Pride and Prejudice meets The Fast and the Furious in this rollicking, romantic Regency adventure in which a meticulous young woman must abandon the rules of propriety to save Britain—and perhaps even find love along the way. . . .
Intrigued? Read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from Fast and Fastidious by R.M. Caldwell, which releases on April 14th 2026.
England, 1810. Lucy Elliot has often been described as fastidious, given her belief that there is an objectively correct and logical way to do things. And while she strives to be proper in every way, she does have one rather scandalous secret: Lucy, the prim and gentle lady, is a frequent attendee of the entirely disreputable and illicit Night Races, where unchaperoned men and women from all social classes gather on dark country lanes to gamble on the outcomes of furiously fast carriage races.
But her secret might become more than just a danger to her reputation when her mysterious new neighbor, Captain Dashwood, begins partaking in the races. Lucy can’t help but feel there’s something more to the handsome Captain Dashwood than meets the eye, and she suspects that his arrival in the neighborhood in the midst of a spate of curious and alarming carriage robberies is no mere coincidence—something is most certainly afoot in the county, and it’s a mystery Lucy intends to solve.
Though Lucy prides herself on her preparedness, she never could have anticipated the web of lies, deceit, and espionage that she finds herself and Captain Dashwood entangled in; nor could she have known that the very fate of Britain would hang in the balance. But will her meticulous nature be the very thing that saves her, or will it be her—and England’s—undoing?
Chapter 1
While it may forever be debated whether there is an objectively correct way in which things should be done, Miss Lucy Elliot held firmly in the belief that there was. That she was born to a good family, both in heritage and fortune, no doubt fostered this sentiment. Lucy strove to be a paragon of proper and precise behavior— in every way she could achieve.
Had this attitude manifested itself merely in social graces, she might have spared her parents a good deal of apprehension, but it reached into all areas of her life, even those where no rules previously existed. Her slippers had to be one-third of the way down from the head of the left side of her bed (an optimal position for rising), eggs poached for an exact duration (for optimum texture), and cards held fanned in an angle no greater than 120 degrees (to best facilitate open play). She eschewed lace handkerchiefs (impractical) yet insisted on always carrying a linen one (versatile). Her parents might have cheerfully dismissed these requirements as childhood whimsy had not Lucy continued to back them with earnestness and well- supported facts.
Her meticulous nature extended to the mechanical world. For instance, it was not enough to know how to play the pianoforte— Lucy frustrated her music tutor by being vastly more interested in the internal workings of the instrument than in the artistic subtleties of playing.
While Andrew and Alice Elliot found their youngest daughter’s behaviors concerning, she placated them with her otherwise good- hearted and thoughtful nature. She was polite and pleasant on all occasions but for those where her internal ordering conflicted with the arbitrary rules of society.
This was exemplified in a tale that her mother delighted in retelling, despite her father blushing beetroot if it resurfaced at social occasions. At the age of ten, Lucy Elliot was presented with a gift from her wealthy aunt. It was an ornately crafted replica of a coach carriage, complete with crossbar and spring suspension. While her aunt was concerned that the lack of horses might be upsetting to a ten- year- old, Lucy was thrilled by the gift and thanked her aunt with excessive enthusiasm. She was left to play while the adults conversed. When they next looked in on Lucy, it was to discover— to the utmost dismay of her aunt— that the floor of the conservatory was now laid out with row upon row of neatly dismantled coach pieces.
“I just wanted to see how it worked,” a tearful Lucy tried to explain as she was sent to her room by her father.
Whether it was fierce determination to complete her task, or youthful indignation, Lucy waited until the adults were walking the grounds to defy her confinement and descend to the conservatory once more. Upon their return, the adults discovered Lucy sitting proudly with the coach perfectly reassembled.
“You’ve put it back exactly like it was,” her aunt had exclaimed with surprise and more than a hint of pride.
“Not exactly,” Lucy corrected her. “Now the suspension works properly.”
This was by no means an uncommon occurrence in Atherton Manor in Lucy’s youth. Her parents had hoped her quirks might soften with age, but now, at twenty, Lucy was as upright and proper a daughter as any manor estate might hope to produce. So firm was her sense of propriety, in fact, that her parents despaired of ever finding a suitor to meet her exacting and esoteric nature. She was highly intelligent yet displayed a focus that excluded all else; kindhearted yet earnest to the point of discourtesy; and expert in the theory of social rules yet ill at ease in their practice. Presented with the contradiction that was Miss Lucy Elliot, there was much speculation as to what manner of fortune she would find.
Thus, few who knew her could imagine that she might be found, sometime after midnight on a full moon, covertly reentering Atherton Manor well after those within were fast asleep. Nonetheless, there she would be, squeezing through a ground- level window into a dimly lit kitchen in a most im- proper manner.
What, they might wonder, had so altered the scrupulousness of Miss Elliot?
The answer was simplicity itself to those who knew it yet quite alien to those who did not.
Lucy Elliot had found the Night Races.
