will know... They know that they're going to work it out somehow. I don't think either of them ever fully believes that they're never going to speak together again, even during that two-week break when they don't talk for a while.
[01:01:56.650] - Haley
Yeah. I think the last time I read this book was in 2022, and I actually do remember feeling frustrated with the pace on that reread. I was just like the whole time, I felt like I was like, Just kiss, kiss.
[01:02:09.920] - Beth
It just took a while.
[01:02:12.140] - Emma
It's a slow burn. It takes a while. Yeah.
[01:02:15.550] - Haley
With this reread, I actually felt totally different. I felt like the pace made perfect sense for these two. We enter into the narrative when Sebastian has been in love with Violet for a long time with no real hope or need for her to reciprocate. It's not like he's given up, but he's resigned, I guess. And then his resignation turning into joy as Violet starts turning towards him through the story. That is one of my favorite arcs. And as always, I read some negative reviews of this book to get my blood pumping. One complaint that I saw over and over again was that... I have to know who I'm fighting. I need to know who my enemies are. I support that. Thank you, Beth. But one of the ones that and it was actually mentioned multiple times, was that we never know what it is exactly about Violet that made Sebastian love her. But I think that's the point. What Sebastian sees in Violet, what no one else does, and what she cannot see for herself, and he loves her so much that he's willing to do whatever it is that she needs over necessarily even what he wants for himself.
[01:03:21.910] - Haley
So it doesn't really matter why he loves her. He does. And we get to witness Violet's slow reckoning with someone knowing her as well as he does and wanting more of her and not less, which is what she feels like with her first marriage and even the relationship with her father prior to that, where it's like she, Violet herself, was not enough for somebody, and so she's just decided that she doesn't need to really exist as a person. She shrunk herself down like a shrinking Violet, and then she's just removed herself. She's just become so interior, and And she doesn't think that anybody really cares about her as a person. But then there's Sebastian always there. And then I actually even love the way he declares himself, where he's like, Listen, Violet, I'm in love with you. So we're just going to... And she's like, Sorry, what? He's like, I'm in love with you. But it's fine. Don't worry about it. And he's like, No, I'm going to worry about it. What?
[01:04:28.360] - Beth
Yeah, I feel like that's the strength of friends to lovers. Like, your friends, you have an existing relationship. I don't know. You just love each other.
[01:04:37.530] - Emma
Right.
[01:04:38.080] - Beth
Do we feel like lectures are part of friends to lovers? If you have an existing relationship- That's very Emma.
[01:04:44.140] - Emma
I know.
[01:04:45.460] - Beth
I was literally thinking of that, too. Mr. Knightley is dressed in someone down. But if you have this relationship and you feel like you can say something to this person you care about, it Who else are you going to go at?
[01:05:03.710] - Emma
Because Violet can't interrupt him. And she thinks about doing it. She's like, Oh, my God. I have to stop him from doing this right now. Or she thinks he's going to reveal the secret in that moment. And It's like, but he has to have her be a captive audience because she's not going to understand unless he speaks in code. So it also has to be this thing that only she gets. I think that's something that I think Violet struggles with when you were talking about, we don't know why Sebastian loves Violet so much. I think Sebastian loves Violet in a way. She thinks that Sebastian loves everyone, and she doesn't realize that she's getting special attention from him because she's like, Sebastian is just gregarious and fun and everyone loves Sebastian, and he loves everyone. It's like, Why am I special? But it's like not until... It's like when he speaks in code, he's able to reveal. It's like, Oh, I do give positive attention to lots of people I care about. You are different. You get something special. She gets these moments where... Also, I think she feels about her feelings towards Sebastian. I was Obviously, I'm attracted to Sebastian.
[01:06:01.640] - Emma
Everyone's attracted to him. She doesn't realize that she's also in love with him. Her feelings towards him are... Not everyone would do those things for him. She just doesn't realize how special it is unless he speaks in those coded moments. I think the lecture really serves that where it's Like, it has to explicitly be like, I just like you this way.
[01:06:21.060] - Beth
No one else.
[01:06:22.390] - Emma
Right. And not even just like, if you said that to her directly, she's like, Oh, it's platonic, right? We love each other platonically. It's like something off the code actually makes it easier for her to understand, which works for their whole communication style.
