In Revolutionary France, the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel rescue vampire aristocrats from the guillotine. And Eleanor, an English maid, is key to their most ambitious plot yet: save the royal family. But revolution’s a bloodthirsty business . . . Scarlet is a thrilling, fast-paced romp by Genevieve Cogman.
My thoughts: what if all the aristocrats (or most of them) were vampires and the French Revolution was against them as well as the human kind?
Eleanor works for a vampire aristo in England, who lends her to another – Sir Percy Blakeney and his wife due to her resemblance to a very important French woman they plan to rescue. Because Percy and his friends are the infamous Scarlet Pimpernel!
However Eleanor gets frustrated with their short sighted approach to things – rescuing those poor, innocent aristocrats, from the ungrateful poor, and not realising that some of the aims of the Revolution are positive. Because she’s working class, a maid, she has a very different perspective.
But she’s still willing to help them with the plan, and risk her own life, as she does several times, to help others in France.
Hijinks ensue as the team get into character and then end up in the sewers, as part of their escape. Can Eleanor succeed? Will she convince even one of the Pimpernel’s crew that not all of the Revolution’s ideas are bad?
This is the first in a trilogy from one of my favourite writers and I really enjoyed it, can’t wait for the next installment.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 