Wow, until I looked up the publication date, I assumed this book was written to ride the recent wave of Downton Abbey popularity, considering that the mother in that show is an American heiress who married a titled Englishman in the late 19th century (real-life women like her are the focus of this book). But it appears to have been published 20+ years ago.

I wish I had read it a long time ago, too, before I ever picked up any Henry James or Edith Wharton. It gives such good background for the time period those authors' books take place in. If I were running a high school lit class that included any Wharton, etc., then this book would be excellent class material. The level is not too high and there are lots of pictures and callouts and graphs and boxed text. I've been reading this book off and on over the last six weeks - it's very easy to pick up, read a few sections, and then put down again for a while. It doesn't depend on a single narrative; rather, it's thematically organized and progresses according to the decades in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Anyway, interesting book. Now I can't wait to read The Age of Innocence and House of Mirth again.

A informative, entertaining look at upper class life in the Edwardian and late Victorian eras. I gave up on keeping track of all the heiresses and their husbands, but the book creates a detailed picture of daily life for a peer's wife in this time period, and of the culture clash between the American girls and their new English families. Recommended for anyone interested in the Victorian/Edwardian era.

TL;DR - If the period interests you, this would probably be a fun book to dip in and out of. It has a slight sense of humor in the writing that doesn’t detract from the information presented and a great deal of that information was new to me. I do not regret the read at all. There are a lot of images and random facts, though it can be a bit scattered at the beginning.

To Marry an English Lord is presented as a popular history style book that talks about the period of time during the Late Victorian era into the Edwardian era when it became common practice for rich Americans to attempt to net a title through marriage. My copy in particular had a large printed emblem that stated “An Inspiration for Downton Abbey”. I can’t testify to the relevancy of the book to Downton Abbey, having never seen more than a single episode, but viewers of the show may enjoy the book. Based on the size of the image on my cover alone the publishers are certainly trying to hook those readers.
The book focuses on the known groups of girls who came over within the same time frames of each other to net a titled husband. It talks about how they needed to dress, who they needed to know, and how they needed to act. They also take apart why this became something that was relatively common and popularized. The most interesting part of the book goes into what I would call the fallout - the divorces, the life after marriage, and what life was like for a lot of these girls turned wives.
As someone with very little knowledge of the time period past what I’ve gleaned from context in novels or the very rare movie set in the period this was an interesting read. It didn’t manage to completely entrance me, especially in the beginning as a lot of people and names dropped rang hollow to me. In addition, a lot of these individuals are mentioned and then summarily left alone with no further mention or addressing. I think perhaps just a line or two to describe or follow up on those individuals would have helped me in those occasions.
Once the book hits the girl who I think is the main ‘star’ Consuelo Vanderbilt, it became much easier to follow and enjoy. This presented a single consistent thread of reference that made it easier for me, as a casual reader to follow. This meant that the latter half of the book was the richest to me. These were the sections that looked at life after the marriage, and on onto such events as divorce.
The book also has a lot of small, one page inserts that talk about people or context like gardens and parties. A lot of these I did enjoy but found a bit annoying as I’d often have to move on to the next page to finish a section or chapter, and then flip back and read the insert. If you don’t mind the constant back and forth, this will work for you. Because of this, the book is filled to the brim with quotes, images, and random facts that would make for great trivia nights for those inclined. For that I cannot fault it. I finished it with a strong desire to read more on the time period and people. I will likely pick up Glitter and Gold by Consuelo Vanderbilt and learn more about her life from the source.
If the period interests you, this would probably be a fun book to dip in and out of. It has a slight sense of humor in the writing that doesn’t detract from the information presented and a great deal of that information was new to me. I do not regret the read at all.

Super unterhaltsam, hat sich wegsnacken lassen wie eine Packung Kekse. Witzig, bissig und sehr informativ, wenn man sich für die Upperclass-Skandale der Edwardianischen Gesellschaft interessiert.
Viele haben die Aufmachung bemängelt, aber genau die fand ich besonders toll. Es ist halt aufgemacht wie eine Klatschzeitung - d.h. man hat mitten im Text Bilder und eingerahmte Kurztexte, Mini-Biographien, Specials etc. Man kann sich immer entscheiden ob man einen Abschnitt konsequent durchliest und dann zurückgeht und die kleinen Einschübe liest oder ob man zwischendurch die Einschübe liest und den Artikel dafür unterbricht. Ich habe es mal so, mal so gemacht und hatte nie Probleme dem Inhalt zu folgen.
Da das ganze wortwörtliche über den High Society Skandale des späten 19. Jahrhunderts berichtet, war das meiner Meinung nach einer sehr passende Aufmachung und ich hatte viel Spaß damit.

I think the format and (what I viewed as) lack of organization hindered my appreciation of this book. Also, I've heard it talked up so much on the History Chicks podcasts and FB page, that perhaps my expectations were just too high. I still liked it; it just wasn't great or amazing to me.

Interesting topic, but the writing wasn't great. The structure of the book was scattered and difficult to follow.

Despite plenty of interesting information, stories, and people, this book was ultimately hard to enjoy. Broken up, with numerous insets, asides, and tangents, it was hard to keep up with the many people who were covered, and sidebars about particular fashions/behaviors would sometimes be 50+ pages past a point where it might make sense in narrative to discuss them in more detail. Surely someone has written a a better book on the subejct.

Upon rereading, this book ran dry. There were too many twee paragraphs about "papa-in-law" and the like that grated on me because they felt like bland generalizations. Not enough about the people just a few recurring characters here and there that feel like cutouts without depth. Authors ought to have just picked a few and written a full collective biography, with a few Buccaneers and American Princesses and the other categories they created.

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First Reading:
This read like a fun tour guide of the so called "Buccaneers" with some asides and offset sections to break up the novel with many pictures. The little sections got a little annoying because they didn't talk about much, escpecially towards the end. The best ones dealt with the father and Newport. I can't say all of the ladies were interesting. Some of them were quite boring but a majority, especially the Jeromes, Astors, and Consuelo were extremely fun to read about

A fun read, full of delightful (if 150 year-old) gossip. The layout was awful, though. Between the little quotes and facts in the margins, and the smaller sub-chapters placed so that they interrupted paragraphs and even sentences, it was hard to keep track of the main point, at times. Then again, the main point wasn't all that difficult, so I managed.

Not a strong 3, but I'll round up. The overall layout of the book was hard to follow, there were so many things to read (inserts and small anecdotes) that it distracted me from the overall text. The pictures were fun to look at, and it was interesting to read about the upper society of New York at that time.