[01:06:37.460] - Beth
We've been talking a bit about how Sebastian has showed up for Violet, which I like. But also the end when Violet goes to see Benedict and be like, Hey, you're being a huge asshole to your brother, actually. What she says to him, she talks about all the things that he's been doing, that Sebastian has been doing for Benedict without... He's still making him smile, even though Benedict has been horrible to him and stuff. But She's like, And he's precious. He's precious, and you're treating him badly. And I was like, Okay.
[01:07:06.380] - Haley
I think it's interesting to think about, and then Sebastian's right behind her, and she didn't know. It's interesting to contrast the alley scene where it's both of these moments of vulnerability that the other party witnesses without the first party realizing, that gives them a demonstrated, obvious and external demonstration of connecting a feeling to an action. Violet realizing, oh, no, no. Sebastian is interested in my body. He likes me, likes me. And then Sebastian sees Violet saying, his mind is important. You know what I mean? I think that's interesting. And then the way that they are both so taken aback and also like, oh, no, they do. Like, It's so telling. It's very revealing. I love that.
[01:08:04.410] - Beth
Yes, I like what you're saying. It's the same scene, but in reverse of where the appreciation is going and how that changes the relationship. Where she's like, yes, Sebastian is attractive, but also smart.
[01:08:17.470] - Haley
He has a good mind.
[01:08:21.320] - Beth
Also a good person. I think maybe that was more her point. Yeah, he's a great person and you are being bad.
[01:08:28.470] - Haley
He's so mean.
[01:08:29.840] - Emma
So mean. Yeah, so I wanted to talk about both of Sebastian and Violet's siblings because this is another parallel they have. So they both have a sibling who doesn't totally get them. So we see Sebastian and Benedict's relationship be repaired by the seeing of Violet going to see Benedict and be like, Hey, you got to ship up and be nicer to your brother. But Violet and Lily have a pretty severe break that we don't really ever come back from. And I'm not sure if we could. It's pretty emphatically cruel in a way that I would have a hard time forgiving Lily for this. I think it's one of the most painful seeds to read in the book. We could talk about that and just general sibling dynamic stuff. I think the scenes of Benedict and Sebastian are more typically the dynamic between a second son and a brother with a title, where one sibling realizes they've been misinterpreting the affection that they assumed was there. I think Violet and Lily's scenes also mirror that. But then I think Milan here is also subverting second son syndrome because really, Sebastian has a chip on his shoulder, but he has this...
[01:09:26.720] - Emma
Because he doesn't... Benedict is not giving him the affection he wants. But Benedict does not the super capable older brother who everything's working for in the second son is the fail son. It's actually the opposite. Benedict is the heir, so he falls into these things, but he has to work really hard to get the place that he's in in his business. Well, Sebastian, he points out everything comes really easily to him. That's the dynamic that Benedict struggles with. Again, she's flipping a very classic romance trope.
[01:09:52.300] - Beth
Yes, I agree with that. This time around, when I read the book, I was shocked by Benedict's cruelty. So Benedict raises Sebastian after their parents pass away. So Sebastian views Benedict more as a father figure, therefore holds him higher in his estimation because of that. And I don't think Benedict sees Sebastian as a son figure. So his treatment of Sebastian is much more sibling-like, in my opinion. Not that parents can't be jealous of their kids, but this one scene. So it's after Sebastian makes a bunch of money through shipping and then meets with Society for the Betterment of Respectable Trade, which Benedict refers to as my society. So he's there. And so Sebastian is trying to be like, hey, no, I have worth. I can do things. Look what I did. And Benedict accuses him of being all flash and no substance. So Sebastian tells Benedict he's being unfair, which he is. Then Benedict says, you forget. I understand you. They didn't grow up with you. Every person who meets you today walks away with stars in his eyes, blinded by brilliant lights. But I've seen you all my life, and you can't hide from me.
