A lovely regency romance all the great bits of this genre that i love with addition of snippets of love letters from the past

Loved it

Using diaries, letters and stories of scandal from the newspapers, author Felicity Day reveals the real women of the Regency world: their loves, their lives, their opinions and adventures. She takes us behind drawing room doors and into high society ballrooms, following six leading ladies and their family, friends, and contemporaries as they move from matchmaking to matrimony and beyond. Forget fiction, this is real-life Regency romance and it's even more enticing . . .

What a fun book this is! It is full of gossip and disgraceful behaviour from our past so-called 'betters'. One thing I learned is that there was a great deal more than fleeting glances and occasional touches, very amusing tales and scandalous divorces. Excellent read. Thank you Netgalley and the publishers for a highly entertaining read.

We love Regency and love the stories of Regency women who belonged to the Ton.
This is how they really lived and it talks about aristocrats and women from other classes.
Well researched, informative, and intriguing
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

It’s no secret that I love all things Regency – be it Jane Austen, Bridgerton, or the Jonathan Groff episode of Doctor Who. I also love discussions about historical accuracy, and how it relates to our understanding of a time period. When I came across this book, it was an obvious read for me, and I absolutely loved it.

Drawing on letters, personal accounts, and more, Felicity Day guides us through the reality of the Regency romantic life, busting some myths and confirming others. I was in equal parts surprised about what was true and what wasn’t from our popular imagination; for example, I never thought that most aristocratic women didn’t get married until their late twenties, or that weddings really did take place in intimate ceremonies in the family drawing room.

I also appreciated how clear the author was that the Ton, and by extension those featured in her book, represents an elite few rather than life as a whole. Day’s descriptions of their lifestyles and parties reminded me of people like the Kardashians, whose ultra-wealth (and their display of it) is so far detached from the lives of everyday people. I thought she did an excellent job of placing all of the families and individuals she discussed in the correct context, explaining what a dowry actually is, and giving a wider view of a life that we often think of as being common, if not almost universal, experience.

This was such a fascinating read, and I enjoyed it immensely. I think it will be of interest to any fans of Regency fiction, and anyone interested in the romances – and particularly the lives of women – in the past.

I received a free copy for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to read this book - The Game of Hearts by Felicity Day.
This book is like real life Bridgerton but insights into real life events of the time. This is a mixture of diary entries and letters and doesn't just focus on one character which I found a little confusing. I have read war diaries before and struggled and thought I would give this a try but have realised non-fiction is not for me.

As a lover of regency romances this was a fascinating insight into the real lives of members of the ton in the early 1800s.

Really enjoyed this look into the real life’s of regency women! Filled a Bridgerton shaped hole, but with more realistic endings. I think is a great accompaniment to any regency fiction and will be promoting as such.

A super accessible and informative book all about real lives and experiences of marriages in Regency Britain. A great book for fans of Bridgerton who was to learn more about the time period and the reality of the lives their favourite characters lead.

I was immersed in this book and while there were things I expected, I was amazed by some of the exciting facts and tidbits the author gives us. We really follow these characters from debuting in the ton until after their marriage when kids are involved and war arrives. Sometimes it did feel that I was reading the gossip scandal sheet myself with all the juicy details compiled.

I would like to thank netgalley and Bonnier Books UK for a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

This is a highly interesting book that focuses more on marriage than love. It dispels a lot of commonly held beliefs about the regency. It also introduces some truly interesting women who had more control of their own future than historical fiction would have you believe.

A lovely look back at the regency era of romance. Nice real life touches with quotes from letters written at the time.

This is a fascinating, entertaining and often deeply moving social history of women from the aristocracy and landed gentry (the 0.1%) in the Regency era in the UK. Carefully researched from primary sources including letters, diaries and newspaper articles, it frames its narrative around six women in particular but includes plenty of contextual information and details about their contemporaries. I found all the discussions of social customs and conventions interesting but was especially intrigued by the information about financial settlements, marital infidelity, and 19th century divorce law and practice.

As a long-time reader of historical fiction and romance, I’ve often come across characters or plot lines that appear outlandish or flat-out unbelievable, but I take back all my eye-rolling - truth is at least as strange as fiction in many respects and my jaw dropped at some of the experiences related in this book. Some of my preconceptions about social conventions of the era were also dispelled by facts such as the average age of first marriage for aristocratic women of this period being 25 years, much later than is suggested by much popular fiction and television productions, and the amount of and variation in work that upper class women could and did do outside the domestic sphere.

