Bodice Ripping Cliches, Part 3: A Swift Kick In the Crown Jewels

I'll be the first to admit that the romance novels of Bertrice Small were the source of much unintentional comedy between myself and The Happy Scribe in our younger years. For all the talk about Mme. Small's devotion to historical accuracy and painstaking research, even I will have to admit that our tolerance for romance-novel cliches were diminished by our repeated reading of her oeuvre.

Let's run down the cliche list, shall we? Coercion? Check. Stockholm Syndrome? Check. Horny Scottish Lairds? Check. Repetitious sequences involving kinky sex in harems? Check. Too many underage milksop brides trying to be feisty, yet throwing their corsets to the wind as soon as the Horny Intrepid Hero(es) entice them to bed? Check, check, check.

But the most tiring Bertrice Small cliche of them all, in my opinion, is the one involving the Excessively Horny Real-Life Royal. I swear, after reading so many Bertrice Small novels, you'd think that all these European royals were never taught how to keep it in their pants; not the impetuous young princes, and certainly not the lecherously Dirty Old Kings who ought to know better.

Say what you want here, but apparently Bertrice Small may have taken Henry Kissinger's words about power being "the ultimate aphrodisiac" a little too far here.

Don't even get me started on the repetitive nature of each plot line: Royal seduces our heroine in the most lascivious way; Royal shows Heroine a "good time" in bed; history intervenes (regardless of whether or not our Heroine actually becomes enceinte from their one night of "passion"), and Our Lovely Heroine parts with the Royal on relatively civil terms so that she can be reunited with Our Intrepid Hero. Ho. Freaking. Hum.

With all due respect, I'm the kind of romance reader who would rather enjoy a book where the leads engage in Hot, Sweaty, Exclusive Monogamy. No partner-switching, no plot-driven adultery, not even a single attempted rape. Which is why I find it ironic that I've actually found a Bertrice Small novel that actually defies the cliches I've written above, even with a Horny Royal romping about the premises.

Do not be fooled by the cheese-tastic (and horribly inaccurate) cover: Love, Remember Me is actually Not That Bad. Intended as a sequel-of-sorts to the also semi-cheesy Blaze Wyndham, this novel follows Nyssa Wyndham - the daughter of the titular Blaze - into the court of her mother's ex-lover Henry VIII as a lady-in-waiting to Anne of Cleves, rendered here as a pragmatic, good-humored German princess who sees her sham marriage to Henry for what it is and agrees to part with him on civil terms. Here Small's historical research pays off nicely - the court of the Tudor King, and its surrounding characters, have never been rendered with so much rich detail.

Yes, it starts out very, very badly: Amid speculation that the virginal - and brunette - Nyssa may be in line to be Henry's next mistress (which... considering that her mother used to do the nasty with the King himself: awkward!), certain forces conspire to have Nyssa wake up in bed naked next to the "notorious rake" Lord Varian de Winter, in order to take her out of contention and replace her with Catherine Howard. That the devilishly handsome Lord Varian would also turn out to be an illegitimate relation of Cat Howard also factors prominently in the story, since the rest of the story is centered around the rise and fall of a woman who married for power and ended up in the history books as the "beheaded" between Anne of Cleves ("divorced") and Katherine Parr ("survived").

But enough about poor Cat Howard, who would never have lost her head had she actually kept her own legs crossed. I know some readers have complained about Love, Remember Me having too much history and not enough hot lovin', but I thought that the side action (ahem) between Nyssa and Varian dovetailed nicely with the rest of the history-book aspects of the novel. Nyssa starts out as a feisty but proper 18 year old, who is rightfully freaked out to find herself being gossiped about in relation to both Varian (approximate age in book: 32) and the grossly obese fortysomething King Henry (who, as other characters would point out later in the book, may as well have been her own father... again: ewwwww). Once Nyssa enters the marital chamber, however, Varian handles her "first time" with a surprising amount of finesse and sensitivity... and that's just the first of many heartbreakingly intimate revelations between man and wife. Suffice it to say that Teh Sex between Lord and Lady De Winter may be hot, but it's not as devastating as the quieter conversations they have between all the rumpy-pumpy. It's a testament to Small's restraint that not only do Varian and Nyssa remain faithful to each other throughout the story, but that the only other attempt at Nyssa's post-marital virtue is swiftly thwarted by Nyssa with a few well-placed knee jabs delivered to her attackers.

Despite the age difference between them - not to mention the inordinate amounts of sex - Varian does treat Nyssa with more than a fair measure of equality; as he mentions in the story, he was already preparing to settle down when he met her, and he would have been lucky to choose her as a wife anyway. Nyssa also grows to love Varian - and bears his children (yes, folks, she has twins) - but she also learns to find her own strength, and her growth from lady-in-waiting to fiercely protective matriarch becomes a striking parallel to Cat Howard's infidelity, which Nyssa observes with appropriate puzzlement. By the time Cat ends up facing the chopping block, loyalties are tested and lessons are learned... and our beloved Lord and Lady De Winter emerge from the scandal more ferociously devoted to each other.

Yes, it sounds so cheesy and trite on paper - especially after I've left out some pretty spoilery bits out of that summary above - but the great majority of elements in this book do fit together nicely. You'll be surprised to find how a love story like this could actually turn out to be even more touching amidst all the skullduggery - and even more so to find that such a tastefully developed story could come out of the mind of Bertrice Small, who might as well have bartered every single character in this book into white slavery. At the very least, it should save you some trouble for your next European History midterm.