Favorite Romances Series: The Windflower by Laura London

The Windflower Laura London (Sharon and Tom Curtis) Romance novel, 1984 Rating: A/A+

I first read The Windflower back in 1999, right after I discovered the Desert Island Keeper page at AAR.  I was enthralled by this book and stayed up so late reading it, trying to finish it, that I was exhausted the entire next day at work.  This is the one time that I seriously considered calling in sick so I could keep reading.  I read through my breaks, through lunch, and as soon as 5 o’clock came, I was out the door so I could read some more.  I couldn’t believe a book could be this good, this utterly absorbing throughout. 

Young Merry Patricia Wilding has lived a very sheltered life in a small house away from her small Virginia village, with only her aristocratic aunt and a few servants for company.  Merry’s father, James Wilding, is an important man in President Madison’s government, but he has no time for Merry.  After his wife died, he farmed her off to his sister-in-law, April, and sent money to Fairfield for their upkeep.  Merry, never knowing anything different, is content to live an “American” lifestyle, but April, raised in England in far more luxurious surroundings and with far more elevated personages for company, is not.  She’s raised Merry to be as English as she could which lead to Merry’s being socially shunned in Fairfield.  More or less confined to Aunt April’s property, Merry is bored and lonely.  So when her brother Carl approaches her with a request to do her duty for her country, she jumps at it.

Merry is artistic; gifted.  Every so often when it’s possible and relatively safe, Carl takes her to a public place and points people out to her.  Merry later draws them from memory and these portraits are used to advertise traitors to the populace.  It is on just such an outing that Merry finds herself in more danger than Carl bargained for – in a tavern, surrounded by the infamous pirate Rand Morgan and his men.  Also along is Devon, a gorgeous, dangerous man who is immediately attracted to her but suspects she is more than the common puppeteer she is posing as.  Dismissing any possibility that Merry is dangerous, Devon reluctantly lets her go, and afterwards Merry draws all of them, the traitors she was seeking as well as the pirates.  This gets her into hot water some months later when she is mistakenly kidnapped and winds up on Rand Morgan’s ship.   This time around Devon and Rand know she is hiding something and suspect it has something to do with a mutual enemy of theirs, Sir Michael Granville, a man with whom Merry was very innocently keeping company before she was abducted.

Merry refuses to talk and thus endanger her brother.  Devon refuses to let her go.  They are at an impasse.  And thus begins one of the best romance novels ever written.  The premise sounds hokey – kidnapped by pirates – ridiculous, even, if the book took itself too seriously.  But it doesn’t.  The pirates don’t want Merry aboard; she’s a nuisance and in an atmosphere of necessarily enforced celibacy, a danger to harmony.  Devon wants her, ostensibly for information, but more because he just wants her.  He can’t figure her out and his reaction is a bit of a mystery for a man who’s had no problem getting ladies to cooperate before. 

The beginning of Merry and Devon’s relationship is more humorous – despite a significant amount of snogging – than romantic.  Merry is seriously outclassed on the Black Joke, Rand Morgan’s ship.  Everyone but the resident pig has more survival skills than she does, and Devon, Rand, and Cat, Rand’s companion, can out talk, out think, and out mock her in their sleep.  But Merry is brave, kindhearted, nonjudgmental, open to new experiences, and innocently funny, besides being beautiful.  She has a knack for gathering protectors.  Soon the balance of power aboard ship has shifted from the pirates supporting Devon out of habit to their siding with Merry and wanting to get her away from him.  Rand finds this all very amusing and allow the escapades to continue for entertainment. 

Inherent here are two situations that I usually don’t like in my romance novels: the everyone-loves-the-heroine phenomenon and the completely unequal pairing.  Devon really is out of Merry’s league in any normal circumstance.  He’s the ultimate big man on campus: powerful, charismatic, gorgeous, brilliant, irresistible to women.  And more.  She’s only a sheltered country girl.  However, this is a coming-of-age story.  By the end of the book, after Merry’s pirate education, it’s clear that she is on her way to becoming Devon’s equal or superior.  What he respects in her are the qualities he rarely finds in women – her naturalness, her curiousity, her humility and lack of artifice, her sense of humor.  She is not embittered by hardship and maintains her loyalty to the end.  She sees him in his element as he actually is and understands him.  The ship strips away their differences and emphasizes their similarities and her innate trustworthiness and nobility.  She is the companion he needs.  

