53 pages • 1 hour read
India HoltonThe Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2021A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 1-5Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary
Cecilia Bassingthwaite sits with her great-aunt Miss Darlington at home, reading aloud from a book. Her aunt has forbidden her to go outside in the rain, convinced Cecilia would take ill and die. A strange gentleman knocks on the door. Miss Darlington ignores it, but as the knocking continues, Cecilia goes to answer. A blond man with no hat offers her a brochure about the endangered North Atlantic auk. Cecilia declines and shuts the door in his face. The gentleman, Ned Lightbourne, stands on the porch, astounded by Cecilia’s beauty.
Cecilia tells Miss Darlington that the man, Ned, was likely a pirate, as she saw an anchor tattoo on his wrist when he extended the brochure to her. However, he gave no secret handshake, indicating he is not part of any piracy societies, and therefore must be a rogue. Miss Darlington wonders what he was after, naming a few of the treasures they have in their house that could attract rogue pirates. Cecilia wonders what she should have done with him, asking her aunt if shooting or stabbing would be appropriate, but Miss Darlington chides her for the damage blood or bullets could do to their furniture and fine carpets. Miss Darlington then notices the pirate attempting to climb in through the window. Cecilia opens the window and tells him that the auk he mentioned has been extinct for 50 years. The pirate accuses her and her aunt of being members of the Wisteria Society and being pirates themselves.
Cecilia does not deny his accusation but asks him to leave so that they may have luncheon in peace, pulling out a letter opener that extends to a full sword to force him further out the window. The pirate tells her that Lady Armitage has taken out a contract on Cecilia’s life, and an Italian assassin named Eduardo de Luca is after her (which is Ned’s false persona). Cecilia shuts the window on the pirate after Miss Darlington tells Cecilia that an Italian assassin is nothing to worry about, and that Lady Armitage will likely hire some unknown English assassin to actually attempt the job. Cecilia seems rattled, forgetting what day it is while clutching her locket that features a portrait of, and lock of hair from, her mother Cilla.
Miss Darlington tells Cecilia that they can fly to Bath the next day for a change of scenery, and that perhaps Pleasance their housemaid can practice her pronunciation of the flight incantation that allows their house to fly from place to place. They prepare for luncheon before a grenade flies in through the window. Cecilia sighs with tedium and picks up the grenade, throwing it out the window, where it explodes on the terrace. Miss Darlington requests that Pleasance get the window fixed as soon as possible, worried about the cold air entering the house and making them ill. Pleasance lets the ladies know that luncheon is ready, and when Cecilia looks outside, she sees the rogue pirate and assassin standing against the railing of the house across the street. He gives her a brief salute.
Chapter 2 Summary
Lady Isabella Armitage reflects on her decade-long rivalry with Miss Darlington, Cecilia’s aunt. She hired Eduardo de Luca (in reality, Ned Lightbourne) to assassinate Cecilia as a way to hurt Miss Darlington. Ned charmed her with his fake Italian persona and his flirtatious personality. Lady Armitage finds herself drawn to Ned, even blushing for the first time in her life. Lady Armitage was married four times, and she killed each one of her husbands when she tired of them. As a pirate and member of the Wisteria Society, she has no qualms about killing when the situation calls for it. She feels somewhat bad about killing Cecilia, as she regards her as an innocent, but she deems it necessary for her long plan to kill Miss Darlington, whose grief at the loss of her niece will make her lower her guard. She asks Ned to kill Cecilia quickly and without much pain.
After the grenade through the Darlington house window fails, Lady Armitage gives Ned seven days to kill Cecilia and bring her Cecilia’s severed pinky finger as proof of her demise. Lady Armitage plans to fly her house, which is currently sitting atop another house’s roof due to a flying incantation mistake, to Lyme Regis. Ned currently lacks a flying house, as his fell off a cliff, so he is on a tighter time frame for the assassination, as he must ride by horse. Lady Armitage touches her locket to calm herself, a locket like Cecilia’s that also contains a memory of Cilla. Before Ned leaves, he kisses Lady Armitage on the mouth, which shocks her.
