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funny
lighthearted
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Oof, I didn’t love this one. But, I also own up to making with this a mistake I’ve made many times and probably will for my whole life: falling head over heels for a book by an author and then immediately following it up by reading another of theirs and being disappointed because it was so not the thing I’d fallen in love with in the first one! (I did this, and felt some strange grief and disappointment, with no less a book than Great Expectations, a letdown after my deep love for David Copperfield; and, many years later, with Half of a Yellow Sun after Americanah fully shattered my heart — it’s not like ANY book could have compared, for me.)
So — riding high off my first Jane Austen last month, and just exalting in the magic of Pride and Prejudice, I downloaded Northanger Abbey (more or less at random??! Not clear why I picked this one) and dug in. I enjoyed it at first, and read it on audio and digitally simultaneously (I did this with P&P and LOVED the reading experience!!). But the characters never came to sing for me in the way of my first love. I found myself disappointed and exasperated by the fact that I never truly loved the characters, and neither believed in nor approved of their relationship choices (platonic or romantic). I stopped midway through and read a bunch of other stuff, and when I finally finished today and yesterday I couldn’t get over how disappointing and oddly paternalistic the main romantic storyline felt to me throughout — just gave me the icks.
There are to be sure still things to love. I found Austen’s frequent self-referential moments in this quite funny and unusual — the way in which the actual writer is perhaps the most trusted and interesting character has some interesting play with this odd book whose characters spend a lot of time analyzing whether it’s worth one’s time to read novels(!!). That element of the book felt the most satisfying and engaging — like the reader was actually participating with JA herself rather than just watching so many twee society scenes. I loved so much of the society stuff in Pride and Prejudice — just, somehow, this novel (and Anna Massey’s narration) didn’t make it work for me.
So — riding high off my first Jane Austen last month, and just exalting in the magic of Pride and Prejudice, I downloaded Northanger Abbey (more or less at random??! Not clear why I picked this one) and dug in. I enjoyed it at first, and read it on audio and digitally simultaneously (I did this with P&P and LOVED the reading experience!!). But the characters never came to sing for me in the way of my first love. I found myself disappointed and exasperated by the fact that I never truly loved the characters, and neither believed in nor approved of their relationship choices (platonic or romantic). I stopped midway through and read a bunch of other stuff, and when I finally finished today and yesterday I couldn’t get over how disappointing and oddly paternalistic the main romantic storyline felt to me throughout — just gave me the icks.
There are to be sure still things to love. I found Austen’s frequent self-referential moments in this quite funny and unusual — the way in which the actual writer is perhaps the most trusted and interesting character has some interesting play with this odd book whose characters spend a lot of time analyzing whether it’s worth one’s time to read novels(!!). That element of the book felt the most satisfying and engaging — like the reader was actually participating with JA herself rather than just watching so many twee society scenes. I loved so much of the society stuff in Pride and Prejudice — just, somehow, this novel (and Anna Massey’s narration) didn’t make it work for me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Misogyny, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Classism
funny
lighthearted
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Oof, I didn’t love this one. But, I also own up to making with this a mistake I’ve made many times and probably will for my whole life: falling head over heels for a book by an author and then immediately following it up by reading another of theirs and being disappointed because it was so not the thing I’d fallen in love with in the first one! (I did this, and felt some strange grief and disappointment, with no less a book than Great Expectations, a letdown after my deep love for David Copperfield; and, many years later, with Half of a Yellow Sun after Americanah fully shattered my heart — it’s not like ANY book could have compared, for me.)
So — riding high off my first Jane Austen last month, and just exalting in the magic of Pride and Prejudice, I downloaded Northanger Abbey (more or less at random??! Not clear why I picked this one) and dug in. I enjoyed it at first, and read it on audio and digitally simultaneously (I did this with P&P and LOVED the reading experience!!). But the characters never came to sing for me in the way of my first love. I found myself disappointed and exasperated by the fact that I never truly loved the characters, and neither believed in nor approved of their relationship choices (platonic or romantic). I stopped midway through and read a bunch of other stuff, and when I finally finished today and yesterday I couldn’t get over how disappointing and oddly paternalistic the main romantic storyline felt to me throughout — just gave me the icks.
There are to be sure still things to love. I found Austen’s frequent self-referential moments in this quite funny and unusual — the way in which the actual writer is perhaps the most trusted and interesting character has some interesting play with this odd book whose characters spend a lot of time analyzing whether it’s worth one’s time to read novels(!!). That element of the book felt the most satisfying and engaging — like the reader was actually participating with JA herself rather than just watching so many twee society scenes. I loved so much of the society stuff in Pride and Prejudice — just, somehow, this novel (and Anna Massey’s narration) didn’t make it work for me.
So — riding high off my first Jane Austen last month, and just exalting in the magic of Pride and Prejudice, I downloaded Northanger Abbey (more or less at random??! Not clear why I picked this one) and dug in. I enjoyed it at first, and read it on audio and digitally simultaneously (I did this with P&P and LOVED the reading experience!!). But the characters never came to sing for me in the way of my first love. I found myself disappointed and exasperated by the fact that I never truly loved the characters, and neither believed in nor approved of their relationship choices (platonic or romantic). I stopped midway through and read a bunch of other stuff, and when I finally finished today and yesterday I couldn’t get over how disappointing and oddly paternalistic the main romantic storyline felt to me throughout — just gave me the icks.
There are to be sure still things to love. I found Austen’s frequent self-referential moments in this quite funny and unusual — the way in which the actual writer is perhaps the most trusted and interesting character has some interesting play with this odd book whose characters spend a lot of time analyzing whether it’s worth one’s time to read novels(!!). That element of the book felt the most satisfying and engaging — like the reader was actually participating with JA herself rather than just watching so many twee society scenes. I loved so much of the society stuff in Pride and Prejudice — just, somehow, this novel (and Anna Massey’s narration) didn’t make it work for me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Misogyny, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Classism