[01:11:05.090] - Beth
Behind your jokes and your pleasant words and your flashing smiles, you're nothing. The rest of the world will give you all the accolades it has to offer. But someone has to remind you of the truth about yourself, and that person is me. Kudos to me for not jumping into this book and punching Benedict in the face. I was still stunned, even after just reading that. That is so mean and so cruel. It feels like the thing that Benedict has been telling himself all his life. Like, he's just all flash and no substance. He's not actually good at these things. And we eventually learned Benedict has always been jealous of Sebastian because things come easily to him. But yeah, at the root of this, I do like the ugliness of Benedict's actions. He is cruel and mean, and there's distance in this relationship, and it's Benedict's fault.
[01:11:59.120] - Emma
And yeah, it's It's good. He's also actively dying while this is happening. Yeah, he's probably harping. I think you can imagine that... I mean, he's probably acting out. It's like he's experiencing... I think this is one of the reasons why maybe Sebastian and Benedict can repair their break is that Benedict's actions are motivated by care for his son that's misplaced is this worry, anxiety for Harry, is the son's name. But also he's dealing with the fact that he's going to die young. Even though he's not dead at the end of the book, it's like he has a heart condition that he knows will be the reason that he dies. It's like, whenever this he has this terminal condition. He's dealing with his mortality, which is something we don't often see in romance, this person that we meet and have to repair a relationship, or then we know that they're going to die. I think Sebastian maybe is able to afford a little bit more compassion for Benedict, and also the reader is able to, because he's in a crisis unlike Lily, who's just a bitch. She's so mean to Violet.
[01:12:55.610] - Haley
Yeah, no, you're right. I agree with that. It's so mean too, because Benedict clearly had that locked and loaded. He was ready. That was right there. He's been stewing on this. It's so real, too, that Benedict has held on to his anger for so long. He wants to be angry more than he wants to allow Sebastian to change his mind, because there is nothing that Sebastian... Sebastian keeps bringing these things in like a little dog, trying to get his, Okay, you want me to do this? I'll do it. But it doesn't matter. It's just classic older sibling behavior. But this question also connects back to the way that Milan folds that miscommunication into the narrative in multiple ways. Both Violet and Sebastian are struggling to have honest conversations with their siblings, in part because there's purpose this full withholding of information, whether it's actions or thoughts or feelings. But the contrast in the sibling relationship is so good, too. Lily is outwardly doting on Violet, but ultimately, their relationship is broken by Lily's anger towards Violet's reticence, which is a reaction that comes not from Lily being hurt that Violet didn't share this part of herself with her as her sister, but from anger that Violet hasn't been to her will.
[01:14:09.000] - Haley
Lily wanted something out of Violet that Violet ultimately wouldn't give. And Lily's reaction is like, You are so selfish. This is your fault. All of this is your fault. You've ruined my life. And won't speak to her anymore. Whereas Benedict starts out truly cruel to his brother and is so angry throughout the novel with Sebastian, but the anger has cooled following Benedict's personal revelation that he's always been jealous of Sebastian, and that that's like, ruining the relationship. So that relationship, which seemed like on the verge of fracture, all the way up to the very end, is actually the one that endures.
[01:14:45.140] - Beth
Well, yeah, there's not to be... But like Emma said, there's a time limit here. They got to wrap it up before. I'm glad you brought that up because I know he's dying, and I actually like that he's lashing out cruelly in death. I feel like sometimes people want to I'm like, Sand that down and make it seem like you get all introspective when you're about to die and you're not angry in any way when, yeah, you would be 10 times more angry, especially if you're dying young. I don't know, the older I get, if I hear someone who died in their 70s, I'm like, That's so young. You're a baby still. So he's what? He's 30s, 40s?
[01:15:22.560] - Haley
He's got a young son, too. That would be... There's so much anguish there.
[01:15:28.940] - Beth
Yeah. So I get that. And then Lily, yeah, she's just bad. Emma and I were talking before we started recording about there is no reconciliation with Lily and Violet. But just as you were talking, Haley, I'm like, well, she's got her mom, though. She does as part of her family, but she keeps her mom. Her mom's got her back.
