Georgette Heyer's novels Part II

Heyer’s earlier works were more adventure stories, later she turned more to comedies of manners.  The first books written in her 20s were set in Georgian England.  This time had something of a “Wild West” feel about it - there were highwaymen, lawlessness and it wasn’t unknown for noblemen to kidnap heiresses and force them into marriage or to take young working class girls all but forcibly as mistresses. 
 Heyer used these facts in order to put together good rollicking adventure stories, such as Black Moth, where the lovely Diana is kidnapped by a wealthy nobleman who wants to marry her, but does not care if he has to force into the marriage.  She is rescued by John Carstares, another nobleman who has had to leave England for some years due to taking the blame for cheating at cards.  He has lived abroad, and then come back to England, and lived as a highwayman…Eventually he saves Dian’s virtue, and his brother, who had been the one who cheated, takes the blame.  Jack is restored to his earldom and family estate with his new wife.

 "These Old Shades” has a plot where Justin Alistair, a selfish and rakish man of 40, meets a young street urchin who turns out to be the daughter of his enemy, the Comte De St Vire.  He takes Leonie into his household, as his page sicne she has been dressing as a boy, to avoid molestation.  Justin hopes to use her to shame St Vire, but he falls in love with her and marries her.

The stories are good, if improbable, and even then Heyer was working towards what became her trademark, witty banter, using period slang, and convoluted and comical plotting…
She usually had a few young men of the kind that PG Wodehouse called “drones”, in her novels.  These are idle but good natured young men who spend their time amusing themselves but do not do any harm to anyone.  Their lively conversation, misunderstandings and good natured banter are fun to read, and as Heyer matured as a writer, she began to produce more of these sorts of characters rather than dastardly villains and heroes.  Another trope of hers was the bored young society wife who has a rather dull husband whom she loves, but who seeks amusement, with livelier men as companions.
 As her writing developed, she was able to write plots that had no particular villain and no elopements, gaming debts, abductions or duels.
Her stories moved on to social comedy, about a young woman having her social debut, and learning how to navigate her way through Society and to find a husband.  Occasionally, the plot involves a “fake betrothal”, where a couple pretend to be engaged.
Or in some cases, a couple marry for reasons of convenience and then discover that they are in love.
In her last novels, her heroines are rather older than the debutante age, and are usually young women well into their twenties, who have been out in society for some time but have not found a man whom they wished to marry. They often have a role as mother substitute to younger siblings or a niece. So her heroines matured from “young and rather silly and naïve” to more intelligent and practical, as she herself grew older and her writing became deeper and more serious.