Narrated by Alex Wyndham
A Convenient Fiction is book three in Mimi Matthews’ Parish Orphans of Devon series, and the first of the set I’ve listened to (I read the first book, A Matrimonial Advertisement), and I confess I picked it up for review principally because Alex Wyndham is the narrator (the earlier books in the series were narrated by someone I don’t care to listen to). The author has a reputation as someone who pays attention to historical detail and accuracy in her novels, and her characters speak and behave in a way that is very period-appropriate – which isn’t something I can say about a lot of the historical romances published recently. Her writing is smooth and engaging and she has the knack for creating nicely simmering romantic chemistry between her protagonists – but if you’re someone who likes a bit of on-page action between the sheets in your romances, then you won’t find that here, as Ms. Matthews closes the bedroom door very firmly once the characters make it that far!
As the series title suggests, the novels focus on characters who grew up in an orphanage. The four boys forged strong friendships during their time there, and three of them have kept in touch since their childhoods, but one of them – Alex Archer, the hero of this book – disappeared without trace as soon as he left the place and his friends have heard nothing from him since. Living off his wits since the age of thirteen, Alex is now living a reasonably comfortable life in Paris, making his money (mostly) at the gambling tables. But this isn’t enough for him – he wants something more stable and to that end decides that he needs to find himself a wife with land and property. Perhaps having something of his own will enable him to find some sort of purpose in life and will fill the void he feels within himself.
But finding a rich wife is going to be difficult given that Alex is a nobody as far as society is concerned, and certainly doesn’t move in the circles that could afford him the sort of introduction he needs. But that changes when he meets George Wright in a French gambling club; in his cups, George talks about his childhood friend, young, beautiful Henrietta Talbot, heiress to Edgington Park in Surrey, and Alex seizes the chance to get what he wants. He manoeuvres George into deep play and by the end of the evening, George is in his debt to the tune of ten thousand pounds – a debt Alex says he will consider repaid if George will introduce him to Henrietta.
Since the death of her father over three years earlier, Laura Hayes has been struggling to keep a roof over her head, that of her invalid brother Teddy and her spinster aunt. When her father was alive they lived comfortably; Hayes senior ran a successful and profitable business, with a factory in London and a distillery in France producing Hayes Lavender Water and Hayes Lavender Soap, but some poor business decisions prior to his death have left Laura and Teddy in very reduced circumstances. The terms of their father’s will stipulate that if Laura is unmarried on her twenty-fifth birthday, then the whole of the business interests will go to Teddy when he turns twenty-one; as this is about to happen, Laura visits Harold Weatherwax, the family solicitor, who has been managing those interests since Mr. Hayes’ death, and is horrified to discover that Weatherwax is prepared to have Teddy declared legally incompetent so as to keep control of what remains of the business. But what can she do? Her twenty-fifth birthday is just two weeks away, and with no husband – and fearful that Weatherwax will carry out his threat against Teddy – she cannot challenge the terms of the will.
The story treads the expected path as Alex finds himself drawn far more to Laura than to Henrietta, whom he quickly discovers is self-centred and rather spoiled, but where it really impresses in is the author’s decision to make Alex something of a villain and then to slowly reveal the truth about what drives him and eventually redeem him. His actions in manipulating George are unpleasant to say the least, and Alex knows it; he knows (or rather, believes) he’s not a good man, carrying a shedload of guilt for past actions he keeps running from but can never escape.
Laura is a strong heroine; quiet, caring, dignified and determined, she has a plan to restart the family business and the know-how and fortitude to carry it out. She’s down-to-earth and, in a way, extraordinary in her ordinariness – she’s a woman of her time, but is no shrinking violet either.
With two such well-drawn protagonists and Alex’s redemption story woven into the mix, A Convenient Fiction should have merited a higher content grade, but the problem is that the romance is a bit dull, and after the half-way point, I began to get bored. I really liked the first part of the story, as Laura and Alex try to fight their mutual attraction because it doesn’t fit their plans – and find it impossible. They develop a caring friendship of sorts before finally admitting that they can’t do without one another and want to be together, even though (for a while) Alex tries desperately to cling to the fact that their relationship is really nothing more than the eponymous convenient fiction. I greatly appreciated their honesty and ability to communicate so that the stumbling blocks that might normally arise in a story like this are dealt with and avoided; but, and this is something I’ve found with other books I’ve read by this author – a great first half moves to a second which just… fizzles out. Just to be clear – I’m not talking about the lack of bedroom action; some authors can create as much heat with a kiss or touch as others can achieve in a full-blown sex scene – it’s a lack of intensity in the emotional attachment between the couple that brought this one into the ‘average’ bracket for me. That said, there are loads of four and five star reviews for the book on Goodreads, so I’m clearly a dissenting voice here.
As I said at the beginning, I picked up A Convenient Fiction for review mostly because of the involvement of Alex Wyndham, a narrator I’ve enjoyed listening to on a number of occasions. As ever, he delivers a polished and accomplished performance, differentiating effectively between all the characters, both male and female, and portraying the women in a believable manner through a softening of tone and small rise in pitch. He’s spot on with the emotional nuances, too and his interpretation of Alex is especially good, the character’s self-loathing evident in his voice and manner of speech in the early parts of the story, his confusion over his conflicted feelings for Laura and finally, his complete devotion to her all readily coming across. But I’m sorry to say that there were certain aspects of his performance that didn’t really work for me; one is that almost all the dialogue – and some of the narrative – is delivered in a kind of half-whisper, and the other is that there’s an element of repetitive intonation in some passages that I found distracting. I’m not sure if this is something Mr. Wyndham has begun to do recently (it’s been a while since I last listened to him) or it he’s always done it and I’ve not noticed because I’ve been more engaged by the material, so I listened to a few parts of some of his other recordings, but I didn’t notice it in those, so I’m hoping that perhaps it’s a one-off.
I’m not quite sure whether I’m can honestly recommend A Convenient Fiction. I’m sure it will work better for some listeners than it did for me (the ratings on Goodreads indicate I’m in the minority in not being overly keen on the story) and the narration, while flawed, is still a lot better than some of the performances I’ve heard lately. I didn’t hate it, but it wasn’t one of those audiobooks I wanted to pick up at every opportunity. If you’ve listened to it, drop by and let me know how it was for you!
Caz
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