At the heart of this story is the idea that love changes you, but true love cherishes ideological difference rather than suppressing it. The novel is about finding a way to be true to your ideals while surviving in an unjust world.

Dominic, a government official and a gentleman, believes in an England guided with a strong hand, by officials who know better than the rabble and who wield their power like beneficent dictators with a driving sense of common good. Silas knows that there is one set of rules for the rich, another for the poor. Governing has never been done for his sake, as no one in power has ever cared about him. Until Dominic does, and then Silas points out the inherent hypocrisy that Dominic cares whether he is well-fed and clothed decently, while other poor men starve. This observation, that often a conservative mentality means plucking one “deserving” person from an indigent state and elevating them, rather than solving social issues like poverty, rings true to life. At the same time, Silas is certainly not “deserving,” as he is a seditionist working to overthrow the government, and Dominic is clearly blinded by love rather than operating from a place of ideological consistency. More than that, Dominic is very obviously a good, loving person who brings out the best in Silas; his affection and tenderness, which no other character in the novel gets to see. And Silas is so loving and considerate of Dominic that he feels understood and cherished in a way no man has ever done for him before. Their love is right; everything else in their world is wrong.

The two sets of rules in action, one for the “ox” and the other for the “lion,” as per the Blake aphorism cited in the text, illustrate the unfairness of this world. Dominic publicly upholds the law while privately breaking it in his intimate affairs. But because he is a gentleman, he has considerable leeway Silas is not granted. It is not such a big deal if Dominic is found with a female prostitute; it would be reputation-ending if he were found having intercourse with a man. His officers burst in on him at the brothel while the Madam pretends to be hired by him, Silas hiding just around the corner. The scandal barely affects his social standing. Meanwhile, while no one would care at all that Silas frequented brothels, Silas’s entire business can be ransacked without a warrant, on the suspicion that he is printing seditious papers inciting anti-monarchical sentiment and aiming to overthrow the government. His band of conspirators can be lured to commit crimes and equipped with weapons, then arrested by the government and hanged for what the government pushed them to do. It is unjust, and Dominic cannot possibly support a government turned so corrupt. He eventually resigns.

At the end of the novel, the mechanisms of power finally work in Silas’s favour. Dominic’s friend and ex-lover Richard wields his considerable social clout to create an alias for him which will allow him to escape punishment for his minor role in the Cato street conspiracy. Silas eventually determines that rather than living in poverty, he may as well leverage his increased social standing and steady paycheque into advocacy for slightly less contentious progressive ideals. The rich and poor men are morally equal, Silas thinks repeatedly: the gentleman lie with impunity like criminals. They are not better than anyone. And no, it is not fair. Much of the political plotting in the novel occurs simply because the men are hungry, starving, cold and desperate. It is more comfortable to be well-fed, well-clothed and employed, from which one can contemplate the lot of one’s fellow man with a greater degree of abstraction. Yet is it hypocritical to accept the offer of food and clothing and job security when the gentleman becomes a friend? The story deals very realistically with Silas’s qualms over accepting an elevated social position, which he says he doesn’t want, but obviously everyone wants to be taken care of, well-fed and paid, given the choice. Is this hypocrisy, or merely inevitable; that the body has needs which conflict with one’s ideals? Both men are faced with this dilemma, that they have needs which must be satisfied which put them at odds with their political ideas.

Silas’s struggle to accept material comfort is contrasted with Dominic’s thirst for sexual suffering. We are told that Dominic needs masochistic submission to such an extent that he has risked his life in the back-alleys of London to satisfy it. The arrangement with Silas, made by mutual friends and overseen by the brothel owner, was meant to mitigate his self-destructive tendencies. And again, words contradict desires. In a very cleverly handled initial sex scene, it is entirely clear that despite Dom’s words protesting he doesn’t want this, he really does want to be dominated and to submit. He holds onto the bedrail to signal his ongoing consent no matter how many times he says “No” or “Stop.” Meanwhile, what he is doing is literally illegal: rules for thee, not for me. But Dominic is not a bad person – he is just as idealistic in his own way as Silas. It is this idealism that unites the two men who otherwise have nothing else in common. Both are trying to survive and do good in an unjust world.

All this, and I haven’t even talked about how moving the love story is. These heroes, both close to forty, both somewhat ordinary-looking; the one slightly paunchy and the other greying and scruffy, are so attractive to each other, their strong feelings supersede more usual indicators of physical attractiveness. Both are ordinary, flawed, imperfect, and passionate. Both of them cherish the other; both are vulnerable to each other in a way they are not for anyone else. My heart just ached for them, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about them.

The subplots do become rather intense. I understand that one of them makes far more sense following the first book, though the novel does work as a standalone. I usually wouldn’t read a book written so much like a political thriller – I tend to prefer it when books develop their characters through rumination rather than murder subplots and outsmart-the-police-with-clever-alibis scheming. But these decisions felt true to the theme of unequal justice that runs through this book, that this volume of detail about social unrest in the early 19th century in London was necessary to conveying the world inhabited by the characters.

People of colour and trans characters are a part of this world in a way that feels delightfully matter-of-fact, and one could easily imagine a retelling with these characters fleshed-out as protagonists of their own tales. I can’t recommend this book enough.

Originally published on Goodreads on July 26, 2022