Aristocrats: Caroline, Emily, Louisa and Sarah Lennox, 1750-1832 Cassette

I tried to skim-read this book. But it was far too good and I ended up spending hours and hours totally engrossed in the lives, loves and letters of the Lennox sisters-- Caroline, Emily, Louisa and Sarah. Author Stella Tillyard has given a second life to these 18th-century aristocrats whose extended family included some of the most significant and colourful political figures of the era. She's mixed impeccable research, a sharp eye for detail and a writing style that's both precise and lively to produce a biography of a clan, which doubles as a panoramic history of the aristocracy in the 1700s. Each sister's defining characteristics shine through their letters, portraits and Tillyard's terrific storytelling. Caroline, the eldest, deeply pessimistic, intelligent and moral but fascinated by and attracted to "wickedness" (she eloped with the naughty-but-nice Henry Fox and was hugely happy with him). Emily: beautiful, loving, dictatorial and unbelievably fecund (22 children, 10 of whom survived into adulthood). Louisa, good, gentle, always unwilling to believe ill of anyone and who, when she died, was mourned not only by family and friends, but also by the whole of the Irish town in which she lived. And Sarah. Flighty, flirtatious Sarah, with whom the young George III fell blushingly and tongue-tiedly in love. And who, after disgracing herself and her dull, uninterested husband, with the moody younger brother of Lord Gordon (of Gordon Riots fame) finally found happiness and respectability, in her late 30s, with an understanding soldier. Unmissable. Lisa GeeRead More