That Inevitable Victorian Thing

It's not a perfect book, but I can't stop thinking about it -- so warm and full of compassion and love. It is unique in so many ways, and I wish it weren't. We need a lot more books with hopeful alternate histories and speculative futures like this. I feel the darkness hanging over us as much as anyone does, but that's all the more reason we need models of positive futures. I know exactly which of my readers this book is for: the ones who want all the "gay books," the ones who watch all the anime, the ones who write fanfic.

I have also never ever read YA romance where the happy ending is a thruple. As we throw the romance doors open to include all kinds of loving relationships, I'm grateful to Johnston for adding this option!

This book kind of blew my mind -- partly because the near-future world is so compelling and appealing, partly because it's such a tricky romance. I mean, if we're going for a revisionist history, I like this one. I don't completely understand the religious overtones of their genetic system, and I have to admit that most of the book is fairly sedate on an adventure scale, but I really like that about it. I like that it's about the slow awakenings of romance and idyllic summer and neo-victorian social mores. That part is fascinating. I love it for having an intersex character and a bisexual one at that. I also really love the love is hard work model, and their three way relationship at the end. Pretty sweet, in a fairy tale kind of way.

A pleasant, enjoyable read! It’s basically a teen Regency romance set in an almost-utopia, with added Canadian flavour, and yes, it’s about as fun and fluffy as that sounds. The romance is sweet and believable, the characters are all likeable, the world-building is pretty well thought out, and the whole thing reads lightly. I appreciated the diversity a lot—there are queer and disabled characters and because of the world-building pretty much everyone is mixed-race, and nobody makes a big deal of any of it. It’s also the first novel I’ve read with an intersex heroine.

I had a bit of cognitive dissonance as a Canadian, though. Part of that’s because I’m West Coast Canadian and so don’t know Toronto or cottage country show more culture, partly because the idea of modern Canada but with everyone in presumably Victorian outfits felt weird, and partly because the Canadians still speak with British inflections. It was refreshing to see Canadian rep that isn’t just about beavers and Mounties and saying “eh” a lot, though, and fun to see Canadian folk songs playing during the balls.

I also don’t want to interrogate the world-building too deeply. The way history’s different because the British Empire’s still around is interesting and doesn’t shy away from bad things, and the conceit of a genetic database that doubles as a social media-style matchmaker is equally cool, but I don’t want to poke too hard at either element for fear of it all falling apart into plot holes. The database, for instance, is seen as a solely good thing, though it’s got potential to control lives.

Johnson also seemed weirdly fixated on the readers knowing some characters were of Chinese descent, to the point where I thought that surely would have some bearing on the climax. She doesn’t make nearly as much fuss about Black or indigenous heritage.

But this is also not a novel that demands to be read in detail. It’s a romance! It’s meant to entertain! The world-building’s there to give depth and aid and hinder the plot in turn! I enjoyed the read for sure, though I didn’t like it quite enough to enthuse over it at work, and definitely recommend it to anyone seeking diversity, teen romance, or to spend a few hours having fun.

Warnings: Brief moments of ableist or classist thinking. The Chinese weirdness I mentioned above.

7/10 show less

I found the first half of the book interminably dull, but there was a very fun and unexpected twist around the middle of the book that kept me reading. But I still didn't love it.

For one thing, the plot in the second half was too neat by far. It wrapped up much too tidily.

For another, the way women's equality was addressed in the novel was just odd. I appreciated the way history was rewritten to avoid colonialism and racism (I found it unconvincing but it was certainly much nicer than reality). But here we are in a world in a world where women are powerful in business and politics, and yet they wear corsets.

Far as I can tell all women's equality movements in history have involved women fighting against laws and rules that dictate show more constrictive and harmful garments. Why in god's name are these powerful, intelligent and educated women wearing corsets? Waiting for men to ask them to dance? Waiting until they've debuted to go on dates, hold hands, and kiss? That didn't even happen in the Victorian era, let alone in a Victorian-in-the-21st-century era. *Debuting,* for god's sake, when boys don't?

It reads like a strange romanticization of female subjugation with a surface-level empowerment I found unconvincing. show less

First of all, I want to say I was absolutely thrilled to read an early galley of this book, and even with knowing basically nothing about it, I knew immediately from the cover, the title, and a brief synopsis, that I had to read it, and I did...inevitably.
The story took a LONG time to warm up (which seems to ironically mirror the real cold, stoic Victorians of our own past), and it may have been a good half way through the book before I got truly invested. Johnston gives the reader this fascinating alternate world, one that was the main reason I wanted to continue to read on. Being a Brit out here in the States, a world where the British Empire was preserved, makes for a very different history lesson...!
But that was exactly what I show more wanted so much more of - how did all of that happen? How do this society develop? There is a great deal of fascinating world-building that revolves around ideas of gender identity, religion, customs, and the use of new technology, but the book feels like too much of an introduction to it all; I needed to know more than what I got from the added maps and letters too, although I liked these additions. The pacing was a little jumpy, and the ending seemed rather abrupt, leaving the feeling that would be a sequel to come, as the tale of the three main characters seemed to just begin at the end of the book. It was by that point that I wanted to really know how on earth things would work! There is a great concept here and I think it really could have been fleshed out with so much more detail and character development. The next one maybe? show less

I liked this story, mostly for the very readable prose and the quietly competent characters who, despite being dumb teenagers for plot points occasionally, felt very realistic. The historical worldbuilding was a very nice utopia, and as an erstwhile American I deeply enjoyed the occasional offhand slagging on America that happened in this book. I'm not quite sure the worldbuilding holds much together on close inspection, especially the Computer and the combination of religions/historical harmony, autonomous identity, and cohesion under an empire. The poly relationship felt like a quick and strangely convenient afterthought, which on the one hand as a poly person I heartily enjoyed as a means of sidestepping a traditional love triangle, show more but on the other I would have much rather read the sequel to this book where they have to figure out the balance of their relationships, secrecy, and political pressures. I'm definitely not sure that August is a good candidate for Prince Consort, for instance. In the end I enjoyed this book as a light romancey utopian YA, and loved the unapologetic bisexuality and the depiction of awkward first makeouts and teens respecting one another's needs and boundaries. I'm less sure about Helena's intersex reveal--that felt very strange for her to find out at this late date, given how sciencey her family is and how high an importance on genetic testing has in this culture--and I would very much have liked to see her exploring her reactions to this and considering more about her identity a bit more than just being upset that she can't marry her boyfriend b/c she won't be able to bear children for him. Likewise, Margaret's comment about allowing IVF took me aback as well. I would have liked it much better without the Victorian embellishments (the ball and the courtship rules and strictness about premarital ~mingling~ felt a bit odd in an otherwise permissive culture), but this is a very fine novel and Regency fic fans will eat this all up. show less

I didn't know what I was getting into with the book so it was a fun surprise for me that it was set in Ontario and has a ton of great Canadian references. I loved the diversity and representation within the book and enjoyed the story.
That said, it felt like it just kind of glossed over or didn't adequately tackle that the basis of the whole genetic matchmaking system in the world is kinda...eugenics-y?