{"id":6602,"date":"2025-08-13T05:47:24","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T12:47:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=6602"},"modified":"2025-08-13T05:47:24","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T12:47:24","slug":"darcie-wilde-the-heir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/darcie-wilde-the-heir\/","title":{"rendered":"Darcie Wilde: The Heir"},"content":{"rendered":"

Series debut<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em><\/strong>I\u2019ve read many books by Darcie Wilde (aka Sarah Zettel), but this may be my favorite.\u00a0 The writing and pacing are crisp and the character development seems to utilize all the things Wilde must have learned writing her other books.\u00a0 It\u2019s exquisite.\u00a0 While this is a pretty familiar story to a history buff, like any good historical novelist, Wilde shines a new light on history, illuminating the facts with her perceptions of the characters in the story.<\/p>\n

The main character, Queen Victoria \u2013 Princess Victoria at the time of this novel \u2013 is living under the \u201cKensington System,\u201d an elaborate and restrictive set of rules that governed Victoria\u2019s life until she became Queen.\u00a0 She never had a moment alone, had to sleep in her mother\u2019s room, and every movement and thought she had was determined by her mother and her mother\u2019s aide, Sir John Conroy. The result in both fact and fiction was that Victoria wanted nothing more than to shed the rules imposed on her and to try and evade them.<\/p>\n

Wilde posits in this novel, which takes place two years before Victoria becomes Queen, that Victoria insisted on going for a ride and on that ride, discovers a dead body.\u00a0 She\u2019s thrown from her horse and while she\u2019s fine, Conroy attempts to convince her that she saw nothing, she\u2019d imagined it all.\u00a0 Victoria knows that\u2019s not the truth and decides she will discover what is going on, and who the dead man was.<\/p>\n

Every good detective needs a Watson, and Victoria finds one in Conroy\u2019s daughter, Jane (renamed for this novel \u2013 her name was actually also Victoria). Jane is a quiet, querulous girl who is abused and verbally shamed by her father, even though he also sees Jane as an agent of information.\u00a0 When Jane and Victoria appear to be growing closer, he\u2019s delighted by this possible new way into Victoria\u2019s private life.<\/p>\n

Victoria, in life and in fiction, was a determined person, and she and Jane not only form a friendship, they develop different methods to be able to talk to one another where they won\u2019t be overheard.\u00a0 Not only do the girls discover the dead man\u2019s identity, forcing Conroy to admit his existence, they begin to uncover a web of secrets and lies surrounding the man. As Victoria is monitored practically every minute of every day, this is not easy, but the girls manage, often with the help of Victoria\u2019s governess, Lehzen.<\/p>\n

Wilde wraps up the novel with an actual serious illness Victoria suffered, which serves to highlight the forces surrounding her, both good and bad.\u00a0 The friendship between Victoria and Jane, and Jane\u2019s developing identity, make this novel a real standout.\u00a0 Even if you aren\u2019t familiar with the history, you\u2019ll surely be captivated by the universally interesting story of a confined young girl outsmarting her keepers and triumphing.\u00a0 Though as a reader you know she\u2019ll become Queen, to the sixteen year old Victoria, that day seems very far away.\u00a0 This is a wonderful story of personal triumph over adversity and of a deepening and interesting friendship.\u00a0\u00a0— Robin Agnew<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Series debut I\u2019ve read many books by Darcie Wilde (aka Sarah Zettel), but this may be my favorite.\u00a0 The writing and pacing are crisp and the character development seems to utilize all the things Wilde must have learned writing her other books.\u00a0 It\u2019s exquisite.\u00a0 While this is a pretty familiar story to a history buff, … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[268,542,10,162,2234,1224,1276,1441,2233],"class_list":["post-6602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-darcie-wilde","tag-england","tag-historical","tag-kensington-books","tag-kensington-system","tag-queen-victoria","tag-robin-agnew","tag-series-debut","tag-the-heir"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6602"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6603,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6602\/revisions\/6603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}