[01:15:50.590] - Emma
I will mention this in the plot summary, but I think that's the big, I guess, the surprise of the novel is that because of this miscommunication, that Violet thinks that her mother is rejecting her, but then ultimately, when she reveals the actual fraud that has happened, her mother's incredibly proud of her and basically says, I can't believe that you've done something like this on your own, given the circumstances of your father's death by suicide. And all these things, she's like, You're mine. I always cry at the line where she's like, We protect what's ours and you're mine. I'm going to start crying now! It gets me. It's Violet. Violet learns that if she can be herself, and there are going to be people who are going to accept that. Sebastian is one of them. Her friends are one of them. She suspected that her mother would not be one of them, but her mother is one. It's like that's something that she just never thought was an option. I think We talked a little bit, I think before the recording, or maybe at the beginning of the episode, about the rules that her mother has. I think Beth and I were talking about how Violet reads neurodivergent while Lily doesn't.
[01:16:55.610] - Emma
Violet holds on to these rules that her mother writes for this ladies' deportment that she wrote, as part to fund their lives after the father's death by suicide. Also to help the girls not create their own scandals because they were like, We can't recover from both your father's death this way and also a scandal involving you. So they have the public rules and the private rules. And Violet is much more sympathetic to her mother about the writing of the rules. Lily thinks they're pretty stupid and is like, I don't want my daughter to learn these. We can ignore them. They're not real. But Violet, who is written as more neurodivergent, She locks into things and can't hear things when she's working. She gets this monomanical focus on things. She holds onto the rules like a lifeline. It's like, If I follow these rules, I won't be rejected. I think at the end of the book, she learns sometimes people will reject you, and that behavior is cruel, and you can call it cruel and say that's a cruel thing for them to do. Then also, sometimes people won't reject you. It doesn't matter if you're following the rules or not.
[01:17:55.140] - Emma
It's just the way that life goes sometimes, is that you have to make your way with the people who are going to accept you.
[01:18:00.920] - Beth
Yeah, I'm not a fan of conduct books. I think we should poke fun at them. But yeah, I read that it's funding their lives, but also I could see potentially mother being neurodivergent as well, being like, Well, some people need help the social rules, this would be helpful if I outlined it. So yeah, I don't know how to reconcile the Lily thing.
[01:18:24.520] - Emma
I mean, Lily, I think the same thing with realizing the Lily's cruelty extends to the number of Violet's miscarriages. Violet never tells her mother or her sister how many miscarriages she had, but her mother's like, Yeah, I know what my daughter looks like when she's pregnant, and I know that you don't have a baby. I could guess that you were miscarrying. It's like, Lily probably has the same level of intimacy and knowledge of Violet. But it says pretty cruel things about Violet not having children offhand. That's the first hint of her cruelty is that she says things that indicate that she has more value because she has 11 children. It's Yeah, I don't know where I was going with this, but it's another parallel. Again, Violet's mother accepts something about her that-
[01:19:08.670] - Beth
Like, Milan is planting the seed, so it's not surprising when each of these characters react the way that they do.
[01:19:14.460] - Beth
But also Also, just because you mentioned the miscarriages, did I make this number up? Was it 19? That's insane, right? It was a lot, yeah. Over a decade. I get that, but that is devastating.
[01:19:24.540] - Emma
I think it was two a year, at least.
[01:19:26.650] - Beth
That's awful. I can't even imagine.
[01:19:28.850] - Haley
I mean, the physical that that would take on you. Then they talk about that, that Violet was just sick and dying. Sebastian knew he was like, She did something really wrong, and I don't know what it is.
[01:19:41.080] - Beth
He's like, I don't- Well, he knows that after her husband dies- That it stops, that she gets better.
[01:19:45.430] - Haley
Yeah.
[01:19:46.450] - Beth
Again, shout out to Violet's mom. A hero, my gosh.
[01:19:51.490] - Emma
Yeah, she did nothing wrong. At least in that one instance. Maybe there were other parenting decisions she made that were cruel, but this one, it's gold star. We can talk a little bit about how pregnancy and birth control is handled here. I wasn't sure if we wanted to talk about it too in-depth because we do cover this book in our pregnancy episode because I think it's really unique in how it handles this. I think there's so many characters in historical romance who are either infertile or don't want to have kids. We have the accidental pregnancy. I don't know if I've read someone. There's some characters who have miscarriages, but often it's times it's characterized as a miscarriage, and then they want to have a child, and then they're rewarded with a child at the end of the book. There's a Lisa Kleypas book like this. This central conflict between Violet and Sebastian is that she's terrified of penetrative sex because she does not want to get pregnant again. She's so innocent because her husband is the way that he was. She doesn't realize that their sex lives can be more expansive. And that's the thing I always point to this book.
