Hello everyone!
As promised, I didn't manage to get to the movie/show review this week for obvious reasons, BUT I'm back with a book blog, and, again as promised, I'm going to be talking about Diana Gabaldon again this week.
Or, well, okay, not about HER, but about another one of her awesome characters, Lord John.
Now, you're probably thinking: wait, this guy's name is Lord John Grey, which is basically the 18th-century equivalent for 'John Smith' or 'John Doe', how can he be an interesting character? Truth be told, I didn't even know books about him existed until I got past the current halfway point of the Outlander books, and he just keeps popping back up like a Jack-in-the-box (not posting any spoilers here, however, about why, precisely, he keeps doing that)! Also, some additional research on Gabaldon's website gave me this magnificent quote:
"He's what I call a 'mushroom' - one of those unplanned people who pops up out of nowhere and walks off with any scene he's in - and he talks to me easily (and wittily)." (D. Gabaldon)
Without further ado, let's head into the 'Private Matter'.
Now, just a quick backstory so you won't be confused if you haven't read any Outlander books: John Grey first makes an appearance in 'Dragonfly in Amber' when he tries (unsuccessfully) to slit Jamie Fraser's throat on Claire's account (yes, it's all a big misunderstanding). Because of this, Hal, his brother, is forces to take different measures when faced with the problem of Jamie Fraser. John, then sixteen, heads back to London, and he's a Major by the time we catch up with him in his own subsequent works.
In this book, he's actually acting as head of the family, with his brother Hal and the regiment in France, and he's supsicious about his cousin Olivia's betrothed, Lord Trevelyan. Now, Trevelyan is a rich merchant and he will probably be able to gift Olivia with a whole load of carriages and beautiful dresses and the like, but John caught a glimpse of something that might be a problem: according to that glimpse, he believes Trevelyan has syphilis.
And that means? Hell to the no to him marrying his cousin, but of course, instead of directly confronting the man, this has to be done - delicately - , which sends John on a hilarious mission of proving the man's poxed.
Not to mention, he's tracking down who in the blazes killed one of the sergeants from their regiment, and there's a curious 'woman in green' that keeps popping back up. Only, that seems to just be the saying, because it's actually a MAN in a green dress.
Did I mention our Lord John is homosexual?
That's right, and in the mid-18th century, that's a capital offense, so watching him dance through those niches and try to keep himself on the right track is both oddly endearing as it is amusing. He picks up an urchin, Tom Byrd, who becomes his valet, and together they tramp through London to figure out just who, precisely, killed the sergeant, who had apparently stolen vital regiment information to sell it to France. In the process, John also visits an establishment for men's pleasures, gets poked and prodded in general by anyone who seems to have two seconds time to spare, and also gets poisoned by syphilis medicine after he finally confronts Trevelyan (in a way).
He also makes this wonderful blunder of boarding the ship with which Trevelyan is fleeing England with his mistress (who got syphilis from her unfaithful husband and gave it to her lover, AND is now being cured of it by infecting herself with malaria so that the high fever will burn it all out), and instead of making sure he has backup ... he starts sailing away too.
I mean, isn't he adorkable?
Of course, he doesn't end up in India; the sergeant was killed for beating his wife, and the papers were found in an 18th century condom stand (don't ask), Olivia marries an officer from John's regiment, and Tom Byrd stays on as valet.
For more about John, I highly suggest you read his entertaining stories, but here's a glimpse of what he and Tom are up to in the next novel, 'Brotherhood of the Blade':
“Very good, me lord,” he said, resigned. “You’ll look decent for the wedding, though, if I die for it. Come to that, if we’re a-going back to France in March, you’d best be calling on your tailor this week.”
“Oh? All right. Make me a list, then, of what’s needed. Smallclothes, certainly.” Both of them grimaced, in joint memory of what passed for drawers on the Continent.
“Yes, me lord.” Tom bent to shovel embers into the warming pan. “And a pair of doeskin breeches.”
“Don’t I have a pair?” Grey asked, surprised.
“You do,” Byrd said, straightening, “and Lord only knows what you sat on whilst wearing ’em.” He gave Grey a disapproving look; Tom was eighteen, and round-faced as a pie, but his disapproving looks would have done credit to an old gaffer of eighty.
“I’ve done me best, me lord, but bear in mind, if you go out in those breeches, don’t be taking your coat off, or folk will be sure you’ve beshit yourself.”
(D. Gabaldon, LJ and the BotB, p. 20)
xx
*image not mine
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