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Kit Webb has left his stand-and-deliver days behind him. But dreary days at his coffee shop have begun to make him pine for the heady rush of thievery. When a handsome yet arrogant aristocrat storms into his shop, Kit quickly realizes he may be unable to deny whatever this highborn man desires. In order to save himself and a beloved friend, Percy, Lord Holland must go against every gentlemanly behavior he holds dear to gain what he needs most: a book that once belonged to his mother, a book show more his father never lets out of his sight and could be Percy's savior. More comfortable in silk-filled ballrooms than coffee shops frequented by criminals, his attempts to hire the roughly hewn highwayman, formerly known as Gladhand Jack, proves equal parts frustrating and electrifying. Kit refuses to participate in the robbery but agrees to teach Percy how to do the deed. Percy knows he has little choice but to submit and as the lessons in thievery begin, he discovers thievery isn't the only crime he's desperate to commit with Kit. But when their careful plan goes dangerously wrong and shocking revelations threaten to tear them apart, can these stolen hearts overcome the impediments in their path? -- show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Kit Webb was once a bandit, but is now retired and running a coffee shop after a bad experience resulting in a permanent leg injury. Percy is a foppish nobleman with a plan - hire the handsome highwayman to steal something from his father, the Duke, that he can use to extort money which he will use to pay off his own blackmailer, who is threatening to reveal that Percy is not the Duke’s rightful heir. Anyway, they fall in love.
Absolutely delightful. The leads are well-realized and have great chemistry. They have real reasons to distrust each other, that they have to do real work on in the end! The story of Percy’s inheritance and Kit’s family history is almost too complicated, in a way that I found really enjoyable. I was truly show more surprised by the ending because I hadn’t really been following (andI can never remember who the Jacobites are. I’m not even sure if this is actually a spoiler ).
The couple in the next book have the same names as my brother and my sister-in-law so I will not be reading it, but I do need someone else to read it and tell me what happens, thanks. show less
Absolutely delightful. The leads are well-realized and have great chemistry. They have real reasons to distrust each other, that they have to do real work on in the end! The story of Percy’s inheritance and Kit’s family history is almost too complicated, in a way that I found really enjoyable. I was truly show more surprised by the ending because I hadn’t really been following (and
The couple in the next book have the same names as my brother and my sister-in-law so I will not be reading it, but I do need someone else to read it and tell me what happens, thanks. show less
The eighteenth century was superior to the nineteenth century, and Cat Sebastian knows this. Actually both centuries were awful, but before the terriblefication of men's fashion, the rise of middle class etiquette, and the decline of the sword duel, at least life was occasionally fun. People respected an aesthetic, is all I'm saying.
Set in the mid-1700s, The Queer Principles of Kit Webb follows a semi-retired highwayman, Kit, and a nobleman's son with a legitimacy issue, Percy, who team up to Do Some Crimes. Oh, and it's a literal coffee shop AU (I am really warming to this trope). I found this slow burn romance very winning, both in its emotional intensity and its smart characterizations—in fact, I'd say it's one of my favorites of show more Sebastian's novels so far.
Kit, whom I pictured with the visage of young Sean Bean and the affect of Luke from Gilmore Girls, is a sweetheart with a tragic past that's sensitively depicted. The novel beautifully subverts the trope of the "reformed rogue," making it clear that Kit is no bad boy and his principles are a radical correction to the systemic injustices of his era. Earlier this year I finished I Know What I Am: The Life and Times of Artemisia Gentileschi, a book that put me solidly on the side of brigandage as a form of political resistance, so I was delighted to find that Sebastian's novel cosigns this thesis.
Percy, meanwhile, is sassy and sartorially on point—somehow he even makes wigs sexy—without devolving into caricature. I appreciated that the novel gives Kit and Percy space to enjoy the material culture of nobility without consenting to the power structures that shaped it. Our desires are inextricable from our culture; we all have problematic faves.
