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This is a cinnamon roll of a book.
Basic premise: Solomon, our hero, goes to a brothel with some acquaintances one night while at University. Upon getting in the room with his assigned Lady of the Night, he realizes that sleeping with someone who's only sleeping with him as a professional courtesy isn't really doing it for him. In a move that is a mixture of sheer awkwardness and a dose of sympathy, Solomon drops his entire month's salary in her hand and walks out the door.
Fast forward some years, Solomon is happily working as a chemist for his uncle's cloth/tailor business, and Serena, our heroine and former Lady of the Evening, has invested Solomon's money into running an Inn, and is doing so successfully. When Solomon seeks her out, it has nothing to do with their former encounter, nor does he know who she is at first. Rather, she has a reputation for finding things, and Solomon's family has had a pair of earrings stolen and wants it back.
(Serena recognizes him immediately.)
Solomon recognizes her some days later, when they end up in the dark together. He never mentions it until she tells him who she is, at which point he's like, "Oh, I know, I figured it out when I saw you with the lights out." And Serena is very "blink blink," because clearly it has not occurred to him that this makes her lesser in any way. Indeed, the only protagonist in the book who is somewhat bothered by Serena's past is Serena, and that is more in the sense of the choices she had to make and the ways they hurt her than in a shamed sense.
As it turns out, Solomon's missing earrings are part of something much larger involving French spies and English intelligence and a bunch of plot stuff that is pretty spoilery. Suffice to say, there's a lot that's not what it seems in the book, and several of the secondary characters have really complicated, fleshed-out arcs.
One of these arcs leads to Solomon, who is such a solidly sweet dude, but also, a product of being a cishet white male with a number of choices he could have made, coming to one of the most succinctly beautiful summations of conceptualizing privilege I have ever seen:
In a sudden, blinding flash, everything was clear. It was as [Serena] said: [Queer Character] and Serena weren't angry with [Solomon]. They were just sick of being afraid. But they couldn't stop, because it was dangerous simply to be themselves, simply for them to live honest lives. And what [Solomon] had said to [Queer Character] was, If you stopped being yourself, you would be safe. No one had ever said that to Solomon, because it was already safe to be him. In any case, despite all the politics and hijinks, there's something extremely grounded about this book, and I have a soft spot for male protagonists who can wait out extremely wary, fiercely independent female protagonists and win the long game with kindness.
Basic premise: Solomon, our hero, goes to a brothel with some acquaintances one night while at University. Upon getting in the room with his assigned Lady of the Night, he realizes that sleeping with someone who's only sleeping with him as a professional courtesy isn't really doing it for him. In a move that is a mixture of sheer awkwardness and a dose of sympathy, Solomon drops his entire month's salary in her hand and walks out the door.
Fast forward some years, Solomon is happily working as a chemist for his uncle's cloth/tailor business, and Serena, our heroine and former Lady of the Evening, has invested Solomon's money into running an Inn, and is doing so successfully. When Solomon seeks her out, it has nothing to do with their former encounter, nor does he know who she is at first. Rather, she has a reputation for finding things, and Solomon's family has had a pair of earrings stolen and wants it back.
(Serena recognizes him immediately.)
Solomon recognizes her some days later, when they end up in the dark together. He never mentions it until she tells him who she is, at which point he's like, "Oh, I know, I figured it out when I saw you with the lights out." And Serena is very "blink blink," because clearly it has not occurred to him that this makes her lesser in any way. Indeed, the only protagonist in the book who is somewhat bothered by Serena's past is Serena, and that is more in the sense of the choices she had to make and the ways they hurt her than in a shamed sense.
As it turns out, Solomon's missing earrings are part of something much larger involving French spies and English intelligence and a bunch of plot stuff that is pretty spoilery. Suffice to say, there's a lot that's not what it seems in the book, and several of the secondary characters have really complicated, fleshed-out arcs.
One of these arcs leads to Solomon, who is such a solidly sweet dude, but also, a product of being a cishet white male with a number of choices he could have made, coming to one of the most succinctly beautiful summations of conceptualizing privilege I have ever seen:
In a sudden, blinding flash, everything was clear. It was as [Serena] said: [Queer Character] and Serena weren't angry with [Solomon]. They were just sick of being afraid. But they couldn't stop, because it was dangerous simply to be themselves, simply for them to live honest lives. And what [Solomon] had said to [Queer Character] was, If you stopped being yourself, you would be safe. No one had ever said that to Solomon, because it was already safe to be him.
