Dorothy Dunnett - why has it taken me so long?

The niggle that I have never quite managed to shake off, is how Lymond is so accomplished, so notorious, so well known to so many (history with Margaret Lennox etc) when he was only 21 and had been in exile/rowing in galleys since the age of 16. Even if he was 25, it would have been more believable. The contrast with Niccolo, who we first meet as a gawky youth is even greater as we watch his growth.

I'm now half way through The Ringed Castle. But I've found myself doing something I have not liked readers of othr books doing, criticising a trivial error by an author. Rose types in Cadfael for example. DD obviously has visited places and described them from her observations. Like Istanbul in PiF. Where she describes the plane trees. But when I was there, the guide was careful to explain that they were London Planes, and we expressed surprise that they were there. But separate from the geography, that is a hybrid which did not appear till the 17th century. So Philippa could not have seen them. I wish I hadn't known that! Because once the one thing that I know is wrong, I start to doubt the rest. Fortunately, I know nothing about Russia at the period!

I have just got the first Niccolo book on audible @moonshinepoursthroughmywindow as I started and didn't finish it years ago and thought audiobook my be better. The whole series is available. Can you get audiobooks through your library?

I'm a big Lymond fan, or at least Lymond books fan - the character himself is not one of my favourites. I've been reading them since I was in my teens. My favourite character is usually Richard, but on my last re-reading he began to get on my nerves for a while during the last two books - "you ought to see mum" veered almost into EastEnders territory where "she's faaaaaaamly" seems to trump anything else. What would we say to Lymond if he came on here saying how VVVU his DM was B?

I've never read Niccolo. When they were still coming out I was scared to, in case she died before they were all finished. Now I can't get hold of them. My local library service doesn't have them, although it did have Lymond (a newish edition without the awful covers).

If you're going to allow Heyer's heroes, then also Mr Darcy. The way he goes secretively to sort out Lydia and Wickham, and the opinion of his servants at Pemberley put him into that mould.
I wonder if Graves and Butler in attributing Homer of the Odyssey as a woman is a not so subtle put down. The Odyssey is not to be considered as equal to the Iliad or that boring book the Aeneid.
How lovely for Dunnett to have a husband she could see as her hero.

Wimsey is one of DD's influencers and she said her husband was another.

Dr Syn! I loved those as a child. There was a tv series with , I think, Patrick MacGoohan.

As Bart Simpson pointed out, the good looking rebel who plays by his own rules is a character women often fall for, and Lymond is a classic example. As are, for example, Han Solo, Capt Mal Reynolds of Firefly, most of Georgette Heyer’s heroes , Robin Hood etc etc. It’s a tribute to DD’s skill as a writer that she lifts Lymond above the stereotype.

I think I saw Wimsey cited on a page by DD, as a character she may have been influenced by, but he does have PTSD from WWI, and occasionally has spells of needing support, and somewhere, but it may have been another author, he was all for beating his son for some trivial breach.
I note how many of the attractive ones are the product of women's pens. It almost makes me think the Victorian chap (Butler?) who thought the Odyssey was written by a woman, because the rigging of the ship was wrong, was right.

I have always thought that Lord Peter Wimsey is the most similar fictional character to Lymond- daring, speaks many languages, very musical etc etc. However DLS fell in love with her creation so forgot to give him any weaknesses. Whereas Lymond has loads which ultimately make him more attractive.

Woke with the information of a real one. Patrick Leigh Fermor, initially as portrayed by Dirk Bogarde, but his bio in Wikepedia shows that Lymonds can actually exist.

Random tangent here as I await Pawn in Frankincense. Where else have I met a central character like Lymond? With elements of trickster, skills, basic decency (if under cover). Sir Percy Blakeney, Lord Peter Wimsey, Robin Hood, James Bond (uses women, though and trickery provided by Q), Dr Syn (nasty as a pirate, marries someone much too young), Odysseus, Sherlock Holmes (not likable). I thought I had another one but he's wandered off.
Can anyone suggest others?

The books are operatic though. In a less skilled writer they could have been very very dreadful.

I just finished a reread of the Ringed Castle. I'd forgotten just how harrowing parts of it are.

Actually, the Dame in the Tower "The screw may twist and the rack may turn, and men may bleed and men may burn..." sounds more like de Guise.

Have finished Disorderly Knights (must read the history to see if they were that bad). But the final scene in Edinburgh has struck me as being a bit operatic, and G&S at that. (Yeomen of the Guard, not the more comic ones.) Buccleuch just happens to be on the street, Lymond just happens to find him and Gabriel just happens upon him, and then they end up in St Giles with a full chorus of law officials and witnesses, after curfew. I hope there's no serious spoilers there. But it's so convenient. It only missed Mary of Guise coming in like Katisha as a dramatic contralto.
Anyway, I've the next two books ordered - both because it's a BOG10%O offer! I won't get any housework done.
What is odd is that I know I read them before, I remember talking about them with a friend, but none of it seems familiar so far. I am expecting familiarity with the seraglio passages, but the earlier stuff is totally unfamiliar. Odd. I did predict Gabriel's scar, but that was implicit narrative structure, not memory.

The Disorderly Knights have arrived. Just going to start. Liked the plotting of Queen's Play in which one could predict how useful Hughie would be in the finish!

That’s a really good point but I supposed it would have counted as a spoiler. Maybe its name changed.

I think Dunnett rather undersold Henry Lauder. My goodness, what a career.

I like his property Netherthrid!

Thanks for that. I think history as taught in my youth should have included more of the three nations, and Cornwall. I am disgustingly ignorant of Wales, Ireland and Scotland, and only after camping on the Lizard found out about Michael an Gof and a lawyer from Truro who led a protesting group up to Blackheath via Guildford where they won a battle only to be slaughtered at Blackheath. Knew about Trelawney because of the song. I know this is a tangent. But I'm just thinking we need a people's history, both of the people and the peoples. I've got a Welsh history, and an Irish. Must do something about Scotland. Pity Lymond is the upper class. Not the sort of Wat Tyler and Jack Cade.
Queens' Play has just arrived. Hooray!

Treaclewell - he was certainly called Henry Lauder and shortening it to Harry very likely, and a good joke too:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Lauder,_Lord_St_Germains

I must admit I was disappointed when I looked back that there didn’t appear to be a mention of Kilmirren in TLC. It felt like quite a presence, so I was hoping there had been mention of it having been passed down

Finished Game of Kings, ordered Queens Play. Interesting to compare the search for documents with Checkmate, but Will didn't have to go to such lengths to get them. And was the Advocate of the time really called Harry Lauder?

Eye's recovered and I have read on. I don't find listening a good way of enjoying books, though it may come to it. Can listen to plays, currently Wimsey, Strong Poison, but the battery ran out.
Must go to tip, tipping canisters of NO2 dumped by someone on the roadside which must remove from temptation to teens, before Sunak puts me in jail for possessing them. May be empty, though. Food grade, apparently, can't imagine what food uses it. Can imagine what use Lymond might make of the stuff!