The Songbird’s Seduction by Connie Brockway

Narrated by Heather Wilds

Although The Songbird’s Seduction is set in 1908, there is, thankfully, no sign of “Downton Abbey Syndrome”. It’s not set in a country house with storylines divvied up between upstairs and downstairs – in fact, the tone of the book is much more akin to the Screwball Comedies of the 1930s and 40s, and given that’s one of my favourite film genres, that was a very welcome discovery.

The heroine is Lucy Eastlake, a young woman who was orphaned at the age of seven and passed from pillar to post until coming to live with her great aunts Lavinia and Bernice. Now in her early twenties, she makes her living on the stage as a performer in light opera and operetta (think Franz Léhar and Gilbert and Sullivan). She has grown up listening to stories of her Aunt Lavinia’s life in India, whence that lady was dispatched to find a husband when she didn’t “take” during her London season half-a-century earlier. Lavinia never found a husband, although she did fall in love with a young lord, but sadly it seems her affections were not returned. On the eve of the siege of Patnimba, a stranger rode into the British compound, leaving a fortune in rubies in the hands of the occupants for safekeeping, on the understanding that they will be able to lay claim to them if they had heard nothing from him after fifty years. Well, the fifty years is up, and Lavinia is entitled to claim her portion of the treasure.

Lord John Barton has summoned his grandson, the young, up-and-coming professor of Anthropology, Ptolemy Archibald Grant, to his home in order to ask for his assistance. He wishes to have a letter delivered to a woman he met over fifty years ago in India, making over his share of a very valuable treasure to her, and then asks Ptolemy to escort her to France so that she can claim both her portion and his.

Grant is a rather reserved young man who views strong emotions and impulsiveness as the path to ruin; all traces of his boyhood enthusiasms and restlessness have been ruthlessly indoctrinated out of him by his starchy family. His grandfather sees much of his younger self in his grandson, and rather wishes the lad would cast off the bonds of conventionality from time to time, so he is pleased when Ptolemy – who has always preferred field-work to being stuck behind a desk – is enthusiastic at the prospect of travelling to the small mountain village of Saint Gironds in the Pyrenees, as he will be able to study some newly discovered pictograms. He heads off with his grandfather’s letter and is astonished when the door to the house to which he has been directed is opened by the young woman with whom he’d had a frustrating and ultimately rather embarrassing encounter at the Savoy the previous evening.

Lucy, deciding that “Ptolemy” doesn’t suit the piratically gorgeous man who has shown up on her doorstep very quickly takes to calling him Archie instead, completely ignoring his insistence that nobody calls him that. Although his offer of escort is initially turned down, Archie’s conscience won’t let him leave two elderly ladies and one infuriating younger one who, he’s sure, doesn’t speak any French – to make their way through France unaided.

When Lucy is inadvertently separated from her aunts, the Lucy and Archie show really gets going, and a very enjoyable show it is. Lucy is delightfully whimsical and quick witted, changing mental gears at the speed of light which usually leaves Archie rather endearingly bewildered or furious with her. I was impressed with the way the author maintains a good balance in the relationship that develops between them; there’s a danger, when you have a kooky heroine, of her leaving the hero standing so that he emerges as rather dim-witted, but that isn’t the case here. Even though Lucy is the more outgoing and audacious of the two, she doesn’t run rings around Archie. Those little peeks of unconventionality Archie’s grandfather has sometimes glimpsed mean that he is able to hold his own with Lucy, and to put the brakes on the runaway train of her sometimes crazy schemes.

As Lucy and Archie travel through France, they get into a number of scrapes ranging from doing a moonlight flit to joining a group of travelling players. It’s clear that while he finds Lucy exasperating at times, Archie is having the time of his life, but unfortunately, their luck can’t hold out forever. Not far from their destination, they are finally confronted with a situation Lucy can’t talk them out of which threatens to destroy their fledgling relationship.

All the way through listening to this audiobook, I was continually reminded of one of my favourite Screwball Comedies, Bringing Up Baby. Like that film, the hero is a rather stuffy professor with a managing, career-focused (and in this case, would-be) fiancée; the heroine is free-spirited, unconventional and falls in love with the hero almost on sight, unable to conceive of any other outcome than their being together. Their first, antagonistic meeting features a scene in which Archie inadvertently steps on Lucy’s hem and rips her dress – which is surely an homage to the restaurant scene in the film. Lucy’s bright optimism and fearlessness mask a touching vulnerability, rather like Susan’s (Katherine Hepburn) and of course, anyone familiar with it will recall that its male star, Cary Grant, was born Archibald Leach. Not that I’m complaining – Connie Brockway handles it all an incredibly deft touch and it’s impossible not to enjoy the characters’ journey together – both the actual road-trip and their gradually deepening attraction.

While Heather Wilds has generally received good ratings from me for her narrations, the last few audios of hers I’ve listened to have left me feeling somewhat frustrated because she has a number of habits and vocal ticks which have started to become rather obtrusive. She’s a very talented performer and has a beautiful, low-pitched and melodious voice, but her habit of snatching breaths in odd places can make sentences feel unbalanced and un-idiomatic because the inflection ends up in the wrong place. Fortunately, however, those problems happen less frequently here, or I was so wrapped up in the story that I didn’t notice them as much – but whatever the reason, I was more impressed with Ms Wilds’ performance in The Songbird’s Seduction than I have been with some of her other recent narrations.

One of the things I’ve always liked about her work is the way she portrays her heroes. Her naturally deep vocal register is a great asset as she is able to sound suitably masculine without sounding as though she struggles to maintain a lower pitch, and she has a particularly effective way of delivering their lines so as to make them sound both authoritative and attractive. She gives Archie’s speech a slightly clipped quality which emphasises his intelligence and competence without making him sound unappealing. She differentiates well between Lavinia’s aunts, and between all the secondary characters Lucy and Archie meet on their travels, using a variety of accents to (generally) good effect.

Overall, The Songbird’s Seduction is a very enjoyable listen and I’d certainly recommend it to anyone in the mood for something funny, warm and light-hearted.

Caz

Narration: B-

Book Content: B

Steam Factor: At the very, VERY mild end of Glad I had my earbuds in

Violence: Minimal

Genre: Historical Romance

Publisher: Brilliance Audio

The Songbird’s Seduction was provided to AudioGals by Brilliance Audio for a review.