The Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics | Olivia Waite

Let's get this out of the way first: this is a lesbian romance novel set in the Regency era. It's what comes up if you search for "Bridgerton, but gay." And it succeeds perfectly at that, making it a really good book. At the same time, it does not reach beyond the genre, leading me to classify it as mere entertainment and not recommend it. But let's properly get into it.

The Polite Science Society is looking for somebody to translate a groundbreaking work on astronomy from French into English. Lucy Muchelney has become adept at astronomy herself by working with her late father, and she reads fluent French. But she's missing the one qualification the men of the Society value most: she is not a man. In swoops the widowed Lady Moth, who wants to independently finance Lucy's translation of the text. During Lucy's stay at Lady Moth's mansion, the two women slowly discover their love for each other, but is a union of the two possible with all outside forces working against them?

From the first line to its finish, this book does an excellent job of transporting the reader into the Regency era. The language is reminiscent of authentic works like those of Jane Austen, with vocabulary that's period-appropriate without ever feeling stilted or foreign. Similarly, descriptions are colorful and display a range of synonyms that never feel forced.

The budding romance of the two leads is very sweet to witness. In its pacing, it feels true not only to the rising passion of the women but also to their circumstances. And while a more definite resolution to their courting is reserved for the finale of the book, there are intense romantic as well as sexual moments sprinkled throughout. Like all else, these are executed skillfully and range from cute and heartwarming to sexy and hot.

The plot around the romance introduces some stakes and drama that threaten to pull the two ladies apart. All of this is well constructed, with setups that pay off much later and side characters that go through their own little stories. Interwoven is a theme of science versus art: which has greater value, how are they connected, and—period appropriately—how are they gendered? This is a nice exploration, expertly paced to always mirror the women's relationship, and it is as neatly tied up in the end as all other elements of the plot. And this is where the problem lies: every little aspect is so planned out, and all the stars align so perfectly that it actually becomes unsatisfying in the end. There is no room left for things to go wrong, for things to not fit, for the messiness of life, or for ambiguity. It's as if you're looking up at the night sky, and somebody else has already marked all the constellations for you.

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