134 reviews for:

Belinda

Maria Edgeworth

3.59 AVERAGE

coolbaud's profile picture

coolbaud's review

4.5
emotional funny hopeful informative relaxing slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
emotional funny informative reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
funny lighthearted mysterious slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
evgeorge's profile picture

evgeorge's review

2.0
funny lighthearted slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
challenging reflective tense slow-paced

tstorer's review

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
emotional funny lighthearted relaxing sad slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: No
jmm11's profile picture

jmm11's review

4.75
reflective slow-paced
funny lighthearted slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

God help them, Regency and Victorian women need to take the character of a potential lover in far less than 500 pages.  I was enjoying myself until about 300 pages in, then I grew exhausted with Belinda's inability to read a room.  I can tolerate only so many misunderstood signals, servants' lies, and letters gone awry before I want to scream at the heroine. 

Also I found Viscountess Delacour and Mrs. Stanhope super-manipulative and really tedious characters.  

I'm also beginning to grow weary of the morality plays and 19th century virtue signaling.  It's really dreary to realize how frantic these people were about female sexuality and the threat of reputation damage.  😳 

I was enjoying this for a while; there was humor and some interesting characters.  It was simply too long for the plot devices, and the observations about people's character weren't really that penetrating.

What I liked about the book were undercurrents of enlightenment thought:  Belinda is a rational being, who eschews prejudice, gossip and myth (though she can be led astray by those whom she trusts to guide her.  She prefers fact to fiction, calm to chaos, and seems of a liberal and egalitarian disposition.  I further enjoyed the literary references in the book. Amongst all the gossipy blather are sprinkled in the true wisdom of the age (it's all in the annotations.)  

Two-thirds through the book I could not have cared less if Belinda got her man or ran off with the circus.  I was bored with the plot.  I think I have just been in classics for too long of a stretch and I need a dose of nonfiction.  Or a dose of laudenum.  

dnf — even if it’s for class I cannot get through this lmao