Percy is also a mean flirt in a way that, to my utter surprise, really does it for me. How, how in the world, has the author reclaimed this most hateful of tropes? All I can say is that Percy's snideness never feels like negging. Perhaps it's because the power imbalance between Percy and Kit cuts both ways, perhaps because Kit makes no secret of his interest in Percy. (Now I'm imagining an alternate Star Wars where, every time Han calls Leia "Princess," Leia is at the same moment openly checking him out. See, doesn't it fix everything?)
The Queer Principles of Kit Webb incorporates some light swashbuckling and political intrigue; the romance plot comes first, but I thought the action/mystery was readable and fairly compelling. Marian, Percy's childhood friend (and stepmother), is an intriguing character and their relationship felt genuine. I was slightly disappointed that a number of plot threads are unresolved or left to our imaginations, but we get enough of the story to be satisfied with the HEA, and maybe a sequel...?
I received this ARC from Avon and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. show less
Set in the mid-1700s, The Queer Principles of Kit Webb follows a semi-retired highwayman, Kit, and a nobleman's son with a legitimacy issue, Percy, who team up to Do Some Crimes. Oh, and it's a literal coffee shop AU (I am really warming to this trope). I found this slow burn romance very winning, both in its emotional intensity and its smart characterizations—in fact, I'd say it's one of my favorites of show more Sebastian's novels so far.
Kit, whom I pictured with the visage of young Sean Bean and the affect of Luke from Gilmore Girls, is a sweetheart with a tragic past that's sensitively depicted. The novel beautifully subverts the trope of the "reformed rogue," making it clear that Kit is no bad boy and his principles are a radical correction to the systemic injustices of his era. Earlier this year I finished I Know What I Am: The Life and Times of Artemisia Gentileschi, a book that put me solidly on the side of brigandage as a form of political resistance, so I was delighted to find that Sebastian's novel cosigns this thesis.
Percy, meanwhile, is sassy and sartorially on point—somehow he even makes wigs sexy—without devolving into caricature. I appreciated that the novel gives Kit and Percy space to enjoy the material culture of nobility without consenting to the power structures that shaped it. Our desires are inextricable from our culture; we all have problematic faves.
Percy is also a mean flirt in a way that, to my utter surprise, really does it for me. How, how in the world, has the author reclaimed this most hateful of tropes? All I can say is that Percy's snideness never feels like negging. Perhaps it's because the power imbalance between Percy and Kit cuts both ways, perhaps because Kit makes no secret of his interest in Percy. (Now I'm imagining an alternate Star Wars where, every time Han calls Leia "Princess," Leia is at the same moment openly checking him out. See, doesn't it fix everything?)
The Queer Principles of Kit Webb incorporates some light swashbuckling and political intrigue; the romance plot comes first, but I thought the action/mystery was readable and fairly compelling. Marian, Percy's childhood friend (and stepmother), is an intriguing character and their relationship felt genuine. I was slightly disappointed that a number of plot threads are unresolved or left to our imaginations, but we get enough of the story to be satisfied with the HEA, and maybe a sequel...?
I received this ARC from Avon and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. show less
I got to read the NetGalley ARC, this is my review:
I fell in love immediately, and kept falling all the way through. I may still be falling. What a great story! Forged in the pandemic year, (and other adversities, as the author notes in her Acknowledgments), this novel is a snarkily endearing cross-classes treasure not to be missed. Each of our MCs has soul-scarring issues, but the artfully awkward ways they come into each other's lives is what really got to me. Cat Sebastian has taught me to expect a lot from her, but this hit all my buttons on humor, trust, ethics, morals, and kindness.
Very highly recommended.
QUOTE: (Percy)
This was what he wanted--the chance to be known for the worst of what he was and to be held dear anyway, the show more ability to trust a person as more than an ally. show less
I fell in love immediately, and kept falling all the way through. I may still be falling. What a great story! Forged in the pandemic year, (and other adversities, as the author notes in her Acknowledgments), this novel is a snarkily endearing cross-classes treasure not to be missed. Each of our MCs has soul-scarring issues, but the artfully awkward ways they come into each other's lives is what really got to me. Cat Sebastian has taught me to expect a lot from her, but this hit all my buttons on humor, trust, ethics, morals, and kindness.
