A lovely look back at the regency era of romance. Nice real life touches with quotes from letters written at the time.

This is a fascinating, entertaining and often deeply moving social history of women from the aristocracy and landed gentry (the 0.1%) in the Regency era in the UK. Carefully researched from primary sources including letters, diaries and newspaper articles, it frames its narrative around six women in particular but includes plenty of contextual information and details about their contemporaries. I found all the discussions of social customs and conventions interesting but was especially intrigued by the information about financial settlements, marital infidelity, and 19th century divorce law and practice.

As a long-time reader of historical fiction and romance, I’ve often come across characters or plot lines that appear outlandish or flat-out unbelievable, but I take back all my eye-rolling - truth is at least as strange as fiction in many respects and my jaw dropped at some of the experiences related in this book. Some of my preconceptions about social conventions of the era were also dispelled by facts such as the average age of first marriage for aristocratic women of this period being 25 years, much later than is suggested by much popular fiction and television productions, and the amount of and variation in work that upper class women could and did do outside the domestic sphere.

I really enjoyed reading this book. The writing style is very accessible without being in any way dumbed down, and unlike the majority of history books I read, it is not overloaded with footnotes to interrupt the reading flow. I highly recommend this for anyone who reads historical fiction and/or historical romance, or who simply has an interest in women’s history.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance reader copy.

The Game of Hearts has a romantic and playful name and cover, and yet the reading of the text leads to an almost stale, dispassionate expanse of the world of the Regency era. I enjoyed more so the latter part of the book, which is where I feel we have more a delve into the real crux of these women and the impact of things such as how the law sways their decisions. A lot of the time it felt like I was reading the name tag of a woman and then a quote from her diary, and with that there was little heart to really connect me to these people. However despite these little problems I can understand the magnitude that this book tries to undertake. It just needed more of a focused streamline and sensibility to guide it. But if you are willing to be thrown into the deep end then The Game of Hearts will be an interesting read.

I think a lot of us have been enamoured by the regency era, from Jane Austen to Bridgerton, swept up into the romance of it all and the intricate history behind the era. This book was absolutely fab in bringing an element of realism into the enchanting romance of the time.

It was well written with greatly conducted research. We get insights into real life events of the time and it reads easily however it can be quite a big, heavy chonk of information. I was occasionally quite daunted by the large chunks of text and long chapters which had me taking regularly breaks, probably a good thing really to help me absorb and digest more of the information. I would have loved some original extracts from letters of the day rather than little snippets.

I had thought there would be more of a focus on individuals shining a light on their stories but names were peppered in throughout so I felt a slightly disconnected to the flow of people and information but the format was a good one once you got into it - I just think I was expecting something different!

I think if you have a prior interest and a curiosity into this era, this is mostly certainly the book for you! I really enjoyed learning about the people of regency and their lives and all things marriage and romance.

I loved the use of diaries and letters to understand and learn more about the woman and romance of the Regency period,

The Game of Hearts offers a glimpse into the lives of real women who sought love in Regency-era London, focused on six leading ladies and their social circles. Felicity Day draws from diaries, letters, and newspaper accounts to reveal the experiences of these women, with tales as scandalous as those in any fictional Regency romance novel!

I love Regency romances and recently have been really interested in reading more non-fiction about the period, which is what drew me to this book. I recently read a sort of beginners' guide to the period which didn't end up passing on much extra information than I'd already picked up just from reading novels, and left me disappointed. Whereas The Game of Hearts really does get deep into the detail and cover lots of specific information and insight about the period by looking at certain ladies' lives.

Some of the earlier chapters were tasked with doing a lot of upfront work, as there were a lot of intertwined and complex relationships and family connections to explain, which wasn't helped by a lot of the women and men sharing forenames or surnames. However, as the named people reappear throughout the chapters, I ended up with a pretty extensive catalogue of names and histories in my head! Once I started to keep track of everyone, it was much easier to read and I really enjoyed all the new information I learned about the era.

The content:
Introduction - The book starts with a good introduction which explains the Regency period clearly and sets the scene well for the upcoming stories. It also provides context and appreciation for how advantaged and small this group of elites really was.
Ch1-2: These chapters focus on Lady Sarah Spencer as well as mentioning lots of people that reappear in later chapters. Drawing on the experience of these people helped to further introduce details of Regency life.
Ch3 - This chapter covers Sydney Owenson, women in employment, spinsterhood and marriage later in life.
Ch 4 - This chapter introduces Frances Anne Vane-Tempest and the public court case her aunt took against Frances' betrothed, which attracted public and media attention like a modern day celebrity divorce case does.
Ch 5 - This chapter focuses on Harriet Fane and her long and windy tale of marriage settlements.
Ch6 - This chapter covers special licenses, marriage ceremonies and honeymoons.
Ch7 - This chapter introduces Magdalene De Lancey, marriages to men in the armed forces, death of a spouse, mourning and remarriage.
Ch8 - This chapter follows Lady Augusta Boringdon, adultery, separation and divorce.
Ch9 - This final chapter finishes with detailing the fate of the 6 leading women.

I really enjoyed this non-fiction book about the Regency period, and it did a really good job of explaining the social rules and the laws of this time. And it did this by highlighting the lives of 6 real Regency women who I had definitely never heard of before, so I learned a lot from this book.

Note: There appears to be two entries for this book on Goodreads but with different taglines (True Stories of Regency Romance Vs The Lives and Loves of Regency Women) so I will post this review against both books.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC from NetGalley but this is my voluntary and honest review.