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If you read a lot of Regency romance β or watch Bridgerton β you may have noticed that it very rarely rains in the 1810s. Georgette Heyer started this extreme lack of precipitation in her novels, and obviously itβs highly convenient for heroines in flimsy, clinging muslin gowns and straw bonnets, who could easily catch their deaths in a sharp shower, but is it realistic?
Itβs really not. The Regency had at least two major abnormal weather events β the very severe winter of 1813/14, when the Thames froze and there was a vast Frost Fair on the ice, and the βyear without a summerβ, 1816. In April 1815, Mount Tambora in Indonesia erupted β the most powerful volcanic eruption in human history. Many thousands of people died as a direct effect, but the worldwide effects were even more catastrophic. Ash was thrown high into the atmosphere and global temperatures plummeted (if this sounds vague, thatβll be because Iβm a romantic novelist, not a scientist). Harvests failed around the world. If youβve heard about the eruption and its aftermath before, chances are itβs because you know that some Regency kids on their equivalent of a gap year spent the terrible summer of 1816 holed up in a villa on Lake Geneva, drinking, taking drugs and telling each other ghost stories. Students, eh? Who hasnβt seen their girlfriendβs nipples transformed into devilish eyes and run
screaming from the room? Most of the material Byron and Shelley produced was predictably rubbish, but John Polidoriβs vampire story had long-term consequences when Bram Stoker came across it many years later, and Mary Shelley β devil nipple girl – who was nineteen, was inspired to write a novel you may just possibly have heard of: Frankenstein. In similar circumstances, and at the same age, my friends and I were inspired to steal a fridge from another floor in our halls of residence, but we canβt all be geniuses.
Obviously the idea of the Gothic existed long before 1816, but a lot of the images we all have in our heads come directly from the events of that year, and so I thought it would be fun and different to write a Regency romance set then; one that isnβt all strolls with parasols through the golden fields and curricle rides in the park, but more dark clouds across the moon, secret passages and dark, spicy secrets. My female characters spend their summer together in a sinister castle on the wild coast of North Yorkshire. Some of them are there in the hopes that Gabriel, Duke of Northriding, might make them an offer of marriage. Some of them are much more interested in each other. And some of them would run away screaming if he did pay them any attention. Because Gabriel himself is quite sinister at times β yes, yes, he owns half of Yorkshire and heβs very handsome, but he has black hair prematurely streaked with grey, unusual silver eyes, and a terrible reputation as a rake. Heβd vowed never to marry, but now heβs been forced to change his life plans. Doesnβt he sound AWFUL?? Lady Georgiana Pendlebury isnβt sure what he is β but she knows that before she even knew his name they shared a scandalous evening that could ruin her if it were revealed. She knows she should stay as far away from him as possible β easy to say, much harder to doβ¦
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