Ned washes the taste of the kiss out of his mouth with whiskey at White’s gentlemen’s club. His friend and fellow pirate Alex O’Riley joins him, having just returned from Ireland. Alex offers to help Ned, then leaves. Ned is joined by Captain Patrick Morvath. Morvath tells Ned he wants Cecilia brought to him safe and sound, as he has a plan for her that even Ned is concerned about. He agrees to protect Cecilia from any assassination attempts. Morvath tells him that the Darlington house is headed to Bath and that Ned should pursue them. Morvath also hints at a plan that will make England burn.
Chapter 3 Summary
Pleasance accidentally lands the Darlington house in a field a mile from Bath, despite claiming to have performed the incantation and mathematics perfectly. Cecilia wonders why servants are permitted to fly houses once they simply learn the incantation, whereas pirates in training like herself must study intensely for years before they are permitted to fly. Miss Darlington has chided Cecilia in the past when she questioned this, asking if she’d like to do her own washing or dress herself, two jobs that servants fulfill.
The incantation for flying was first discovered by Black Beryl, the wife of a failed explorer, who found it written in Latin in a bottle after her and her husband’s ship crashed on an island in the Indian Ocean. When she discovered that reciting the Latin words could fly objects, she used it to fly an island hut home to England and shared the incantation with her ladies’ book club. They took to piracy and formed the Wisteria Society when some of the ladies began to use the incantation to move people and things instead of buildings, which they categorized as witchcraft. The Wisteria Society and pirates fought in a war against His Majesty’s army. The pirates won, as the army could not take down the houses with land-based guns and the women learned to fight very effectively.
Miss Darlington is happy to leave them in the field, but Cecilia protests, arguing that she was promised she could go to the library. Miss Darlington makes her stay home for the first three days, but then relents and allows Cecilia to walk into town. A bandit tries to steal Cecilia’s purse on her walk, but she easily fights him off.
At the edge of town, she finds Ned. She greets him as Signor de Luca, but Ned shares his real identity with her. He says he is not going to kill her during their walk and offers to pay the toll for the bridge into town, as Cecilia forgot to bring a coin. Ned flirts with her as they walk, and Cecilia finds herself alarmed that she did not even notice him pay the toll, distracted by his banter. He asks her to tea, but Cecilia refuses.
As they part ways, she asks him for the bracelet that he took off her wrist. In return, he asks for the fountain pen Cecilia took from him. They part ways, with Cecilia planning to kill Ned before he can kill her.
Chapter 4 Summary
Cecilia reads Wuthering Heights as she walks through the town of Bath. Her father had Brontë heritage, so even though she does not enjoy the book, she looks for insight into the love story of her parents, Patrick and Cilla, hinting at the identity of Patrick Morvath as Cecilia’s father. She has read a number of Brontë novels to try to understand her parents’ past, but she finds this one to be the most intriguing. Miss Darlington never tells Cecilia about her parents’ relationship, avoiding the topic of her father.
Cecilia returns to the Darlington house, almost falling out of the door as Pleasance starts to fly while distracted by reading. Miss Darlington receives a summons from the Wisteria Society, as a butler absconded with the flying house of society member Muriel Fairweather. She also chides Cecilia for walking into town, concerned she would pick up an illness or die of exhaustion. As a result, Cecilia does not tell her about her encounter with Ned. They take off for Ottery St. Mary, the suggested meeting spot. Miss Darlington naps while Cecilia flies the house, unaware of the shadow that pursues them in the sky.
Chapter 5 Summary
When the house gets close to Ottery St. Mary, a bullet flies through the window, piercing Cecilia’s copy of Wuthering Heights and hitting her metal corset. Pleasance lands the house, and without panic Cecilia pursues the shooter. She apprehends the young woman, who appears to be a pirate herself, at gunpoint. When she brings the shooter back to the house, the girl introduces herself to Miss Darlington as Constantinopla Brown, the granddaughter of Anne Brown. Miss Darlington remembers a battle in which Constantinopla’s mother had her in a sling during the fighting. Constantinopla reached her hand out and touched one of the enemy combatants, who was so startled he shot and killed his own captain.
