chocolatepot | I need a Regency icon

Just finished a book that was technically good but really, really bugged me.

Said book is Something Fabulous, a gay Regency romance by Alexis Hall. The basic setup is: Valentine, Duke of Malvern, proposes marriage to Arabella Tarleton because their parents had wanted it when they were children (most of said parents are now dead). She absolutely loses her shit because in her head he is tragically forcing her into it like a villain and sexual predator. He goes to bed and she runs away with her companion(/girlfriend); her twinky twin brother, Bonaventure, wakes Valentine up in the middle of the night to go after her so she doesn't get hurt etc. The whole book is their pursuit of the women, occasionally catching up until things happen that let Belle and Peggy get away again. And of course, Valentine realizes he's attracted to Bonny and the two of them get together. (Interestingly, I thought Valentine was going to be repressing his sexuality but he seems to be grey ace, never having felt attraction until Bonny.)

What is K I L L I N G me about this is that firstly, Belle is unstable. I'm sorry but she is a fucking basket case. The initial misunderstanding of the proposal was kind of funny/cute/workable as a scene in a book, but DAYS go by and she is still clinging to this bizarre belief that she's a gothic heroine and Valentine is lustfully chasing after her to bring her to his bed, despite the fact that he's quite obviously not. She then escalates to outright lies to make other people more sympathetic to her, which is extremely manipulative.

This is made worse by the fact that there are multiple sane people around who make very little attempt to set her straight. Whenever they meet back up with Bonny and Valentine, Bonny kind of ineffectually goes "Oh, Belle," or ends up saying nothing; Peggy is with her at all times and she seems smart enough to realize from a) meeting Valentine and/or b) being aware that life is not a gothic novel that Belle is being unreasonable, ridiculous, and a pain in the ass. The two of them keep meeting up with other people that Belle blatantly lies to in order to get them to help her by borderline attacking Valentine. The first set of people hold him at gunpoint, one of the second set insults him to the point where he demands a duel (and frankly it was an understandable decision on his part).

Which brings me to my last point - there is a thread of all this that reads like a horror story to me. Valentine seems like a quite lonely and socially inept person. He's realized that he's different from other people in his lack of sexual attraction, which is alienating, but he's determined to do the respectable thing and what he sees as the right thing, which is to honor his father's wishes and also save the Tarletons from poverty. I would go so far as to say that he seems autistic, in that he doesn't understand hints, has a hard time processing other people's emotions (which in fairness do tend to be stupid emotions), says things directly that other people find hurtfully blunt sometimes, and focuses a lot on following society's rules. So obviously I relate a lot, and I do not often relate to characters. But every time they run into people and Belle gets to slander Valentine at length, nobody allows him to explain or defend himself. He gets tied to a chair for hours and when he eventually breaks a little free and falls into a table, he accidentally hits someone else as he's flailing, and they all act like it was a deliberate attack! This is a major anxiety of mine and I Do Not Like It.

I was holding out hope that there would be some big apologies at the end, maybe this was all just done to build up the tension and make Valentine a woobie, but no. It's pretty clear that Hall sees Valentine as a Mr. Darcy figure who is too proud and unkind and needed to learn to change. He even apologizes to Belle at the end for trying to "force" her to marry him and for chasing her! Absolutely makes no sense.