In Regency Buck, as Laura George shows us, it is the female character of Judith who subverts expectations. The Regency period’s favourite fashion icon, Beau Brummell, serves as Judith’s mentor in these escapades. (10)
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In Regency Buck we can see Heyer experimenting with a new form of romance, one that came to have a tremendous impact on popular publishing. She is experimenting as she creates what will become the ‘Regency romance’ and will indeed end up discarding some of the aspects as she develops it here. Never again will historical figures have extensive speaking roles in her novels, for example. Nor, sadly, will there be any more perfectly marvellous Beau Brummells, nor any more heroines who prove wonderfully apt pupils for the most important dandy of the Regency period. Like Beau Brummell in this novel, Judith Taverner is permitted to become one of a kind – a woman who need not uniformly follow the rules that other women do, just as he has made himself a man who need not abide by the rules that other men must follow. Heyer’s interest in dandy culture continues through most of her Regency romances and Heyer readers tend to become adept at visualising perfectly starched cravats and perfectly fitted coats. But female dandies in Heyer? Well, naturally, there is only one. (70)
From the introduction to the volume:
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