60 pages • 2 hours read
Deanna RaybournA Curious Beginning
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2015A 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 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary
In June 1887, Veronica Speedwell attends the funeral of her aunt and lifelong guardian, Nell Harbottle. She does not feel this loss intensely; she and Aunt Nell were not emotionally close, and Nell’s death was protracted. Veronica feels excited about her future without her aunt keeping her connected to England.
After the burial, Veronica accepts the vicar’s invitation to tea out of politeness. As they walk to the vicarage, she sees a gentleman watching them. His style of mustache identifies him as German or Austrian. He slips away, and she quickly forgets him. The vicar asks about Veronica’s future, annoying her by referring to her and Nell as “newcomers.” Veronica tersely clarifies that Nell was not her real aunt, merely her guardian, and shocks the vicar by referring casually to her illegitimate birth. Despite the censure of many, including Nell, Veronica refuses to feel shame about this “accident of birth” (4).
The vicar’s wife, Mrs. Cuttlethorpe, dislikes that Nell and her sister, Lucy, moved frequently, but Veronica finds it “useful” to have lived in so many parts of England—it taught her self-reliance. Mrs. Cuttlethorpe urges Veronica to marry a local widower with six children, but Veronica vehemently expresses her disinterest in motherhood. Mrs. Cuttlethorpe accuses Veronica of being intentionally shocking and decries the rumors that Veronica has “behaved immorally” and had sexual partners while traveling in Europe. Veronica departs, saying she will not see them again, as she is headed off for her next adventure.
Chapter 2 Summary
Veronica returns to her cottage, spirits raised after the debate with the Cuttlethorpes. She recalls how her “obstinacy” led her to pursue her passion for studying butterflies. When she undertook her first expedition to study lepidoptery at 18, she also discovered she enjoys sexual encounters with men. To protect her reputation, she developed rules that kept her encounters short and forbade any liaisons in England or with Englishmen.
She feels bittersweet about leaving England for a protracted time despite long anticipating her trip. She approaches the cottage to retrieve her bag, her last step before her departure, and is surprised to find the door ajar. She finds the cottage ransacked. A noise from the kitchen indicates the intruder is still present. She bursts into the kitchen with a nearby weapon and surprises a large man. He turns to run, but Veronica stops him, demanding to know why he destroyed her cottage. He ignores her question, instead using his greater size to grab her and drag her toward a waiting carriage. The gentleman from the cemetery stops him, and the criminal vanishes.
The gentleman introduces himself as Baron Maximilian von Stauffenbach; he already knows who Veronica is. She confirms that her money, hidden in a sewing box, has not been taken. The baron worries Veronica is in danger and urges her to flee the cottage. He admits that he came to the village seeking Veronica when he learned of Nell’s death. He says he cannot explain but feels obliged to ensure Veronica’s safety. Following her intuition, she agrees to go with him to London, musing that she felt no “precognition that the choice to accompany the baron would prove the single most significant decision of [her] entire existence” (17).
Chapter 3 Summary
In the carriage, the baron expresses that Veronica has surprised him. She’s aware that she is a “woman in search of adventure” (18), as indicated by her practical outfit that lacks any jewelry except a compass she wears pinned to her jacket, a gift from Aunt Lucy. She has retained no sentimental objects from her childhood except a velvet mouse named Chester. Her hatpin serves as a weapon, when needed.
Veronica reasserts her certainty that the housebreaker was not targeting her specifically but was merely pursuing an opportunity to rob an empty house. The baron is dismayed; he is ill but feels strongly about ensuring Veronica’s safety before he dies. He surprises Veronica by comparing her to her mother, whom she never knew. He calls the resemblance between them “uncanny,” noting their shared violet eyes. She presses for more information, but the baron refuses to say more, claiming the “truth is not [his] to speak” (23).
Veronica brushes off his mysteriousness by asserting herself too boring to be in danger. Her only potential rivals are fellow lepidopterists, who all assume her a man as she publishes as “V. Speedwell.” The baron hopes this is true but is unconvinced. He admits, when Veronica asks, that he is not her father, and the two agree to be friends.
On their long journey to London, the baron struggles to come up with a plan for Veronica’s safety. Eventually, he asks about her interest in lepidoptery, which leads him to an idea: He intends to ask his friend Stoker, who owes him a debt, for help with ensuring Veronica’s safety.
Chapters 1-3 Analysis
The novel’s introductory chapters introduce heroine Veronica Speedwell after her life shifts due to the death of Aunt Nell. Aunt Nell’s death thus emerges as the inciting incident of the novel. Veronica’s decision to publish Nell’s death in a London paper alerts both Baron von Stauffenbach and de Clare, who sends his subordinate Silent John to ransack Veronica’s cottage, as to where they can find Veronica. This is after her aunts have spent a lifetime hiding her from anyone who might wish her harm. Aunt Nell’s decision to keep Veronica’s heritage from her until it was too late—as Nell had suffered a stroke that left her unable to communicate—introduces the novel’s investigation of secret-keeping and the balance between when keeping secrets is necessary and when it is dangerous.
The intrigue of the novel thus comes for Veronica, rather that her seeking it out, despite her desire for adventure. This characterizes Veronica as the “reluctant detective” subtype within detective and mystery fiction. This is in contrast to, for example, the “career detective” like Sherlock Holmes or Louise Penny’s Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, who make detection their job, whether within police structures or outside them. The reluctant detective frequently, like Veronica, holds some personal connection to their first case—and, also like Veronica, they tend to show decreasing reluctance as the novel continues, thus suggesting in a series context that future books will see them more interested in solving crimes for the sake of solving them, rather than needing coercion. In this portion of the novel, however, Veronica does not yet believe that there even is a mystery to be solved; she goes along with Max merely to get a free ride to London, illustrating the pragmatism and intrepidness she displays throughout the novel.
This approach to adventure, education, and sex puts Veronica in sharp contrast with sensibilities about The Role of Women in Victorian Society. Veronica’s refusal to follow the rules of polite conversation alienates other villagers while endearing her to her modern-day readers. She thus emerges as less fixed in her time than as a translator of her time period. Veronica resists rather than exemplifies the values of the era, making her more accessible to readers who would find those values archaic.
Even though Veronica does not believe herself to be embroiled in a mystery in these first chapters, despite Max’s insistence, the novel displays aspects of mystery conventions. Notably, Aunt Lucy’s compass is mentioned in a manner that fulfills the Chekhov’s gun trope, which dictates that an object innocuously mentioned in the opening of a narrative will reappear in a significant manner later in the text; for Veronica, Lucy’s compass will later contain the key that leads to a safe deposit box documenting the secrets of her birth.
