Book Review

Romance Readers Guide to Historic London by Sonja Rouillard

A-

Genre: Nonfiction

I read travel guides like any other book. In a world where people seeeeeeeeeeem to think Oh, no, who uses Lonely Planet anymore when you’ve got the internet in your pocket, let me tell you, internet. Browsing through a travel guide is worth your time. You’ll find at least one thing that you may not have found on Expedia’s Top Ten Things to do in London that is clearly a perfect trap set personally for you. (To the point that if I vanish next fall, it’s because the Dennis Sever’s House is RHG bait and I knew that and I booked a visit six months in advance anyway.)

I also saw this particular travel guide advertised at RT, and seeing as I am going to the UK this fall (Stay tuned for meetup details) and three of those days will be spent in London, YEAH YOU BET YOUR ASS I GOT THIS.

The concept behind this guide is to help romance readers find places that appear in our favorite historicals, and explains what’s still around and what you might be able to see. For example, the Serpentine is still there, but Almack’s is completely gone. It includes relevant excerpts from a large handful of romances, from Georgette Heyer to Erin Knightley.  Do you want to know exactly how to get to Vauxhall Gardens? Or go to Tattersalls? Need an idea of what to expect from the various Royal Palaces around London? Or want someone to explain exactly where Mayfair is, what that means to a Regency historical reader, and how to get there?  This book has you covered.

Hotels and places to eat are sorted by price range (from “Governess on holiday” to “King’s ransom”) and then ranked by how authentic a feel the historic establishment has.  How old is, is it a Grade Listed building? How preserved is it? Does it have period decor? Does it give you that feeling of being in “Merry Olde England?”

The Guide also goes through an exhaustive list of hotels that are old and of interest to the historical romance reader. Rouillard lays out in stern detail how, should you stay in a hotel that was built back in The Day, you could expect small, weird shaped rooms and perhaps no elevator (but in the interest of accessibility, she does tell you where there are no lifts), and that Americans will sometimes be… distraught… over the idea of a small hotel room. But if you want to fork out for a room at Brown’s Hotel, where many of the political movers and shakers of the last two centuries have stayed, what you need to know is all there.

My favorite part is the listing of pubs and taverns and restaurants. It’s an impressive list that gives the history of each place (“The current building only dates from 1667 – yawn – when the pub was rebuilt after the Great Fire.” – Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese) and tips on what food is offered and what the best bets are for meal choices. Also important, Rouillard gives the basic price range and dress code –  after all, you wouldn’t want to be turned away from your High Tea at the Ritz because you’re wearing sneakers. (I know that none of you would dare.) Also very handy: a lot of these tiny tiny pubs are hidden and tucked away in the medieval nooks and crannies and you need some specific directions to find them (“Down an unmarked alley…”).

SPEAKING OF THE HIGH TEA, there are many options, dissected and ranked by price and snootiness. (I will be doing one, but in Edinburgh, not London. I’ll report back, don’t worry.)

One thing I found annoying: Rouillard includes notes on things “for the guys” like the Imperial War Museum or the Sherlock Holmes Pub. First, what? Second, these parts are still relevant to the interests of romance readers, some of whom are dudes. Third, gender-essentialist much? Finally, please don’t do that.  She explains this as, “You might need something to salt your conversation with as you plan this trip for your dude to go along with it” but…ugh.

I will be going through this book with post-it tabs as I finalize plans for my own trip. I have my major excursions planned, but there’s a wall left of the Newgate prison to see (complete with ghost), and a girl has to eat, so pubs that are older than the United States are going on the list. I’m excited! I don’t know if I’m going to make it to Vauxhall, though.

Even if a trip to London isn’t in the cards in the near future, this book is fun to read. If you’ve ever wondered what all of the places that keep appearing in historicals are like today, this is for you. I wish I could afford a room in some of these hotels, but I will content myself with knowing they exist.

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Romance Readers Guide to Historic London by Sonja Rouillard

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  1. Lizzie R says:

    Oh please come back and tell us all. This sounds absolutely amazing.

  2. Olivia says:

    This sounds amazing and wish I knew about it a few years ago when I went. I’ll totally admit to y’all there were definitely multiple places I went because of romance novels. Even though I know they’re different, strolling down Bond St., Hyde Park with the horse run, it was awesome.

  3. Linda says:

    This book sounds fabulous! I especially like the bit about dress codes/snootiness level. When I went to England for a friend’s wedding I got to spend one day in England. Apparently there are two hotels of the same name within walking distance of each other and I picked the wrong one the first time. I walked in – wearing jeans and sweaty from hauling my suitcase, heavy winter coat (they had an unexpected warm spell while I was there), and walking a mile from the Tube station – and immediately I knew I was NOT in the charming, low-key hotel I’d booked. Instead there was soaring ceilings, marble everything, and people dressed up like you only see in tv shows over here.

    One of the staff immediately came over to see if he could help me. We looked at each other and had the non-verbal conversation of “you are so not in the right place” and “I agree completely, this is so out of my league”. That said, the guy was actually incredibly polite and friendly and helped direct me to the correct hotel. But it was pretty funny how we both knew in an instant that I didn’t belong there.

  4. Nic Dempsey says:

    If you do make it to Vauxhall, go and visit the Beefeater distillery! Two birds, one stone.

  5. This sounds fantastic! I, too, read travel guides. It’s fostered a love of places I hadn’t previously thought a lot about: Nepal, Iceland, Brazil. So many places I want to see. I’ll be adding this to my list. Thanks!

  6. Karen says:

    This sounds perfect! Thank you so much for sharing it with us! I was in London last year and was thrilled to see people riding horse on Rotten Row. I couldn’t believe they didn’t offer carriage rides. I would have been all over that!

