The Heiress Effect by Courtney Milan

The Heiress Effect by Courtney Milan

Book Two in The Brothers Sinister series

Published July 15, 2013

 “What ungodly color are you wearing?”

“Green,” she said. “Serpent-belly green. Or perhaps it’s the green of a cloud of poisonous chlorine gas.”

“And yet nobody is shrieking and averting their eyes.” He gave her a smile. “Nice trick. How do you manage it?”

She gave him a brilliant smile. “Simple,” she said, adjusting the diamonds at her neck. “I already told you. It’s the heiress effect.”

Grade: A+

Official Summary from Author’s Site:

Miss Jane Fairfield can’t do anything right. When she’s in company, she always says the wrong thing—and rather too much of it. No matter how costly they are, her gowns fall on the unfortunate side of fashion. Even her immense dowry can’t save her from being an object of derision.

And that’s precisely what she wants. She’ll do anything, even risk humiliation, if it means she can stay unmarried and keep her sister safe.

Mr. Oliver Marshall has to do everything right. He’s the bastard son of a duke, raised in humble circumstances—and he intends to give voice and power to the common people. If he makes one false step, he’ll never get the chance to accomplish anything. He doesn’t need to come to the rescue of the wrong woman. He certainly doesn’t need to fall in love with her. But there’s something about the lovely, courageous Jane that he can’t resist…even though it could mean the ruin of them both.

I Say:

I don’t consider this a romance novel so much as a piece of literature. It’s magnificent, one of the best things I’ve ever read. It’s challenging, sometimes heartbreaking, not exactly light reading…and yet I giggled aloud at least ten times while reading some of the more buoyant scenes. I’ve been anticipating this book since December, and counting down the days since Courtney Milan announced its release date. I didn’t dare to hope that this would be better than The Duchess War, which was a revelation; this book was so much more than I ever expected.

The scope is epic, compared to most romance novels, building up many relationships of many kinds: romantic, friendly, familial, political. I’ll try to proceed through this review by talking about these different relationships. I won’t be discussing much of the politics, though, because I’m really bad about that kind of thing. Just know that if you enjoy politics you’ll love their depth and importance in the story, but if, like me, you normally go out of your way to avoid reading about politics, you’ll be able to appreciate what it brings to the story and you certainly won’t be bored by any of it. You’ll learn that politics really matter. Anyway, I'll start by describing the hero, the heroine, and their relationship. Oliver's first impression of Jane:

[L]ooking at her was like picking up a luxurious peach and discovering it half-taken over by mold.

Almost everyone in the story is appalled by Jane, but as a spectator, I adore her. She’s so fabulous. As someone who says the wrong things a lot, and accidentally insults people on an embarrassingly regular basis, I admire Jane’s embracing of such tendencies to make it her entire persona. Take this exchange with a secondary character, which made me giggle incessantly.

She asked Whitting about his studies, and when he made a wry comment about preferring to concentrate his efforts on the study of liquids, she stared at him.

“How surprising.” Her eyes were very round. “I had not thought you to have the capacity of intellect to read physics!”

Whitting stared at her. “Did you—” The man seemed to grasp hold of his amazement with a visible struggle. A gentleman would never ask a lady if she had intended to call him stupid. Whitting took several deep breaths and addressed Miss Fairfield once more. “Yes. I do not have the sort of personality to enjoy the study of physics. As to my capacity…” He shrugged, and gave her a forced smile. “I must have misunderstood you.”

…

Miss Fairfield didn’t seem the least troubled. “Did you misunderstand me?” she asked in tones of solicitousness. “I am so sorry. I should have realized the sentence construction was too complex for your capacity.” She leaned toward him and spoke again, this time raising her voice and slowing her words as if she were talking to an aging grandfather. “What I meant was that I had not thought that you were intelligent. That would make the study of the physical world difficult.”

Oliver, being the hero of the story, soon recognizes her act for what it is. But before that, he empathizes with her instead of giving in and mocking her as everyone else does. And that’s so important.

It didn’t matter how irritating Miss Fairfield was. Oliver had been on the receiving end of those snide comments one too many times to rejoice in making them.

But, soon enough:

“Cut line, Miss Fairfield. You are either very, very stupid, or extraordinarily clever. And I, for one, suspect that you fall on the side of cleverness.”

Jane worries that if he sees she is not terminally oblivious, he’ll want to marry her for her money. But really, Jane is the last person he’ll marry, because

“I want a career in politics, Miss Fairfield. I want to be a Member of Parliament—and not some distant day in the future, either. I need time to gain influence. I want people to listen to me, to respect me. I will be prime minister one day.”

Not I plan to be or I want to be. Not for Mr. Marshall. I will be.

and Jane is entirely unsuitable. This is the main conflict of the book—as Jane and Oliver fall in love, Oliver will not let himself consider a future with Jane because he needs a quiet, biddable political wife. There are plenty of other conflicts, but this is the one which must be resolved for the happy ending to be achieved. It gets rather frustrating, but then of course it is so satisfying to have it resolved—minus the fact that once it is resolved, the book ends.