Very highly recommended.
QUOTE: (Percy)
This was what he wanted--the chance to be known for the worst of what he was and to be held dear anyway, the show more ability to trust a person as more than an ally. show less
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.
My Review: I've been able to write harsh reviews before. It should be a doddle to write a happy one, right?
Wrong...when I'm happy, where I expected to be and really almost was, ecstatic.
First and foremost, however, let me assure anyone who likes historical fiction featuring men who get it on with other men that this is a very satisfying example of the genre. Despite the W-bomb dropped at the 17% mark. (At least it was just the one.)
I was utterly delighted by the odd-couple pairing of the future Duke with the highwayman. I was even glad that the couple took a goodly time getting down to business...I'm sure the rational side of an author of M/M romantic novels knows the show more inflection point of first sexual contact between men is likely to be the source of a sizable, um, payoff for their readers. Knowing it's, erm, coming and being teased to wait for it can be a lot of fun!
Until the magic moment slips by...and it becomes a Thursday-night fuck.
I was 95% there by the time the deed got done, and was fairly resigned to the men having an old-fashioned "the fire flickered and died" fade-to-black coupling. That's not really Author Sebastian's métier, but people are allowed to change and try different things. Going over half the story without the act of consummation was almost too long. It was risky to use alternating PoVs in the story, given the lateness of the sex, because it really risked disinvesting the reader in the when-will-they. There was no question that they wouldn't, of course, but waiting so long to give us the reward when we weren't able to follow one character's perspective on the cost of delay resulted in a certain distancing and detachment...we had no sense of why the particular choice that was made in the final analysis was made. It felt as surprising to me as it must've felt to the men themselves. And yet we dwelt on it not at all!
And yet this monadnock of reticence chooses the loss of virginity that most men quail before! This didn't square with what I'd been told, nor was I privy to anything in the cross-talk of the book that would let me think anything other than, "do what now? where'd that even come from?!"
There are Author Sebastian's trademark delightful aperçus, of course, like this delicious pair:
Thesis, meet antithesis...and both are equally true. Inarguably so. Doesn't something in you resound with the truth in each of these?
Then came a serious issue I felt really didn't get anything like the time it needed to build up to: the return of the wanderer, and the foreshadowing of the real stakes in what I feel sure now is going to be a series. I can't really say more, and was encouraged to say even less (ie, nothing at all) but there's a reason I want to tell you that you're going to need to brace yourself.
In life, as we live it, there are no unmixed emotions, no purely experienced peak moments. We drag the past with us and chuck it up as a screen to avoid looking into the nothingness of the unlived future. The present is almost never enough to really distract us from the blank wall we can choose what to project onto, but more often choose to see in all its void-of-glory through a ragged curtain of life as it was.
When that happens in fiction, it's of necessity a surprise. What stakes there are, however, are utterly and totally on the line for the author. One false step, one gesture misplaced or misused, and the trust between reader and author can crumble. It almost did for me when the past came to haunt the future.
If this is the first time you're reading one of Author Sebastian's books, put it down and pick up The Turners series or the Seducing the Sedgwicks series here and here. They lack this authorial high-wire act, and building your trust in Author Sebastian's landings being solid, if not precisely the one you're expecting, is necessary not to experience disorientation.
The fact that this will be a series is worth noting as well, since there are people whose actions and inactions we need to know more about before they make full sense. And there are some actions that are, to put it mildly, aren't easy to gloss over...and I don't mean the one many will blench at.
So take this as a solid encouragement to pick up and savor the book for existing fans, with the note to set aside some established patterns; and a shove in the direction of the previous reads by Author Sebastian for new readers. For here be pleasures you should definitely not deny yourself or remain without. We need happy distractions from ugly reality...what better way than to see love conquering the many barriers folk decide to allow there to be in its free and complete exercise. show less
My Review: I've been able to write harsh reviews before. It should be a doddle to write a happy one, right?
