In Bliss Bennet's historical romance Not Quite a Scandal, Bathsheba Honeychurch is a good Quaker girl who desperately wants to live up to her deceased activist mother’s standards. Her mother was an idealist who spoke boldly to power and never compromised her values or ideas. Sheba wants to be just like her and is hoping her friend Ash Griffin will eventually marry her so that they can become missionaries in Sierra Leone. Everything goes south when Noel Griffin shows up and informs Ash that he is now the fifth Earl Silliman. Noel was brought up to believe he was supposed to inherit the title but it appeared that Ash is the rightful heir. Noel is all about doing the right thing and part of that is to take Ash under his wing and show the Quaker teen how to be a Noble and what that entails. Ash will have to wait until he turns 21 before he has the full rights of his inheritance. Needless to say, Sheba is horrified that Ash is going to leave their provincial town and become nobility, particularly because Quakers see all that nobility stuff as worldly and wrong. However, Noel explains that being the Earl entails great responsibility over a vast estate and he can’t just walk away. So he and Ash leave for London
Sheba is desperate not to lose her friend and fiancé (well not quite fiancé because Ash has never agreed to her plan), so she follows Ash to London and arranges to stay with one of her non-Quaker cousins. Ash starts settling into his new life with his grandmother and Noel teaching him how to be aristocratic. Everyone is horrified by Sheba’s outrageous behavior (this is the Regency period after all) and Noel wants to find a way to keep her away from Ash. Noel despite his best efforts can’t keep himself from finding the outspoken idealism of Sheba very attractive and they both are very interested in stopping the slave trade in England.
Bliss Bennet adroitly navigates the clashing worlds of Quakers and Aristocracy and the book takes a deep dive into the issues of the slave trade during that period. She meticulously weaves historical context throughout the novel and simultaneously creates a compelling love story between Sheba and Noel. Sheba has to learn a lot about how to deal with the political world to help change the attitudes and laws that were so heinous. This is as much a historical novel as it is a romance which made it even deeper and more interesting read.
I received an advance reader copy for free and this is my honest opinion.
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