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fffridayIn eighteenth century Britain, Alice Payne disguises herself as a highwayman and robs rich assholes to pay off her father's debtors, with the help of her inventor companion, Jane. In the future, Major Prudence Zuniga, exhausted and burnt out from fighting a time war whose sides are starting to blur together, plans treason in the hopes of ending the war for good. When these two epic ladies cross paths, mayhem ensues, and it's a joy to read.
These two novellas are, in a word, delightful, a rollicking adventure of history and time travel. The stakes are high - not just for the history of humankind, but on a personal level. Alice could lose her home, her freedom, even her life if she's found out. Prudence knows that changing history can have terrifying butterfly effects, which includes potentially wiping Prudence's beloved sister, Grace, from existence. What Heartfield is very good at is making these stakes very affecting, while maintaining a page-turner pace and a real sense of fun. The story may touch on dark elements, but at its core, it's not a dark story at all. Rather, it's a story about love, family, found and otherwise, and finding hope in a world that pushes you toward cynicism.
I love both the heroines. They are fierce, funny, flawed, and very human. These flaws, in fact, are some of what I like best about them. Alice is impulsive and adrenaline-hungry to a fault. Prudence, a former propagandist, has swallowed a bit more of her old faction's byline than she'd like to admit. Jane, Alice's companion and love of her life, has a chip on her shoulder about being disregarded and left behind.
Speaking of which, I really like Alice and Jane's relationship. Like the characters, it feels very real. They read like women in their thirties, who have been together for years and love each other deeply and comfortably without having lost their spark, and also without their relationship coming off as rose-colored-glasses-perfect. Part of it is, Jane's a fully realized character in her own right, with her own agency and emotional arc, something I've found frustratingly lacking in a lot of lesbian fiction love interests.
The secondary characters, from the temporally-unstable Grace, to Wray Auden, a local constable investigating Alice's highwayman hijinks and facing a 'lawful vs. good' crisis, are just as lovable as the leads. The primary antagonist proves a real threat without reading over the top, in part because you can see how he got there, even if the 'there' is callous and vaguely sociopathic.
Heartfield has a great eye for historical detail, painting the time-travelled history in powerful, unwordy strokes. When we first meet Prudence, for instance, she is trying and failing to save the Crown Prince Rudolph from his suicide at the Meyerling estate for the seventy-somethings time. In the course of the two novellas, Heartfield takes us to the American Revolution, future Canada, and (briefly) pre-Arthurian Britain, and gives us a strong sense of each place. As mentioned previously, Heartfield doesn't shy away from the darker sides of history. Both the heroines are women of color. Alice, in particular, is the manumitted daughter of a British nobleman and a Jamaican slave. The pain of that isn't glossed over, but neither is it dwelled on.
A deft touch, with a plot and characters who manage to have depth without a trace of ponderousness, plus a sweet, likable romance. These novellas made me happy, and so I highly recommend them.
These two novellas are, in a word, delightful, a rollicking adventure of history and time travel. The stakes are high - not just for the history of humankind, but on a personal level. Alice could lose her home, her freedom, even her life if she's found out. Prudence knows that changing history can have terrifying butterfly effects, which includes potentially wiping Prudence's beloved sister, Grace, from existence. What Heartfield is very good at is making these stakes very affecting, while maintaining a page-turner pace and a real sense of fun. The story may touch on dark elements, but at its core, it's not a dark story at all. Rather, it's a story about love, family, found and otherwise, and finding hope in a world that pushes you toward cynicism.
I love both the heroines. They are fierce, funny, flawed, and very human. These flaws, in fact, are some of what I like best about them. Alice is impulsive and adrenaline-hungry to a fault. Prudence, a former propagandist, has swallowed a bit more of her old faction's byline than she'd like to admit. Jane, Alice's companion and love of her life, has a chip on her shoulder about being disregarded and left behind.
Speaking of which, I really like Alice and Jane's relationship. Like the characters, it feels very real. They read like women in their thirties, who have been together for years and love each other deeply and comfortably without having lost their spark, and also without their relationship coming off as rose-colored-glasses-perfect. Part of it is, Jane's a fully realized character in her own right, with her own agency and emotional arc, something I've found frustratingly lacking in a lot of lesbian fiction love interests.
The secondary characters, from the temporally-unstable Grace, to Wray Auden, a local constable investigating Alice's highwayman hijinks and facing a 'lawful vs. good' crisis, are just as lovable as the leads. The primary antagonist proves a real threat without reading over the top, in part because you can see how he got there, even if the 'there' is callous and vaguely sociopathic.
Heartfield has a great eye for historical detail, painting the time-travelled history in powerful, unwordy strokes. When we first meet Prudence, for instance, she is trying and failing to save the Crown Prince Rudolph from his suicide at the Meyerling estate for the seventy-somethings time. In the course of the two novellas, Heartfield takes us to the American Revolution, future Canada, and (briefly) pre-Arthurian Britain, and gives us a strong sense of each place. As mentioned previously, Heartfield doesn't shy away from the darker sides of history. Both the heroines are women of color. Alice, in particular, is the manumitted daughter of a British nobleman and a Jamaican slave. The pain of that isn't glossed over, but neither is it dwelled on.
A deft touch, with a plot and characters who manage to have depth without a trace of ponderousness, plus a sweet, likable romance. These novellas made me happy, and so I highly recommend them.