  7. Gigi says:

    I’m not much for travel guides but this has my name written all over it. My views of London have been completely formed by my love of historicals. I will be expecting and subsequently disappointed by the lack of ladies wearing pelisses and beaver hatted gentlemen riding smartly appointed carriages.

  8. BellaInAus says:

    Our family are travelling to England later this year.

    Am saving madly.

    Want. This. Book. So. Much.

  9. JenM says:

    We go to London every few years and I often find myself walking through certain neighborhoods thinking Regency thoughts. One year I insisted that we absolutely had to go to Hyde Park and the Serpentine. My hubs was confused but obliging. He’s learned not to question me when I want to go to these random places in London LOL.

    I will definitely check out this travel guide. I’ve tried various Internet guides and they are just not the same, so even though I’m usually obsessive about cutting weight out of my luggage, I always carry at least one hard copy guide on my trips.

  10. Jenny says:

    Red Headed Girl, will you make it down to Brighton? I still haven’t made it across my square to the Regency Townhouse museum and we have the Pavilion too…

  11. I’m one of the authors quoted in this book. And when Sonja put the idea to me, I thought “Why hasn’t anybody done this before?” With the honourable exception of Louise Allen’s “Walks Through Regency London,” which is a companion rather than competition, I can’t think of another.
    This was a labour of love for Sonja, and I’m really thrilled with the way it turned out!

  12. So does the book mention Apsley House, aka Number One, London — the Duke of Wellington’s home? (The current Duke still lives upstairs, the first two floors are a museum.) I will admit I did a few quick and awkward box steps in the ballroom, pretending to waltz with a dashing officer I met in Brussels before Waterloo.

    I had an extremely hard time not sitting on the chairs. They all have little signs that you are not supposed to sit on them. But I really, really, really wanted to sit on a chair and pretend I was at the banquet laid out on the table with all the silver the Portuguese royalty had given to Wellington.

    Apsley House is and extremely Regency novel destination in London, and it is right smack in the center of things – at Hyde Park – it’s not “Number One, London” for nothing. If you go, you must do the audio tour – the current duke narrates part of it, talking about his childhood during the Blitz and how his old nanny (or maybe his grandmother, I forget) had the naked Napoleon statue’s genitals covered up with a leaf.

    (I highly recommend, although my spouse and kids were meh – but Napoleon’s sword is in the treasury display.)

  13. mirandapanda says:

    If you are there on a Thursday, this walking tour will be right up your alley, especially if Richard III is the guide.

    http://www.walks.com/our-walks/old-mayfair-the-champagne-caviar-of-london-walks-1

  14. josiejazz says:

    Seconding the Richard III recommendation! He’s been my guide for a couple of different walking tours and is extremely knowledgeable and funny. He also knows all there is to know about Victorian detective stories.

  15. Redheadedgirl says:

    @jenny: the plan is London, York, and Edinburgh. No Brighton This time.

  16. Perfect timing. We are going to London and Wales in autumn.

  17. Ez says:

    The Cheshire Cheese is a gooooood pub. I think. At least from what I can remember…

  18. SamC says:

    Perhaps the pleasure gardens are gone but Vauxhall is home to Vauxhall City Farm which I always enjoy. My main recommendation for anyone coming to London (apart from walking along the Southbank past the Globe theatre and onwards) is Leighton House: https://www.rbkc.gov.uk/subsites/museums/leightonhousemuseum1.aspx which is gorgeous and ridiculous and not too far a walk from Notting Hill and Portabello Road.

  19. Beth E. says:

    The book is a fun read, but was anyone else irritated by the fact that the author footnotes items, but the footnotes are not actually included in the book? You have to email the publisher for them if you want them. Seriously odd.

  20. OMG! I’ve been out of the country and dealing with family disasters and everything in between and only now coming up for air — what an absolute thrill to find this informative review of my Guide to welcome me home!! As Lynne Connolly says above (her Temptation Has Green Eyes is quoted in my book), this project was really a labor of love for me…and a tremendous amount of work for my wonderful graphic-designer husband. But I do think it’s a very pretty book inside.

    I enjoyed reading everyone’s comments above because it’s great to know others share my deep fascination with all things historical London. Happy travels and bon voyage everyone — whether to somewhere special or into a wonderful historical novel!

  21. Kip Hammond says:

    This is a book I would recommend to anyone who likes biographys, history, and of course guide books. I saw this book by a person named Sonja Rouillard and I thought now I used to know a girl by that name but she was not a writer, she was a dancer! Same girl! Sonja you have become a writer! A very good writer of a fabulous book. To me it was more than a guide book. It is full of details and is just a fun read. I have never read any of those romance novels and I am 97 years old. not planning on any return trips to London but I loved the book and would encourage anyone to read it. It would be a great addition to an English Literature class. It is highly entertaining!

  22. Emma L says:

    I work in London, commuting in 3 days a week. I found myself walking along Cheapside the other day coming back from a meeting, and all I could think about was Elizabeth Bennett telling Darcy that she stayed with her Aunt and Uncle there. Not helpful when I was trying to find my way back to my office!

    This looks like a great book though. Will have to check it out and plan some lunch-break or after work excursions…

  23. Claudia Martinez says:

    Damn! 15 years too late. While stationed at an AFB in Suffolk, a day out in London was a little slice of bliss. My husband was stumped by my insistence on seeing Rotten Row for myself, but lunch near the Serpentine made it all better.

  24. Felicitas says:

    If you have an afternoon, visiting the ruins of the Crystal Palace is interesting. They also have some very sweet and awkward dinosaurs there too.

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