THE MISER OF MAYFAIR

by Marion Chesney ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 19, 1986

The author of the amusing Six Sisters Regency series begins another. This time the permanent fixture is a household of servants whose changing fortunes are dependent on transient tenants in a Mayfair establishment that is convenient to all the doings of the London Season. The house at 67 Clarges Street is doom-haunted, hard to rent even during the Season, and the servants--from the butler, Mr. Rainbird, with his ""clever comedian's face,"" to the potboy--are despairing and starving. The house agent, a scoundrel, holds them all in suspension through blackmail (Mr. Rainbird, for example, had been dismissed from his previous position when he was discovered in bed with his former employer's wife), and the agent also skims off aplenty from their wages. The servants pray for a rich tenant, but, alas, that monument to miserdom, fat, slovenly Mr. Roderick Sinclair from Edinburgh, arrives with his gloriously beautiful daughter Fiona. Ah, but Mr. Sinclair (a cheerfully sinning echo of Rev. Armitage of Six Sisters) is really a broad-hearted toper, stranded high and dry when his greedy brother left him penniless, his only legacy a ""ward,"" Fiona. So it's off to London to parlay Fiona's beauty into a marriage-contingent purseful for both. Fiona is beautiful, Sinclair thinks, but dim. How wrong! Fiona artfully manipulates gossip about her ""father"" the rich miser; cleans out the ladies' gaming tables; takes the town by storm (stunning costumes appear as window curtains disappear); and good soul that she is, she fattens the purses and larder of the servants. Then, of course, there's the predictable off-and-on romance with a handsome peer, a romance aided by Mr. Rainbird. It all ends with a carriage race toward Gretna Green--one carriage jouncing with a household of adoring servants. Chesney uses a mild Upstairs, Downstairs model here, but at this point, she has not given her servants enough brassy eccentricities (like those of the elders in Six Sisters) to hit a pitch above mere heartwarming. Still, it's only the beginning, folks. (Note new publisher.)

Pub Date: May 19, 1986

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1986

Categories: FICTION