Lady Worsley's Whim: An Eighteenth-Century Tale of Sex, Scandal and Divorce - Softcover

It was the divorce that scandalised Georgian England...She was a spirited young heiress. He was a handsome baronet with a promising career in government. Their marriage had the makings of a fairy tale but ended as one of the most salacious and highly publicised divorces in history. For over two hundred years the story of Lady Worsley, her vengeful husband, and her lover, George Maurice Bisset, lay forgotten. Now Hallie Rubenhold, in her impeccably researched book, throws open a window to a rarely seen view of Georgian England, one coloured by passion, adventure and the defiance of social convention. The Worsley's story, their struggles and outrageous lifestyle, promises to shock even the modern reader.

"As a historian and a storyteller, Hallie Rubenhold is in a league of her own. She keeps you glued to the very last page when, exhausted, exasperated and elated, you can at last put the book down and get yourself some sleep. Lady Worsley's Whim should come with a warning: nothing else in the genre is close to being this good" (Literary Review)

"The story of the Worsley divorce has never been revealed before, and Hallie Rubenhold tells it with panache. Her account of the elopement is gripping but this is far more than an 18th-century bodice-ripper. Rubenhold combines narrative skill with historical expertise, and she traces the knife-edge that women walked between social success and public disgrace with subtlety and assurance" (Spectator)

"A fabulous story and Rubenhold tells it beautifully" (Daily Telegraph)

"Lady Worsley's Whim takes its subject from a zesty period... Rubenhold is sure-footed in her research... Her special forte is rakes and roués" (Sunday Times)

"Readable new book brings the most shocking divorce case of its day vividly to life" (The Gloss (Ireland))