Oliver, despite what he believes and how he sometimes acts, is a good man. He’s witty, intelligent, and cares so deeply for Jane. Like Robert in The Duchess War, he convinces himself he must make a decision between one part of his life and the other, without stepping outside of himself to consider the possibility of having both. I do appreciate, though, that the worst thing he does to Jane is leave her. That sounds weird—but he has so many opportunities to truly hurt her—in fact, at one point he believes he must choose between humiliating her and winning the right of men like his father to vote—and, in an inferior book, this would be an excuse for him to do all kinds of awful things to Jane and then just make up by groveling. But despite his persistent fears to the contrary, he treats Jane well.

Jane...well, she's on my list of my favorite heroines.

Sometimes, Oliver thought that society was like an infant trying to shove a square, colored block through a round hole. When it didn’t go, the child pounded harder. Oliver had been shoved through round holes so often that he’d scarcely even noticed that his edges had become rounded. But Jane…Jane persisted in being angular and square. The harder she was pushed, the more square—and the more colorful—she became.

For the book to be resolved, Oliver needs to undergo significant changes. But Jane—who one would think did a much worse job of being around people—doesn’t need to change, just modify her energy. She blooms by just continuing to be herself, without exaggerating her self to the point of pain. I really love how the same traits that make her a laughingstock can also make her highly respected when employed differently.

Also, this happens when her aunt calls her a ninnyhammer. It’s one of my favorite lines in the book.

“A ninnyhammer,” Jane said, “sounds like a magic hammer. One that I can use to smite ninnies. I have a great need for one of those.”

As with all of Milan’s books, family is an essential part. Family is what gives this book its epic scope, creating a community around its hero and heroine.

I can’t do justice to the sisterhood between Emily and Jane. It is just beautiful. Jane puts on her persona in order to avoid marrying and stay with her sister. Emily has epileptic fits and so her well-meaning but terribly misguided guardian, her uncle Titus, essentially keeps her in the house. Emily is much too vivacious and feisty and awesome to handle this very well, and Jane does her best to help Emily in whatever way she can. One of my favorite details was that Jane smuggles Emily two copies of an adventure novel, anticipating that Titus will take the book away and making sure that Emily can still have that glimpse of the outside world.

That being said, Emily is no invalid miss. In fact, she climbs out of her room in order to attain freedom. And in one scene that is equal parts hilarious and horrifying she attempts to scare away the uncertified doctor who wants to test his electric shock machine on her by inviting him to join in worshiping Ba’al and Apollo.

At first, I thought Titus was going to be abusive, like Sir Walter in Milan's “What Happened at Midnight.” [That link goes to Milan's site; I guess I'll have to write a review eventually!] But I should have known that Milan wouldn’t do the same thing twice. Titus cares, but goes about things in completely the wrong way. In trying to find a cure for Emily’s fits, he deprives her of a normal life, submits her to torture by doctors, and almost sends her to an insane asylum. Jane summarizes it pretty well:

“She yells at you, and you think she’s disobedient; she stops yelling, you think she has melancholy. Can she win? No.”

Violet, one of Oliver’s friends, whom we met in The Duchess War, doesn’t get much awesome in this book (contrast with The Duchess War's unforgettable train scene) but she does get to deliver this:

“Fairfield,” she said in cutting tones, ‘if you had been a hunter on the plains of old, the lions would have killed you while you were wandering around the savannah saying, ‘Where is everyone, and what have they done with my spears?’”

The Marquess of Bradenton is a much more malevolent villain—the one who promises Oliver the vote he wants in exchange for humiliating Jane. But he does not hold much power over the story, and in fact there is a beautiful motive that arises because of him. At one point, he threatens Jane by destroying a cactus when they are alone together. But when Jane tries to do something for the plant, she encounters Violet, who tells her:

“You can kill a cactus, but it takes a sustained effort—consistent overwatering and the like. This piece of vandalism?” She shrugged. “This is just an act of propagation.”

The act of destruction actually gives rise to nine new cacti. It’s a beautiful symbol of hope, and the cactus that Violet lets Jane take with her makes appearances through the end of the book. (On a personal note, I find it oddly appropriate that a plant should be so important in a book where sisterhood is so cherished, since my sister is an aspiring botanist and any mention of plants makes me think of her.)

We get to see a lot of Oliver’s family as well, including his father and Robert, who already had their stories told. Anyone who read The Governess Affair knows exactly how much ambition Hugo Marshall gave up for his family, and it’s terribly sad. But he and Oliver have a wonderful relationship—once again, Milan reminds us that family is not a matter of biology (Hugo is not Oliver’s biological father) but of choice. And Oliver and Robert have an important brotherly moment.

