The Mayfair Affair (45 page)

East Adilabad, West Basmat, Upper Tandur, and Fort Arthur are fictional, but the East India Company and the British government and army did take advantage of feuds between Indian rulers in their effort to win trading concessions and ultimately to take control of India. I am indebted to Elizabeth Longford's excellent account of the early nineteenth century British army in India in
Wellington: Years of the Sword
(
New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1969).

The plot to bring down Lord Liverpool is also fictional, but Liverpool did struggle to hold together the various factions in the Tory party. He mother was part Indian, and he spent time in Paris in 1789.

THE MAYFAIR AFFAIR

Tracy Grant

About This Guide

The suggested questions are included

to enhance your group's reading of

Tracy Grant's
The Mayfair Affair.

1. How does being a parent influence the different characters in the story? Which characters make choices because of their children and which make choices despite them?

2. Did you guess who was behind the deaths of the Duke of Trenchard? Why or why not?

3. Suzanne says this investigation will be a test of her and Malcolm's ability to work together with the truth in the open. How do you think they handle that test?

4. Discuss the similarities and differences in the relationships of Malcolm, Suzanne, and Raoul and Jane, Jack, and Trenchard.

5. What do you think lies ahead for Laura?

6. What do you think Raoul is really saying with his last question to Laura and why is he relieved she understands?

7. Which couple do you think has the greatest challenges ahead
—Malcolm and Suzanne, Hetty and James, David and Simon, Harry and Cordelia, Mary and Gui
? By the end of the book would you call Raoul and Laura a couple?

8. Do you think Raoul's greatest loyalty is really to his cause?

9. What do you think Malcolm, Carfax, and David would have done if they'd learned the truth about Trenchard's and Craven's murders and Louisa hadn't killed herself?

10. Laura Dudley is living a life of deception. Which other characters are hiding parts of themselves?

11. Do you think Harry is right to worry about Cordelia growing bored?

12. Suzanne says Malcolm wouldn't have married her if he'd known the truth about her. Raoul says she may be doing Malcolm a disservice if she thinks he wouldn't marry someone who wasn't from his world. What do you think?

13. How do you think the quote at the beginning of the book relates to Malcolm and Suzanne? To Harry and Cordelia? To David and Simon? To Louisa?

Rannoch / Fraser Series

The Paris Plot

The Berkeley Square Affair

Imperial Scandal

His Spanish Bride

Paris Affair

Vienna Waltz

The Mask of Night

Beneath a Silent Moon

Secrets of a Lady

Lescaut Quartet

Dark Angel

Shores of Desire

Shadows of the Heart

Rightfully His

 Tracy Grant
studied British history at Stanford University and received the Firestone Award for Excellence in Research for her honors thesis on shifting conceptions of honor in late-fifteenth-century England. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her young daughter and three cats. In addition to writing, Tracy works for the Merola Opera Program, a professional training program for opera singers, pianists, and stage directors. Her real life heroine is her daughter Mélanie, who is very cooperative about Mummy's writing time. She is currently at work on her next book chronicling the adventures of Malcolm and Suzanne Rannoch. Visit her on the Web at
www.tracygrant.org

Author Photo by
Raphael Coffey Photography