I have been saving this for a leisurely read and I was not disappointed.

Princeton professor Sophie Gee's lively, highly literate debut Scandal of the Season* provides the backstory to Alexander Pope’s famous poem "The Rape of the Lock".

1711, London. The anti-Catholic sentiments and secretive Jacobite plots to overthrow the Protestant queen makes for an uneasy social season. Pope’s growing literary reputation allows him entry into high society where he watches with interest the courtship and secret affair between beautiful Arabella Fermor and Robert, Lord Petre.

When Robert is forced to offer marriage to a wealthier heiress, Arabella’s disappointment and humiliation brings on the scandalous event that inspires the famous poem and launches Pope's career.

“Delightfully gossipy, psychologically insightful and historically fascinating”, this novel is "sprinkled with literary cameos, ...crackling verbal one-upmanship and crude double entendres...". For readers of Mary Balogh and regency romance.

* = Starred Review