Merry gathers her share of admirers on board, but for all of them but Devon it’s only infatuation, the novelty of being near a beautiful woman.  Cat and Rand are not immune to her, but their feelings are more complicated, more familial, than infatuation or romantic love.  None of the pirates are unaware of her faults or shortcomings. 

While I love Merry and Devon, what makes this book my favorite romance novel are three things: the book's humor, plotting, and secondary characters.  Oh, and the zinging, stinging dialogue - the best I've ever read.  Really. 

Of those three, the easiest to explain is the plotting, which is also fairly complex.  The book has many conflicts.  The main ones are (in chronological order as they are established):

I realize this seems to be an awful lot of conflict, but each one is deftly introduced, interwoven with the others, and resolved in its time.  The story's crafting is intricately done.  Each part of the book contains information that will be important to the plot later on.  Late in the book there is a scene in which everything comes together, and it truly made me gasp.  I was so impressed at how the Curtises rolled their story's tumblers click-click-click to unlock the whole.  Delightful.  It's still one of my favorite scenes in any book after many a re-read. 

Then there is the humor, some of which is observational, most of which is embedded in dialogue.  It's fairly complex humor;intelligent, contextual.  Do any of these sound funny?

"You might try giving it a sugar lump."

"Cat, fetch the thumbscrew."

"Why don't you surrender the military hardware and let me see what I can do to make amends?"

In context, they are hilarious.  As are the pirates refusal to be melodramatic about any aspect of their lives and Merry's naive innocence juxtaposed with their cynical bawdiness.  The whole book is highly entertaining, especially the secondary characters.

Of these Rand and Cat stand out as the most intriguing fictional characters, primary or secondary, ever to appear in fiction.  Rand has so many facets he'd outshine a diamond.  Big, scary pirate, family meddler, authority figure, big brother, master manipulator.  Without Rand this story would end far sooner and far less happily, though he never makes anything easy or comfortable.  Cat, the survivor of child prostitution and abuse, is clearly damaged yet clever, witty, able, and surprisingly nurturing.  His care for Merry brings them both away from the edge.  Readers have for years asserted that he needs his own book, and I would wholeheartedly concur. 

Additionally The Windflower is laden with history, filled with details of everyday life in the new United States, including the politics that lead to the War of 1812.  Both Devon and Merry have well stated political opinions and how Washington and the British War Department are running it.  All of this only adds to the historical feel of the book. 

If the book has a real flaw it's that the language, while beautiful and incredibly descriptive, is sometimes too flowery.  Quite literally flowery in that the flora of many locals is excessivley described and Merry's, Devon's and Cat's physical details are often compared to natural phenomena. 

Also, the book's main conflict - Merry and Devon's distrust of one another and subsequent refusal to divulge critical information to each other - is resolved approximately 70 pages before the book ends.  Those final 70 pages are used for loose end wrapping and hinting at Rand and Cat's futures.  It's still good, sometimes great reading, but the book's climax comes too early for best impact. 

Many times online I've read that the book isn't romantic enough, that Merry and Devon aren't interesting enough or that Rand, Cat, and the pirate Raven outshine them.  Having read this book at least six times, I'm inclined to disagree.  Merry and Devon, for all the reasons above, complete each other in a way Merry and Cat or Merry and Raven or Merry and Rand (shudder!) could never have.  Their romance sometimes takes a backseat to the book's general cleverness, but it's still a great romance.  The romantic denouement, after many, many false starts, comes late in the book, but when it comes, it's so sweet.  One of the sweetest love scenes out there.  So tender and heartfelt.  And funny.  Funny even while steamy.  That's hard to do.

Cat deserved his own book, yes, but this one - this one - is perfect just the way it is.  My highest recommendation for any fiction book, any romance, is The Windflower.  It's worth what I paid for it many times over.  Every library system in the nation should have this one on its shelves as a shining example of great romance.

tags: books  romance novels  favorite books  laura london