Runaway Bride
By: Jane Aiken Hodge
Rating: 4 of 5
Jane Aiken Hodge was an author whose books I read when they were first published years ago. Most of her books have a more gothic feel, but this one is a Regency romance without any the dark brooding characters.
As a Regency romance of the period when it was written, it was a good one. That spanned the range of someone like Barbara Cartland to the master of Regencies (and who, I believe created the genre), Georgette Heyer. Some would try to put Jane Austen in this list but remember that she was writing stories during the Regency period itself and about her contemporaries rather than a made-up world of balls, intrigue, dashing heroes, and plucky heroines.
In “Runaway Bride”, all of those elements come to play. Jennifer Purchase is an extremely young woman of 17 whose hand is forced to run rather than marry someone she didn’t know. Her age, today, is of rather shocking but when these Regencies were written, it was par for the course. The two other authors I mention used heroines who were both younger and older in various books, as did Ms. Hodge.
Once Ms. Purchas has run away, it seems to become part of her DNA. When confronted with a new situation, the fight or flight takes hold and off she goes. It happens so frequently that it becomes almost Shakespearian comedy. The rest of the characters in the book revolve around her and her flights, as they try to catch up with her only to have her run once again.
The story is what happens when she actually touches down for a time in spot to spot. In that story, you find the meat of the tale. While it isn’t a filling meal of a story, it is a lot of fun to read. My favorites by this author are still the gothic stylings. She must have felt it, too, as this is the only straight up Regency I am aware of in her catalog of books.
As Ms. Hodge is also the author of “The Private World of Georgette Heyer”, a definitive work on the life of Ms. Heyer, I wonder if Ms. Hodge wrote this one Regency romance as a sort of homage to Ms. Heyer. Pure speculation on my part, but it could easily be the case. By the way, the Heyer biography is a wonderful read on its own.
For me, the book was a fun reminder of where and when I began reading books in earnest. For someone new to it today, it may seem a bit dated and perhaps not up the standards of today’s society (given the ages of the heroine 17 and her would-be hero, 35.) Still, a fun and lively romp in the traditional and clean PG-rated Regency style.
Jane Aiken Hodge was an author whose books I read when they were first published years ago. Most of her books have a more gothic feel, but this one is a Regency romance without any the dark brooding characters.