A cross-post from The Regency Redingote: Though seldom used today, gimmel rings had been in use since the late Middle Ages as wedding or betrothal rings. And they continued to be used for that purpose right through the Regency. Long before the Regency began, a variation on this type of ring had become even more…
Today, romance author, Judith Laik, shares her views on the third of Georgette Heyer’s Regency-set novels, The Spanish Bride. This is a substantive novel for which Heyer did a great deal of research. Laik gives us a peek into the scope of research in which she is engaging in preparation for her upcoming Regency novel…
Almost a century ago, a teenage boy, suffering from hemophilia, was ordered to bed for an extended period of rest. To a bright, eager thirteen year-old, this was a devastating sentence of unutterable boredom. At this time, there were no game consoles, computers, the Internet, or even television. The radio had only recently become available…
The next "Regency" novel which Georgette Heyer published after Regency Buck was An Infamous Army. But it was a radical departure from her first Regency-set novel. Today, romance author Shannon Donnelly explains how An Infamous Army differs from Regency Buck as well as how it is connected to it, and other historical novels in Heyer’s…
The Beau Monde is pleased to begin our year-long celebration of the 80th anniversary of Regency romance with an article by Alina K. Field on the very first Regency romance novel, Regency Buck. Alina is a Regency romance author herself, as well as a Regency romance reader, and she brings both viewpoints to her discussion…
Eighty years ago, in 1935, the very first Regency romance novel went to press. That novel, Regency Buck, was written by Georgette Heyer. It was not her first novel. In fact, Heyer had been writing historical fiction for more than fifteen years, and Regency Buck was her seventeenth novel. She had set her stories in…
A cross-post from The Regency Redingote: How many Regency novels have you read in which the hero and his cronies share one or more rounds of brandy, drowning their sorrows, or in celebration? And how many times is that brandy served in a snifter, or a balloon? Yet that simply was not possible during the…
A cross-post from The Regency Redingote Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding are on the menu for traditional Christmas dinner in many homes in Great Britain and in parts of the former British empire, even today. They were, of course, a regular part of many British Christmas dinners during the Regency. But just what is Yorkshire…
The holiday of Thanksgiving as it is known in America was not celebrated in England during the Regency. Nevertheless, large game birds were an important part of the autumn season, for many English gentlemen devoted a great deal of time to shooting them. In today’s article, Regency romance author, Regina Scott, whose most recent book…
Kathryn Kane is today’s Featured Beau Monde Author. Kathryn is a historian and former museum curator who has enjoyed Regency romances since she first discovered them in her teens. She credits the novels of Georgette Heyer with influencing her choice of college curriculum, and she now takes advantage of her knowledge of history to write…