Wrong...when I'm happy, where I expected to be and really almost was, ecstatic.
First and foremost, however, let me assure anyone who likes historical fiction featuring men who get it on with other men that this is a very satisfying example of the genre. Despite the W-bomb dropped at the 17% mark. (At least it was just the one.)
I was utterly delighted by the odd-couple pairing of the future Duke with the highwayman. I was even glad that the couple took a goodly time getting down to business...I'm sure the rational side of an author of M/M romantic novels knows the show more inflection point of first sexual contact between men is likely to be the source of a sizable, um, payoff for their readers. Knowing it's, erm, coming and being teased to wait for it can be a lot of fun!
Until the magic moment slips by...and it becomes a Thursday-night fuck.
I was 95% there by the time the deed got done, and was fairly resigned to the men having an old-fashioned "the fire flickered and died" fade-to-black coupling. That's not really Author Sebastian's métier, but people are allowed to change and try different things. Going over half the story without the act of consummation was almost too long. It was risky to use alternating PoVs in the story, given the lateness of the sex, because it really risked disinvesting the reader in the when-will-they. There was no question that they wouldn't, of course, but waiting so long to give us the reward when we weren't able to follow one character's perspective on the cost of delay resulted in a certain distancing and detachment...we had no sense of why the particular choice that was made in the final analysis was made. It felt as surprising to me as it must've felt to the men themselves. And yet we dwelt on it not at all!
Webb frequented neither church nor tavern nor anywhere even remotely interesting. Percy had become momentarily intrigued when he realized how often Webb went to the baths, but the man seemed to spend his time there actually bathing, so Percy resumed being unimpressed.
–and–
Kit was usually very good at controlling this sort of urge. Hopping into bed with attractive strangers had never appealed to him very much anyway. It always seemed like a lot of hassle {anachronism; coinage not attested until 1945} and risk for pleasure that never quite lived up to one's expectations. And that was with women; with men things were even more complicated because a heaping great dose of danger was thrown into the bargain.
And yet this monadnock of reticence chooses the loss of virginity that most men quail before! This didn't square with what I'd been told, nor was I privy to anything in the cross-talk of the book that would let me think anything other than, "do what now? where'd that even come from?!"
There are Author Sebastian's trademark delightful aperçus, of course, like this delicious pair:
“I used to think that revenge was about defending one’s honor, but it turns out that honor is just spite dressed up for Sunday.”
–and–
Percy realized he had had it all wrong when he told Kit that honor is just spite dressed up; spite was honor when it was the only weapon you had against someone more powerful.
Thesis, meet antithesis...and both are equally true. Inarguably so. Doesn't something in you resound with the truth in each of these?
Then came a serious issue I felt really didn't get anything like the time it needed to build up to: the return of the wanderer, and the foreshadowing of the real stakes in what I feel sure now is going to be a series. I can't really say more, and was encouraged to say even less (ie, nothing at all) but there's a reason I want to tell you that you're going to need to brace yourself.
In life, as we live it, there are no unmixed emotions, no purely experienced peak moments. We drag the past with us and chuck it up as a screen to avoid looking into the nothingness of the unlived future. The present is almost never enough to really distract us from the blank wall we can choose what to project onto, but more often choose to see in all its void-of-glory through a ragged curtain of life as it was.
When that happens in fiction, it's of necessity a surprise. What stakes there are, however, are utterly and totally on the line for the author. One false step, one gesture misplaced or misused, and the trust between reader and author can crumble. It almost did for me when the past came to haunt the future.
If this is the first time you're reading one of Author Sebastian's books, put it down and pick up The Turners series or the Seducing the Sedgwicks series here and here. They lack this authorial high-wire act, and building your trust in Author Sebastian's landings being solid, if not precisely the one you're expecting, is necessary not to experience disorientation.
The fact that this will be a series is worth noting as well, since there are people whose actions and inactions we need to know more about before they make full sense. And there are some actions that are, to put it mildly, aren't easy to gloss over...and I don't mean the one many will blench at.