I really enjoyed reading this book. The writing style is very accessible without being in any way dumbed down, and unlike the majority of history books I read, it is not overloaded with footnotes to interrupt the reading flow. I highly recommend this for anyone who reads historical fiction and/or historical romance, or who simply has an interest in women’s history.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance reader copy.

The Game of Hearts has a romantic and playful name and cover, and yet the reading of the text leads to an almost stale, dispassionate expanse of the world of the Regency era. I enjoyed more so the latter part of the book, which is where I feel we have more a delve into the real crux of these women and the impact of things such as how the law sways their decisions. A lot of the time it felt like I was reading the name tag of a woman and then a quote from her diary, and with that there was little heart to really connect me to these people. However despite these little problems I can understand the magnitude that this book tries to undertake. It just needed more of a focused streamline and sensibility to guide it. But if you are willing to be thrown into the deep end then The Game of Hearts will be an interesting read.

I think a lot of us have been enamoured by the regency era, from Jane Austen to Bridgerton, swept up into the romance of it all and the intricate history behind the era. This book was absolutely fab in bringing an element of realism into the enchanting romance of the time.

It was well written with greatly conducted research. We get insights into real life events of the time and it reads easily however it can be quite a big, heavy chonk of information. I was occasionally quite daunted by the large chunks of text and long chapters which had me taking regularly breaks, probably a good thing really to help me absorb and digest more of the information. I would have loved some original extracts from letters of the day rather than little snippets.

I had thought there would be more of a focus on individuals shining a light on their stories but names were peppered in throughout so I felt a slightly disconnected to the flow of people and information but the format was a good one once you got into it - I just think I was expecting something different!

I think if you have a prior interest and a curiosity into this era, this is mostly certainly the book for you! I really enjoyed learning about the people of regency and their lives and all things marriage and romance.

I loved the use of diaries and letters to understand and learn more about the woman and romance of the Regency period,

The Game of Hearts offers a glimpse into the lives of real women who sought love in Regency-era London, focused on six leading ladies and their social circles. Felicity Day draws from diaries, letters, and newspaper accounts to reveal the experiences of these women, with tales as scandalous as those in any fictional Regency romance novel!

I love Regency romances and recently have been really interested in reading more non-fiction about the period, which is what drew me to this book. I recently read a sort of beginners' guide to the period which didn't end up passing on much extra information than I'd already picked up just from reading novels, and left me disappointed. Whereas The Game of Hearts really does get deep into the detail and cover lots of specific information and insight about the period by looking at certain ladies' lives.

Some of the earlier chapters were tasked with doing a lot of upfront work, as there were a lot of intertwined and complex relationships and family connections to explain, which wasn't helped by a lot of the women and men sharing forenames or surnames. However, as the named people reappear throughout the chapters, I ended up with a pretty extensive catalogue of names and histories in my head! Once I started to keep track of everyone, it was much easier to read and I really enjoyed all the new information I learned about the era.

The content:
Introduction - The book starts with a good introduction which explains the Regency period clearly and sets the scene well for the upcoming stories. It also provides context and appreciation for how advantaged and small this group of elites really was.
Ch1-2: These chapters focus on Lady Sarah Spencer as well as mentioning lots of people that reappear in later chapters. Drawing on the experience of these people helped to further introduce details of Regency life.
Ch3 - This chapter covers Sydney Owenson, women in employment, spinsterhood and marriage later in life.
Ch 4 - This chapter introduces Frances Anne Vane-Tempest and the public court case her aunt took against Frances' betrothed, which attracted public and media attention like a modern day celebrity divorce case does.
Ch 5 - This chapter focuses on Harriet Fane and her long and windy tale of marriage settlements.
Ch6 - This chapter covers special licenses, marriage ceremonies and honeymoons.
Ch7 - This chapter introduces Magdalene De Lancey, marriages to men in the armed forces, death of a spouse, mourning and remarriage.
Ch8 - This chapter follows Lady Augusta Boringdon, adultery, separation and divorce.
Ch9 - This final chapter finishes with detailing the fate of the 6 leading women.

I really enjoyed this non-fiction book about the Regency period, and it did a really good job of explaining the social rules and the laws of this time. And it did this by highlighting the lives of 6 real Regency women who I had definitely never heard of before, so I learned a lot from this book.

Note: There appears to be two entries for this book on Goodreads but with different taglines (True Stories of Regency Romance Vs The Lives and Loves of Regency Women) so I will post this review against both books.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC from NetGalley but this is my voluntary and honest review.