Miss Darlington tells Cecilia to put away her gun, as Constantinopla is their friend, even though Miss Darlington and Anne Brown had a long rivalry over a robbery framing. Constantinopla apologizes for shooting at Cecilia but lets the women know that they were warned in the postscript of the invitation to the gathering: PCAP, which Miss Darlington thought stood for “Please Contribute a Plate,” but actually stands for “Provide Code at Perimeter.” The women were supposed to use Morse code with their lanterns or curtains to display the code when landing, which they failed to do.
Anne arrives at the house and shares the news of Constantinopla’s piracy education in school, which Miss Darlington finds shockingly modern. The women then move to attend the gathering of the society. As they walk away, they fail to see Captain Patrick Morvath inspecting his cannons in the distant peaks.
Chapters 1-5 Analysis
Cecilia Bassingthwaite serves as the protagonist of The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels, with Ned Lightbourne as a deuteragonist and eventual love interest. Their first encounters introduce the theme of Romance and Relationship Between Equals, as both are depicted as courageous and unconventional individuals who, it is implied, would be equally matched as partners. From the opening chapter, Ned’s attraction to Cecilia is clear, which foreshadows the romantic interest in her that he will develop. Even though the first time he meets her he ostensibly attempts to kill her, he knows she will dodge the grenade successfully. Ned thus immediately fulfills the role of love interest in his flirtatious demeanor, echoing the rakish stereotype often associated with Victorian romantic interests.
Cecilia appears to outwardly conform to some of the gender expectations for Victorian women while secretly engaging in The Subversion of Gender Roles through her piracy. She is dutiful and dedicated to her aunt, an avid reader, and holds her sense of morals and propriety close, as is expected of a woman of her socioeconomic class. However, she is also adventurous, a capable fighter, and has gone on numerous raids and robberies with Miss Darlington. In maintaining this double-sided identity, she both conforms to the tropes expected of a middle-class Victorian girl while also subverting those tropes by adhering to the tenets of piracy and the Wisteria Society.
Women in India Holton’s world are powerful and independent because they are in charge of piracy; there are male pirates, but they are far less prolific and wealthy than the women of the Wisteria Society. This was not always the case, however. Prior to the formation of the Wisteria Society, women were not afforded equality. After the discovery of the flying incantation, the women were able to seize control of their lives. As the narrator says, “If His Majesty’s troops had not responded to the advent of airborne crime by trying to put the Wisteria Society back in their proper place—i.e., on the ground and preferably in the kitchen—the ladies would never have learned how to fight” (26).
The king’s response to the Wisteria Society women creating their own freedom alludes to the subordinate status traditionally given to women in English society (See: Background). It was not piracy, the narrator argues, that was the problem with the Wisteria Society, but the way in which women could now escape from the confines of the private domestic sphere. The fact that the women fly their houses as their mode of transportation and piracy complicates both the idea of the private sphere and Victorian gender roles. Since Victorian social norms demand that women must stay in the home, the Wisteria Society ladies found a way to stay within their homes while still practicing piracy and seeking the exotic adventures historically reserved for men.
Men like Morvath, however, seek to steal their houses and force them fully back into the private sphere to rob them of their independence. The opening chapters thus set the scene for the rising conflict with Morvath that will drive the narrative of The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels. Morvath’s misogyny is not yet revealed; he wants to burn England down, but his desire to burn things down results from his anger at the women in charge of the social hierarchy. The ending image of Chapter 5 is of Morvath’s Northrangerland Abbey lurking in the hills, representing the trouble he will bring to the Wisteria Society.
The Quest for Independence against Societal Constraints also emerges as a key theme. Miss Darlington keeps tight control over Cecilia. She worries constantly about her own health and Cecilia’s health, warding against the fears of various contagions, sun exposure, and cold weather. These fears keep Cecilia close to her and away from much of the world. When she decides to take Cecilia to Bath, Miss Darlington reflects, “[O]ne does not want to encourage the younger generation too much, lest they lose sight of their proper place: under one’s thumb. She decided, however, to take pity on the girl, having herself once been as high-spirited” (8). Miss Darlington acknowledges the wildness of her own youth and her past desire for freedom and independence while simultaneously defending her decision to keep Cecilia suppressed by her control. Cecilia does not yet yearn for as much independence as Miss Darlington worries she will want, seeking simply to visit the library in Bath to read. As the novel progresses, however, Cecilia’s character arc will involve learning how to take control of her own destiny.