So take this as a solid encouragement to pick up and savor the book for existing fans, with the note to set aside some established patterns; and a shove in the direction of the previous reads by Author Sebastian for new readers. For here be pleasures you should definitely not deny yourself or remain without. We need happy distractions from ugly reality...what better way than to see love conquering the many barriers folk decide to allow there to be in its free and complete exercise. show less
“Kit clenched his teeth in jealousy. He did not like watching Percy insult anyone who wasn’t him, which was probably a mad thought, but if insults and flirtation weren’t synonymous for Percy, then Kit was very much at sea.”
A hero who is jealous the other hero’s insulting other people? Be still my heart.
I loved this. They end up planning a highway robbery together and fell in love which was delightful to watch. I cannot wait until Marian’s book.
A hero who is jealous the other hero’s insulting other people? Be still my heart.
I loved this. They end up planning a highway robbery together and fell in love which was delightful to watch. I cannot wait until Marian’s book.
Sebastian hasn't been a hit with me but I'm a sucker for M/M historical romance so I was still excited to read this one, especially with its cute cover (rather than the usual horrible photoshop Fabio-esque covers on most M/M romance). However, I was again disappointed.
I didn't really get any chemistry between the two leads - it plays on the enemies to lovers trope but their eventual fondness for each other doesn't read organic and the eventual sex scene seemed forced, like the author threw it in as an afterthought to appease her audience. Especially the fact that it ends on a bit of a sour note (not a euphemism) and is then never really mentioned again.
There was also a lot of buildup in the highway robbery/revenge plot that went out on show more a super anticlimactic ending then a cliffhanger. There should have been a lot more focus on the development of that instead of all the coffeeshop scenes. It didn't feel believable or historically accurate at all.
This was a fast, sometimes cute read but overall unmemorable. The second book in the series is also going to focus on the M/F relationship that was barely a background blip in this story, so it seems pointless to continue with the series. If this is your first foray into M/M and/or historical romance, there are better places to start. show less
I didn't really get any chemistry between the two leads - it plays on the enemies to lovers trope but their eventual fondness for each other doesn't read organic and the eventual sex scene seemed forced, like the author threw it in as an afterthought to appease her audience. Especially the fact that it ends on a bit of a sour note (not a euphemism) and is then never really mentioned again.
There was also a lot of buildup in the highway robbery/revenge plot that went out on show more a super anticlimactic ending then a cliffhanger. There should have been a lot more focus on the development of that instead of all the coffeeshop scenes. It didn't feel believable or historically accurate at all.
This was a fast, sometimes cute read but overall unmemorable. The second book in the series is also going to focus on the M/F relationship that was barely a background blip in this story, so it seems pointless to continue with the series. If this is your first foray into M/M and/or historical romance, there are better places to start. show less
I like Cat Sebastian's writing. And I know that I bang on about this too much, but Joel Leslie keeps putting me off. His voice works when his characters are pompous, but I'm starting to wonder if he makes characters sound pompous automatically?
But I liked this, especially Percy's sidequest into prizefighting.
But I liked this, especially Percy's sidequest into prizefighting.
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- The Queer Principles of Kit Webb
- Original publication date
- 2021-06-08
- People/Characters
- Kit Webb; Percy, Lord Holland; Betty; Marian Hayes; Scarlett
- Important places
- London, England, UK
- Epigraph
- Since laws were made for every degree,
To curb vice in others, as well as me,
I wonder we han't better company,
Upon Tyburn Tree;
But gold from law can take out the sting,
And if rich men like us were to swing... (show all),
'Twould thin the land, such numbers to string,
Upon Tyburn Tree.
--John Gay, The Beggars' Opera, 1728 - First words
- Kit Webb had principles.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)“I’m right here,” Percy said, and reached up for a kiss.
- Original language
- English
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 543
- Popularity
- 55,055
- Reviews
- 34
- Rating
- (3.93)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 7
- ASINs
- 2
