Best Georgette Heyer to start with?

[InsaneDame]

Just that really! Haven't read any before and seen her name pop up a few times so fancy trying one. Which is the best to start with?

bunty stop whatever you're doing immediately and start reading!

I love The Grand Sophie, and Frederica and also Friday's Child which is the source of my name.

However, any newbies who are going to take the consensus view and start with Sophie should be warned that although it's 98% brilliant, it comes with a poison pill in the form of a nasty slug of anti-Semitism which isn't visible in her other novels. So bear this in mind when making your choice.

Will do MyKingdom. I feel so ashamed of myself having ignored them all this time!

Depends which they are, Bunty.

As much as I love Heyer not all her books are brilliant. There are several I've read to shreds; there are several I've read precisely once and Never Again. Sometimes it just doesn't quite click.

However, if they're crap you'll at least be able to pick up one of the old faithfuls in consolation!

As much as I love Heyer not all her books are brilliant. There are several I've read to shreds; there are several I've read precisely once and Never Again. Sometimes it just doesn't quite click.

Oh, yes - absolutely. I've never read The Spanish Bride or Beauvallet or Royal Escape, I've started An Infamous Army at least three times and then just never got around to finishing it, and Friday's Child and Charity Girl are almost untouched. Others I have read more times than I can count since I discovered her on my mother's bookshelf as a teenager.

Love The Unknown Ajax, The Talisman Ring, The Grand Sophy, Frederica, These Old Shades, Devil's Cub....

The best contemporary ones that I have found to give GH a run for her money are Stella Riley or MM Bennetts. Everyone else falls short.

Although Jude Morgan is pretty good too now I come to think of it.

Hello my friends! Hurray for Georgette... She is my go-to author for a pick-me-up, especially The Grand Sophy, but The Unknown Ajax and The Toll-Gate are pretty fine too.

I really like her detective work, particularly later ones where her detectives are more rounded. I like the way characters from one story crop up in another.

ShutUp I love some of Jude Morgan's stuff. The one about Keats is so powerful and sad, sorry, I can't remember the name of it. I really didn't like the one about Shakespeare though (no I can't remember the name of that one either! In my defence I do have a non-sleeping baby so it's pretty much a miracle that I can type in a straight line). I think she (he?!) was trying to say something profound about the nature of his genius but ended up selling him short as this blank at the heart of his own story.

Jude is a he! I haven't read either of those but I do like his not-real-history novels and I loved his one about CHarles II and the Duke of Monmouth.

Frederica is my absolute favourite. I'm fairly amazed that anyone wouldn't like An Infamous Army - I think it's very clever the way she combines her normal type of story with meticulous historical research.

I enjoy An Infamous Army, especially since it was (possibly still is) a set text at Sandhurst.

I love An Infamous Army and think it's one of the best things GH ever wrote, but it's much more work than the others to read (unless one's into military history, I suppose), so I can see why not all posters enjoy it.

I love it too, as it brings characters and families from some of her other books :)

Regency Buck is fab. I love An Infamous Army and The Spanish Bride as well.

My other favourite is My Lord John, but it is medieval as opposed to Regency.

These old shades is my favorite! I was always going to call a dd Leonie but the. I didn't :-(

I'm utterly impressed by finding someone who enjoys My Lord John, I could never get through it at all.

"Arabella": my first and lovely yet no simpering simpletons ...
"The Grand Sophy", "The Reluctant Widow", "Faro's Daughter", all rollicking good fun ...

Well, just picked up The Grand Sophy from the library - can't wait to get stuck in. Will keep you all posted!

Hi MNers. Just wanted to say thanks again! I haven’t read a GH in ages and couldn’t decide what to buy next. 3rd hit on google lead me back, yet again, to MN. I just purchased The Grand Sophy. Very excited!! Thank you all!

I think Venetia is my favourite. But The Unknown Ajax, The Reluctant Widow and The Talisman Ring might be the funniest. I love The Toll Gate and I sigh for These Old Shades, although I find Leonie a bit annoying. Her lesser known books (which I think might be her later ones?) are engaging too - Lady of Quality is a charming romance of two very adult people. Heyer is my go-to comfort read when I need to keep the world at bay for a while.

I do think that Heyer has suffered unfairly as a writer, with the constant Jane Austen comparisons. Austen was writing contemporary social commentary; Heyer was writing historical fiction which just happened to be set in the Regency.

I think she's more a humourous writer in the vein of P G Wodehouse - but I find Wodehouse mostly tedious and Heyer always makes me laugh. Being a female writer her considerable accomplishments are subsumed into the despised category of "romance". Which isn't fair to Heyer or romance.

If you've exhausted Georgette Heyer, Loretta Chase is a witty writer of regency romances.