It is always a great feeling to discover a book that you didn't really know anything about before you picked it up and find that you can't put it down. Recently a new book, Lady Helen and the Dark Days Club caught my eye. The synopsis looked promising - young adult urban fantasy set in Regency London, and it involved Lord Byron (always a plus in my book).
I simply could not put it down, yet at the same time I didn't want it to finish - the curse of many a good book. The plot isn't terribly original (sparky heroine discovers she has special powers and is introduced to a secret supernatural underworld), there are many familiar tropes (tortured, but dashingly attractive Byronic hero etc), but the quality of the writing and the attention to period detail - such as the inclusion of the real life assassination of the British Prime Minister Spencer Perceval - in the setting make for an excellent read.
Young adult urban fantasy is an extremely popular genre (see Twilight, Fallen, Vampire Academy etc, as is Georgian / Regency fiction like Georgette Heyer, and Jane Austen and her imitators, so it is kind of fun for an author to mash up these genres to create something that is both familiar and fresh. And which uses words like 'gallivanting' and 'fornication'.
Add a comment to: In which Katherine indulges her weakness for Lord Byron