One of the benefits of reading Oliver’s book is meeting the rest of Oliver’s family. Namely, Oliver’s youngest sister, Free (Frederica). Free wants to learn Greek and attend Cambridge.

“Someone will have to be The Girl Who Went,” she said. “Why shouldn’t it be me? And don’t worry; I have no intention that getting a college degree will be the last of the dreadful things I do. I’d rather be the Girl Who Did instead of the Girl Who Didn’t.”

Then…On her website, Courtney Milan says of Free, “There’s a line in The Heiress Effect that I wrote and looked at and then cursed mightily, because if I put that line in the book, there would be no way that she wouldn't end up with her own book. But how could I leave it out? I couldn’t.” I suspect it occurred in this passage:

“I worry about you,” [Oliver] finally said to Free. “I’m afraid that you’re going to break your heart, going up against the world.”

“No.” The wind caught her hair and sent it swirling behind her. “I’m going to break the world.”

She almost seemed not to have heard the words she’d said, so absently did she speak. As if it were a conclusion she had come to years ago, one she didn’t even need to examine any longer.

My only problem with Free is that I am sad for her. In this book, she and other women demand the right to vote. According to Wikipedia (I am so terrible at history—why do I read historical books?) women in Britain don’t win that right until 1918, about 50 years later. I am going to pretend to myself that she lives that long and helps achieve that victory. In fact, it would be awesome if this is what happens in the epilogue of The Mistress Rebellion (what will be Free’s book, sometime next year).

Free is named after her Aunt Freddy, who appears in The Governess Affair. I can’t tell you how Freddy is involved in this story but it’s one of the best parts of this book. Which has a lot of good parts.

If you’re still reading this, I’m impressed. There’s just so much to this book. Like I said, there’s not only family but friendship. The most satisfying friendship was seeing (spoiler so mild I’m not going to white it out) Jane’s friendship with the Johnson twins completely turn around. In the first chapter, they amuse themselves by steering her wrong, and Jane welcomes it, so that she can scare away suitors. But Jane finally comes clean, and I love the twins’ reaction.

“I…” She took a deep breath. “I’m this awful on purpose. I owe you both an apology.”

“Oh, no,” Geraldine breathed, stepping forward, a smile spreading across her face.

“Indeed.” Genevieve laughed. “Skip the apology. I’d rather have an explanation. This has to be good.”

And then on top of it all there is a secondary romance! One which elevates this book. Emily meets an Indian man, Anjan Bhattacharya, on one of her escapes from her room. When I say their romance is adorable, I'm not belittling it; I mean it's so wonderful it puts a smile on your face. I appreciate that severe, violent racism is hinted at—Anjan mentions the possibility of his getting “pummeled” for escorting Emily home—but it is the less obvious racism that Milan presents the reader with most directly, addressing the fact that both negative and positive stereotypes are problems. (It reminded me of her posts about something that happened on The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, which I found illuminating. Be warned that this one has strong language, though this one doesn’t.)

Anyway, Anjan is wonderful:

“If [Emily’s guardian, Titus] won’t hold you precious, then I will.”

and Emily gets a spectacular line, in response to Anjan’s colleagues Anglicizing his name to “Batty”:

“The name,” she said primly, “is Bhattacharya. And since it’s going to be mine, you had best learn to pronounce it properly.”

and I’m very happy that they’ll be together. Also, Mrs. Bhattacharya , Anjan’s mother, sails over from India (I am not sure if this is a permanent move or just a long visit) and she’s awesome.

I’m almost done! I just want to talk about Sebastian, who was one of my favorite characters even before he started breaking my heart. He starts out hilarious, as he was in The Duchess War. When Jane calls Oliver “Oliver Cromwell,” trying to offend him, Sebastian introduces himself as

“Sebastian Brightbuttons.” This, with a glance at Mr. Marshall. “If you get to assume a name, I want one, too.”

and in the conversation Sebastian continues to be just delightful. The following quote alone convinced my sister (the aspiring botanist mentioned above) to read the book:

“Nobody can object to a discussion of plant reproduction. If they did, we’d require flowers to don petticoats instead of wandering around, showing their reproductive parts to all and sundry.”

But we see Sebastian breaking under the strain of becoming a famous scientist—he is either adored by Social Darwinists, who want to use the theory of evolution to justify society’s hierarchical structure or even practice eugenics, or met with vitriolic hatred. The epilogue is beautiful, bright, and promising, but makes no mention of Sebastian. Naturally, everything will be set aright in The Countess Conspiracy…I hope.

Bottom Line:

This book is magnificent, challenging, heartbreaking, and excruciatingly funny. It’s not a beach read or something to read when you’re waiting at the doctor’s office. Like its characters, this is a novel that needs to be taken seriously, appreciated, and loved. I sincerely hope you give it a chance.