The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels

The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels (2021) is a historical romance/fantasy novel by New Zealand-based author India Holton. The story takes place in an alternate reality Victorian England that has magic: Women can use an incantation to fly their houses, which the Wisteria Society ladies use to their advantage in their piracy. The narrative centers on Cecilia Bassingthwaite, the niece of one of the women of the Wisteria Society, and her romance with the pirate Ned Lightbourne. Together, Ned and Cecilia try to stop her diabolical pirate father Patrick Morvath from destroying the Wisteria Society and instituting patriarchy in England.

The novel is the first in the “Dangerous Damsels” series, since followed by The League of Gentlewomen Witches (2022) and The Secret Service of Tea and Treason (2023), which take place in the same universe. Holton has also written The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love (2024).

This guide refers to the 2021 Kindle Penguin Edition. 

Plot Summary

Cecilia Bassingthwaite is sitting with her aunt Miss Darlington in their sitting room, reading aloud, when they are interrupted by the arrival of Ned Lightbourne. Ned warns Cecilia that Lady Armitage, a member of the ladies’ pirate group the Wisteria Society, has hired an Italian assassin to kill her. Lady Armitage has a rivalry with Miss Darlington and, after unsuccessful attempts to kill her, has decided to kill Cecilia instead. Ned, under a false Italian name, is the assassin, even though he does not plan to actually kill her. Ned is enamored with Cecilia from the moment he sees her and barely attempts to kill her with a grenade to keep up appearances. He then meets with Patrick Morvath—a male pirate, failed writer/poet, and supposed son of Branwell Brontë—to discuss his plan to take over England and his desire for Ned to bring him Cecilia alive and well, as he is her father. 

Miss Darlington and Cecilia go to Bath to relax. Pleasance, their housemaid, flies their house to Bath but accidentally lands it in a field outside town. After a few days stuck inside because of Miss Darlington’s fear of sun and illness, Cecilia walks into town to go to the library. Ned sees her and walks with her, paying the bridge toll since Cecilia did not bring money. He flirts with her, which throws Cecilia off. When she returns to the house, Miss Darlington has a summons from the Wisteria Society for a meeting, as a member’s butler stole her house. They fly to Ottery St. Mary to join the gathering after being shot at by Constantinopla Brown, the granddaughter of society member Anne Brown, for their failure to use their lanterns to display the morse code password. The Browns go to the meeting with Miss Darlington and Cecilia. Cecilia hopes she will be promoted to full member of the Wisteria Society, as she has completed all the prerequisite tasks and now has an assassin after her. She is not promoted, and she sits with Constantinopla and Jane Fairweather in the younger ladies’ area.

She takes a walk during the meeting and finds Ned outside, who attempts to restrain her to prevent her from telling the Wisteria Society that Morvath and his henchmen are stealing another member’s house. She manages to escape and tell the ladies, who follow the thieves with their flying houses prepped for battle. Ned flies the stolen house away and evades the society ladies, then Morvath boards the house and spews his vitriol against the society women. He blames the women for turning his wife Cilla against him, even though he murdered Cilla in cold blood after she left him and escaped with Cecilia.

After the theft, the ladies regroup in Ottery St. Mary, having tea at a teahouse to discuss what to do about Morvath. They send Cecilia out of the teahouse to have a walk, as they do not want her to hear about her father, even though Cecilia knows he is behind the attack and has her own plans to kill him. While in the teahouse, Morvath’s henchmen drug the society ladies and kidnap them by flying the teahouse to Morvath’s massive flying house, Northrangerland Abbey. His henchmen also steal the ladies’ houses. Cecilia is left behind and must team up with Ned to rescue the ladies. She is wary about trusting him even though he gives her his true identity; however, she agrees to go with him to find Lady Armitage, who has the last flying battlehouse that Morvath hasn’t stolen. Constantinopla defies Ned’s order to return to Ottery St. Mary, instead journeying to London with Tom Eanes, the man she is engaged to, in order to tell Queen Victoria about Morvath’s plans. 

Ned and Cecilia travel by stolen carriage, stopping at a fancy hotel to spend the night. They pretend to be husband and wife, having a romantic dinner and a bottle of wine that makes Cecilia drunk. Ned admits that Miss Fairweather was a traitor who helped Morvath execute his plan to kidnap the Wisteria Society. Ned helps the inebriated Cecilia to bed, sleeping on the floor to avoid making her uncomfortable. The next day, Cecilia steals two horses for them to go the rest of the way to Lady Armitage. While sneaking down to get the horses, they are pursued by Jacobsen, one of Morvath’s men. They hide in a closet and Ned kisses Cecilia. They sneak past Jacobsen to the horses, then arrive at Lady Armitage’s house at the same time as Jacobsen. They subdue Jacobsen after he tries to kill Lady Armitage, then convince Lady Armitage to help them against Morvath. They fly her house to where they think Morvath and Northrangerland Abbey are lurking. Meanwhile, Tom and Constantinopla meet with Queen Victoria and convince her to help in the fight against Morvath. 