[01:20:47.660] - Emma
It's like, I wish the historical romance had more expansive sex lives. I don't know why there's ever an accidental pregnancy in a book because you can do things that don't lead to pregnancy. That's actually historically what would have been happening. It was like, lots of people engaged in sex acts that didn't involve penetrative penis and vagina sex. That's how they avoided pregnancy. Sebastian's like, Yeah, we can have fun without ever having penetrative sex, or if we do, we can use condoms. You can see that even when he lists the scene that Haley read where he lists out his partners. He's like, 37 if you include mutual masturbation, which he does. It's like, yeah, he sees these non-penetrative acts of sex as sexual relationships, which it is. That's one of those things Because I feel like books now belie a really conservative world bench that they still have this supremacy of we are at the peak of our relationship when we are having penetrative sex that is reproductive. It bugs me so much. And this is a standout because I don't think there are a lot of books that... We know that the couple is probably not going to be having that much penetrative sex in the course of their lifetime, or it's always going to be protected
[01:21:54.090] - Haley
Yeah, she's always like, We can't do this a lot, but maybe occasionally.
[01:21:57.480] - Beth
Yeah, and I feel like the peak of I feel like this conversation where they talk about condoms is later in the book. But I feel like I see that more as an evolution of Violet's trust that Sebastian has your best interest at heart, not that, here's the supremacy of us having penetrative sex. It's like, You've thought this through, you're not going to afford it. You know what I mean? Like, this is... He's got her.
[01:22:20.940] - Emma
Right. And she's... There's a line she thinks where she's like, you're a rake, how could you be with someone who can't have sex with you? And he's like, I don't want to have sex with someone who doesn't want to have sex with me, but I do want to be you. It's so hard for her to conceptualize that he could be in love with her and this non-physical relationship, which I think is partially her conception of rakes, but also her conception of her husband. That was all she was good for, for her husband. And it's just... This book was published in 2012, and I still feel like it's one of the best examples of this alternative journey of other sex acts, which lots of people... One of my least favorite things that happens is when a male character has an ED, and then the heroine solves it. I'm like, That would be a perfect plot to have alternative sex acts. People who have erectile dysfunction have sex lives. I don't know why we have to solve this problem with this one type of act It feels so straight and heterosexual in a way that I'm like, why are we still doing this?
[01:23:20.410] - Emma
It drives me crazy.
[01:23:21.450] - Beth
Right. Also, condoms were invented. Our vulcanized rubber was used for condoms in 1855. And then I were googling this, and I just have to info-dump an author in a romance novel, just by the way. And this book was 1867. So we figured he's a rich guy. He's got access to stuff.
[01:23:41.760] - Emma
I do think it's very romantic in the moment when she asks him what it is and he says vulcanized rubber. And as he's putting it on, he's like, If you ask me about the process at this moment, you owe me two ices. He knows exactly what she's thinking. She's like, How do they do that?
[01:23:54.850] - Haley
Don't ask questions right now. We'll come back to this. Okay.
[01:24:02.400] - Emma
Any other thoughts about Countess Conspiracy by Courtney Milan? We love this book. It holds up.
[01:24:07.740] - Beth
It's a good book. Ten out of ten.
[01:24:09.060] - Haley
I could talk about it for an eternity.
[01:24:11.890] - Beth
Well, we'll do another episode with you, just It's hard, too. It's hard, too. It's hard, too.
[01:24:16.170] - Haley
It's hard to keep going about. It is a standout. It really is. I'm always reminded that when I realized, Hey, this was published 2012, 2013. I'm like, Nobody's doing this. Nobody's writing books like this right now. I haven't found its peer, except for ones that are around the similar time.
[01:24:39.100] - Emma
Thank you so much for listening to Reformed Rakes. If you like bonus content, you can subscribe to our Patreon at patreon. Com/reformedrakes. You can follow us on Twitter, Blue Sky, and Instagram for show updates. The username for all of them is reformedrakes, or email us at reformedrakes@gmail. Com. We love to hear from our listeners. Please rate and review us on Apple and Spotify. It helps a lot. Thank you again, and we'll see you next time.
