The Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics
Ratings48
Average rating4
DNF - PG 48
Why?
Because I do not like the writing style. It's so, so very verbose. Everything is described well, but then we have to get even more in depth. Not only do we have to know what dress Lucy is wearing, but when she last wore it, how it makes her feel, how she got it, ect. (Which, fair, could almost be important to character development, but the way it was done, it's just extra words.)
Lady Moth is described as: ‘She was a complete confection, a richly, roundly luscious, perfectly domestic delicacy.' First of all, that too many words for me for how little it actually tells me of what she looks like. Also, I've dealt with it before when the author has a type that is very much not mine and it always makes things a little awkward. (I could have dealt with that, if not for the writing.)
I finally gave up when there's page upon page upon page of Lucy ruminating over Lady Moth not entering her husband's library, which means she was mistreated by him - I wonder if she likes women, but it's not about that, it's about how badly her husband treated her - I wonder if I could introduce her to science because she should love it as much as I do - but I'm so young, how would I ever help her.
Exhausting.
hmm I will say this was a liiittle bit of a letdown after [b:The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows 46041449 The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows (Feminine Pursuits, #2) Olivia Waite https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1582192213l/46041449.SY75.jpg 70946037], which is technically the 2nd book in this series but I had randomly picked it up bc a) I know romance “Series” don't usually need to be read in order and b) I was more interested in beekeeping than astronomy? Anywayyy this was still very sweet and I appreciate shining a light on the under-recognized contributions of women but also I think the other book just hit me better.
Let me start by saying that there were things this book did extremely well. The way it addressed the sexism, racism, and homophobia of the time period was excellent, and Waite is a talented author with a gift for uniquely lovely turns of phrase.
For all of these, I gave it an extra star.
Unfortunately, the romance itself was terrible. In short, it was poorly paced, poorly executed, and quite frankly boring as hell. I didn't even get a chance to enjoy the lack of a Big Misunderstanding, because a seemingly neverending series of Small Unnecessary Dramas took its place.
With that said, I quite liked both Lucy and Catherine as characters! I loved the general story and message very much, and the secondary characters were all terrific. They were well developed, and I am looking forward to seeing more of one in particular.
In conclusion, I think I would have enjoyed this book MUCH more, had the author not tried to force it to be a romance novel. The romance was not the driving force of the story, and to spend so many unnecessary words on it made the story drag on interminably. If the romance had been a subplot, allowing Lucy and Catherine's passions for their respective projects to shine and breathe life into the story, it would have been much stronger.
I do have high hopes for the next book in the series, though, and I will be giving it a shot! Fingers crossed for better relationship development and significantly less (metaphorical) U-hauling.
Ughhh this was so delightful and sweet and exactly what I needed right now. I'm so glad this is going to be a series.
This was really sweet! I think I'm discovering my romance niche: untold stories of women doing awesome things that we didn't think they did hundreds of years ago like badass astronomy and science and adventuring and such. Which makes sense because that's what I like about historical fiction in general. (And I'm realizing I like historical fiction more than I would have said I did!)