High Lady of The Night Court's Reviews > The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue

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I absolutely LOVED this book and everything it stand for. I love the way the author created these characters and articulated their thoughts in such a marvelous way. I was in love with Felicity, Monty, and Percy before the second chapter even ended and only grew to like them more as the story progressed.

I’m not sure what I was expecting from this book but it definitely was not this. I knew I was going to love this book the second I started it and it met all my expectations, which were pretty high to begin with considering the amazing things I’ve heard about it. I read the blurb for this book on Goodreads and started reading it with a perspective that it was going to be this easy to get through, funny read and I did get that feel from it, but it was also so much more.
This book is tagged Historical Fiction, Romance, and LGBT, even though they are accurate, they make the book seem kind of superficial but there is actually a lot of emotional depth to this book if you look for it.

Our main characters, Monty, Percy, and Felicity make the most heartwarming trio possible. Henry Montague is an Earl’s son, yet he is the opposite of what you would consider to be a ‘lord’. He spends him time drinking, chasing after both women and men, and just about anything else that will tarnish his father’s reputation. Monty is so deeply in love with his best friend, Percy, to the point where it hurts to be around him as he is unable to tell him he’s in love with him. Through this book we get to see their relationship progress and it is so adorable because neither of them are sure if the other likes them and they are 2 very emotionally volatile people.

Putting the nature of their relationship aside, their friendship and the fact that they stand by the other’s side no matter what, really hits you in the gut. It clearly reflects the value of friendship and how much it means to every single one of us to always have a friend to laugh with, to have fun with, to lean on, to confide in, to go so crazy with to the point where anyone else would put the both of you in a mental hospital, no matter what comes your way.

The book deals with a lot of issues in the 18th century society such as racism and sexism. In the racism point of view, the author clearly shows how blacks were abused and dishonored and how they were never treated above the position of a servant. The sexism aspect we see clearly with Felicity as we see over and over again that women were not given the opportunities men were and that they considered to be inferior to the man. In such a situation, seeing Felicity’s dreams and how she will always defend and argue in favor of the position of women in society, is inspiring. Felicity is without a doubt my favorite character.

Felicity goes against the picture of what an ideal ‘lady’ would be in that time period. She’s a total bad ass. She is capable beyond measure and can take care of herself. She stands against how women are treated and embodies a true feminist. She is a bookworm, which only gave me reason to love her more. I mean come on, when we were first introduced to her, she was eating breakfast with a book standing up with the support of a jam pot with a fork wedged in it to keep it standing. How can we not love this girl?!

It’s a funny, clever, charming, delightful story and I loved it. I must say, I don’t really read much Historical Fiction but this book was amazing. All the hype surrounding this book was justified and if you are a person who enjoys reading Historical Fiction or a fun contemporary book I definitely recommend it to you.