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yaragirl 's review for:
The Secret of the India Orchid
by Nancy Campbell Allen
The Secret of the India Orchard by Nancy Campbell Allen is the second in a series, though the name of the series has not been given. I did not realize this until after I began reading, though, you don’t need to have read the first book (My Fair Gentlemen) to enjoy this book. The book is part of the “Proper Romance” sub-genre which are romantic stories without any sexual content.
We then meet our young heroine Sophia traveling to India to get away. She had formed an attachment with her brother’s best friend Anthony, but he ends their friendship unexpectedly and leaves the country soon after, leaving Sophia confused and upset. In India, she runs into Anthony. There they rekindle their friendship while also getting involved in a pretty decent murder mystery. At the very beginning of the story, we learn that Anthony had intended in courting Sophia, but he’s forced to leave England immediately when his former boss and spymaster recruits him for an important mission.
Anthony’s mission because a central part of the story, as the documents he’s perusing have come into the ownership of a guest of the house Sophia is residing in while in India. The murder mystery is engaging as well as the description of the English colonization of India in the mid-1900’s century. Sophia is aware of the cultural misconceptions perpetrated by the British Empire and while she’s socially enlightened it’s not to an extent that would be incongruent with someone who had lived at that time.
The obstacles to the romance are not the focus of the story, the narrative is being pushed by the outside forces such as the murder and the search for the documents that are driving the narrative and are driving the interactions between the two characters. The romance eventually resolves itself in an organic way and we get very nice interactions between Sophia and Anthony. They had been best friends and we see why they had gotten along so well in the past.
I’ve noticed that the Proper Romance novels focus more on the social and cultural aspects of the story. It has a tinge of Jane Austin and the social commentary that she provided throughout her novels. And while these are not at that level, they still give us an interesting, though sometimes superficial, view of Regency culture.
We then meet our young heroine Sophia traveling to India to get away. She had formed an attachment with her brother’s best friend Anthony, but he ends their friendship unexpectedly and leaves the country soon after, leaving Sophia confused and upset. In India, she runs into Anthony. There they rekindle their friendship while also getting involved in a pretty decent murder mystery. At the very beginning of the story, we learn that Anthony had intended in courting Sophia, but he’s forced to leave England immediately when his former boss and spymaster recruits him for an important mission.
Anthony’s mission because a central part of the story, as the documents he’s perusing have come into the ownership of a guest of the house Sophia is residing in while in India. The murder mystery is engaging as well as the description of the English colonization of India in the mid-1900’s century. Sophia is aware of the cultural misconceptions perpetrated by the British Empire and while she’s socially enlightened it’s not to an extent that would be incongruent with someone who had lived at that time.
The obstacles to the romance are not the focus of the story, the narrative is being pushed by the outside forces such as the murder and the search for the documents that are driving the narrative and are driving the interactions between the two characters. The romance eventually resolves itself in an organic way and we get very nice interactions between Sophia and Anthony. They had been best friends and we see why they had gotten along so well in the past.
I’ve noticed that the Proper Romance novels focus more on the social and cultural aspects of the story. It has a tinge of Jane Austin and the social commentary that she provided throughout her novels. And while these are not at that level, they still give us an interesting, though sometimes superficial, view of Regency culture.