Beauvallet - Book 32

To counter reading the serious book, Resisting Throwaway Culture, I was concurrently reading Beauvallet by Georgette Heyer.  This has got to be one of Heyer's fluffier concoctions.  The whole time I was reading it, I was picturing Errol Flynn in the lead role as the swashbuckling pirate Beauvallet who is at his cockiest when things are most dangerous. 

The novel is set during Elizabethan times.  Beauvallet is a pirate who is constantly harrassing the Spanish.  He's good friends with Sir Francis Drake and Queen Elizabeth herself is quite fond of him.  One day while in Spanish waters, he takes as prisoner the ex-governor of some Spanish colonial territory in the New World (I can't recall exactly) and his beautiful daughter.  The great Beauvallet falls for her hard.  He sets her down in Spain in deference to her father's ill health, but he's wooed her enough to promise that he'll return to whisk her away to be his bride.  But how can the famous pirate sneak into Spain to accomplish this task?

Lots of derring do, plot twists, sword fights, and breathless escapes.  Heyer of course is British all the way, so those dastardly papish Spaniards are pretty much all dolts who are nothing against the noble and brave Brits.  She gets in some jabs at Catholicism.    Her characterization of King Philip was interesting. 

This was a fun read mostly because Heyer is so good at incorporating so many lines and expressions from Shakespeare into the way she writes and the way people talk.  It's really a fun romp through Shakespearean language!  Beauvallet's valet, Joshua, is an amusing character as well.  But the book doesn't have the depth of some of her other books.  I believe she wrote it in 1929, so the author was young and doesn't present some of the more nuanced themes her other works can possess.

Two thumbs up if you can't find a good Errol Flynn film to watch and want that kind of diversion.  For more book reviews go to Read 52 Books in 52 Weeks.