While Lady Armitage flies her house, Ned and Cecilia make dinner and kiss passionately again. They then set out to look for Northrangerland Abbey on foot. They lose Lady Armitage while searching and then are taken into the abbey, where Ned knocks Cecilia unconscious and presents her to Morvath to avoid having his loyalty questioned. Cecilia wakes up in her childhood bedroom with her cousin Frederick Bassingthwaite, whom Morvath plans to marry her to in order to inherit the Bassingthwaite battlehouse. Frederick waxes poetic about Cecilia, which irks her. She finds a secret passageway and attempts to escape, but runs into Ned. Ned encourages her to go back into her room and find a better plan for beating Morvath. She struggles to trust him, but does what he says. Ned goes to the cellars where Morvath is keeping the Wisteria Society ladies and tells Pleasance that Cecilia is in the abbey. Upon hearing the news, the ladies get up and find a way to escape.

Cecilia bathes and then joins Jane Fairweather and the elder Miss Fairweather, Jane’s grandmother, in the breakfast room along with Ned and Frederick. Cecilia is rude to Jane, whom she believes to be a traitor. When Morvath enters the room, Cecilia has a flashback to him murdering her mother in front of her. She then shouts curses at him and throws breakfast dishes at him before running away. Ned chases her and reveals that Morvath murdered his mother, too. He also reveals that he knew her mother, Cilla, who saved him after his mother’s death. To repay her, he promised to make the world safe for Cecilia, which is why he infiltrated Morvath’s trust, took the assassination contract from Lady Armitage so a real assassin didn’t, and also joined the Queen’s special service to make sure the Queen did not have Cecilia killed. Cecilia now trusts Ned, and, joined by Ned’s pirate friend Alex O’Riley, they all hide in a secret passage behind a portrait, where they find the Wisteria Society ladies and Frederick.

The ladies form a plan to attack Morvath and get their houses back. They also find Jane, who reveals she is not the traitor, but that her grandmother Miss Fairweather is. The group improvises weapons and heads into the hallway, where they find Morvath. He reveals that Miss Darlington is his mother, which shocks Cecilia. Miss Darlington reveals that Branwell Brontë may not be Morvath’s father, as she had a romantic relationship with Charles Darwin at the same time. She tries to reason with Morvath, but he refuses. Cecilia then throws down a battered copy of Wuthering Heights to renounce her Brontë heritage, which enrages Morvath. Battle breaks out between Morvath’s men and the Wisteria Society ladies, while Jane leads Ned, Cecilia, and Frederick to the garden, where Morvath has stored the stolen battlehouses. Jane and Frederick take one house, while Ned and Cecilia take another. Ned and Cecilia fly the house into battle against Morvath and his abbey. They see a garden shed flying away, which they assume is Morvath escaping, before it slams into the hillside and explodes. 

Constantinopla teaches Queen Victoria the flying incantation, which allows her to fly Windsor Castle into battle against Morvath. After the fighting ends, Ned and Cecilia have sex in Cecilia’s bedroom, as Cecilia thinks it is the last time that they will be with each other. They land the house, and Ned talks with the Queen as Cecilia goes to find Miss Darlington, whose life was saved by Pleasance after Morvath stabbed her. Miss Darlington and Cecilia return home. The society ladies bring Miss Fairweather over to decide her fate; the ladies appreciate that any of them may have done the same for the right price. They fine her for her indiscretion. Jane and Frederick arrive and announce their engagement, having fallen in love during the battle. The Queen and Ned then arrive, and Ned takes Cecilia upstairs and kisses her, begging her to marry him. She refuses, citing Miss Darlington’s need of her. Ned kisses her goodbye.

At the Queen’s Jubilee Banquet, the ladies of the Wisteria Society mingle with European royalty. Cecilia sees Ned, who waltzes with her and asks her to marry him again. Before she can answer, Morvath appears, having faked his death, jumping out with a parachute before the garden shed exploded. He holds Cecilia at knifepoint and threatens to kill her if anyone tries to stop him. He’s angry at the women for denying him entry to the women’s Wisteria Society and at Miss Darlington for giving him up. He tries to drag Cecilia to the roof. He has parked his escape garden shed there, planning to raise the castle using the flying incantation and dropping it, which would kill the people inside. Queen Victoria bashes Morvath over the head with her heavy crown and has the guards drag him out.

Ned kisses Cecilia in public, and the Queen demands they marry. Cecilia tries to protest out of duty to Miss Darlington, but Miss Darlington tells her she wants her to marry him and choose her own destiny. The Wisteria Society gives her the option to join as a full member, with only Lady Armitage and Miss Darlington voting no, as they hope Cecilia will make her own adventure. Cecilia decides to marry Ned. He steals a public library for her that he converted into a cottage to honor her love of reading.