And yet, I love Jewel’s historicals, and will read all that she writes. Her writing is lyrical without being flashy, and everything feels emotionally and psychologically right.

The Dream Hunter is one I've never read, although I love Kinsale. Sounds like I need to track down a copy!

Oooh, you are in for a treat, SonomaLass.

In a way, it reminded me of heroes like Mary Balogh's Sydnam Butler in Simply Love or Elizabeth Hoyt's Sir Alistair Munroe in To Beguile a Beast who are actually disfigured by injuries. Foye's not nearly that bad, but there's a definite difference when one of the main characters isn't conventionally attractive.

I was thinking it sounds similar to Dain from Lord of Scoundrels.

I once had a very petite girlfriend (5'1”) who only seemed to date REALLY tall men (6'3”+). She said she was just trying to even out the gene pool, LOL! Irked me to no end as I'm nearly 6' myself and men tall enough to make me feel girly are few and far between (and they almost always seem to date midgets!).

In a way, it reminded me of heroes like Mary Balogh’s Sydnam Butler in Simply Love or Elizabeth Hoyt’s Sir Alistair Munroe in To Beguile a Beast who are actually disfigured by injuries. Foye’s not nearly that bad, but there’s a definite difference when one of the main characters isn’t conventionally attractive.

The Dream Hunter is one I’ve never read, although I love Kinsale. Sounds like I need to track down a copy!

…his height was a very definite part of his characterization as a man who did not, in almost any way, fit the ideal of beauty we normally see in English aristocrats. His nose is hooked, his cheeks sharp, his hair very curly, and his height makes it difficult to miss the rest.

Now you may not like this pairing at all, because IIRC the heroine is 5′3″, but in my contemporary mind, a hero who is 6′2″ or 6′3″, for example, is just not going to have the same effect as one 6′6″,

Interesting. I think that in the early nineteenth century, sharp cheeks and curly hair were part of the Byronic ideal. Also hooked noses, following the popularity of the Duke of Wellington. Also, I definitely can’t see the appeal in a pairing between a 5’3″ woman and a 6’6″ man. My neck is hurting just trying to picture it. And finally, my experience of men of that height is that they are are typically very slender, lanky, and gentle. Possibly I have met a skewed sample, but nevertheless, they are the sample I have met and thus they form my opinions. I would find a man of 6’3″ with wide shoulders and a broad chest to be much more physically imposing than one with a couple of extra inches of height.

Which all goes to show how important readers’ preconceptions are, and thus I return to my original point – why must actual figures be given? Let him be described as ‘a man of exceptional height’ or ‘like a tree’ or something else which gives the reader more room to fill in the gaps in the way they like best.

Interesting you should mention The Dream Hunter. Jennie and I both briefly mention that we were reminded of it as well in our upcoming conversational review, and Jennie does compare the books a bit there.

regardless of how much shorter people of the Regency era might have been on average

From what I've been able to determine, aristocrats would have been/were of roughly the same average heights as modern American/British Caucasians. You can read about my research and find links to the studies on my blog post about the topic.

The main gist of the post is that the only study to take class into account (a study of height in 18th century Germany) found a 6” average difference between the poor and the middle class and then another 3” on top of that for the upper class. So, if you take this into account, the “average” height for male members of the English ton turns out to be around 5'9” (which just happens to be the average height of British Caucasian men today).

@Ros: Janine and Jennie may have more to say on this in their review (or anyone else who’s read the book, of course), but his height was a very definite part of his characterization as a man who did not, in almost any way, fit the ideal of beauty we normally see in English aristocrats. His nose is hooked, his cheeks sharp, his hair very curly, and his height makes it difficult to miss the rest.

Now you may not like this pairing at all, because IIRC the heroine is 5’3″, but in my contemporary mind, a hero who is 6’2″ or 6’3″, for example, is just not going to have the same effect as one 6’6″, regardless of how much shorter people of the Regency era might have been on average. So for me it worked, because it really did set him apart in my mind and because it communicated to me both an authority and an imposing facade, both of which were important aspects of his conscious characterization.

I was going to give this a pass, but the review convinced me to give it a try. I don’t read a lot of romances with heros from the Middle East, because they do tend to be have extreme stereotypes, but this looks interesting. Plus I have a weakness for the whole ‘girls disguised as boys’ trope.

Is there a particular reason why authors feel the need to give us feet and inches? Can’t they just describe their heroes as tall/broad/huge etc and let us fill in the gaps with our own ideals of such men?

There is something sad that happens, but it didn’t strike me as being as tragic or dark as what happened in Scandal.