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3.71 AVERAGE
3.71 AVERAGE
I'm not sure if it was my state of mind at the time, but reading this book felt like trying to find my way through a semi-familiar city in a dense fog. I didn't understand which characters I was meant to sympathize with or which ones I was meant to distrust. Nice to read something else of Charlotte Bronte's, but I didn't really get it.
This book is so good and so often overlooked in favor of Jane Eyre. It's a masterpiece of atmosphere and characterization with acute psychological observations. A fascinating, and in some places completely surreal, book. I guess I don't reread it as often as Jane Eyre (I'm a sucker for Jane's moxie! and of course, moody, tortured Edward Rochester), but I think I actually like it better.
Almost four years elapsed between me starting and finishing this book, but overall I’d have to say I enjoyed it quite a bit. The writing takes awhile to get used to - very old-fashioned, very flowery, lots of French - but it does a good job in creating a specific mood and defining the thoughts and feelings of Lucy Snowe, the main character.
Lucy is a lot different than most MCs that I’ve read, but fascinating in her own way. She’s incredibly repressed most of the time, and very passive, but beneath that rigid control is a turmoil of emotions. A lot of her true feelings get glossed over or go unremarked until they explode outwards or they are indicated in another way through others’ remarks.
M. Paul won me over quite a bit, by the end, unlike many Bronte leading men. But wtf was that ending??? So much of her life is gone over with meticulous detail, then a three year time skip in like five pages, then the implication that he died without outright saying it (which is very Lucy), then it ends??? I had no idea what I was feeling or should be feeling.
Overall I enjoyed the book, even if the slower pace and flowery language took some getting used to.
Lucy is a lot different than most MCs that I’ve read, but fascinating in her own way. She’s incredibly repressed most of the time, and very passive, but beneath that rigid control is a turmoil of emotions. A lot of her true feelings get glossed over or go unremarked until they explode outwards or they are indicated in another way through others’ remarks.
M. Paul won me over quite a bit, by the end, unlike many Bronte leading men. But wtf was that ending??? So much of her life is gone over with meticulous detail, then a three year time skip in like five pages, then the implication that he died without outright saying it (which is very Lucy), then it ends??? I had no idea what I was feeling or should be feeling.
Overall I enjoyed the book, even if the slower pace and flowery language took some getting used to.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
slow-paced
This story has good bones and an interesting main character but it’s way too long. I fell asleep and slept through long stretches of the audiobook.
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
This book could have been merely an inspiring tale of a humble, lonely woman who does uncommon things. Instead it is inspiring and compelling as narrated through the very realistic voice of the main character. The book reads at times as though she is an intimate friend pouring out her fears, inadequacies, philosophies, and perceptions of everything around her to the reader, which is in my opinion the book's greatest strength. Well, that and the strength of the main character herself, who manages to live and to support herself entirely on her own (that is to say, by earning money herself) in a foreign country. It's remarkable how relevant this book is.
I'm conflicted, because initially I was going to give this 4 stars, but then Lucy Snowe unfortunately does not get together with the lovely Dr. John Graham Bretton and in fact gets with the awful little M. Paul Emanuel. I will admit he does suddenly undergo something of a personality transplant near the end there and is actually likeable, but John and Paulina left a sour taste.
The redeeming part of this is that Lucy (based on Charlotte Brontë herself) ends up with Paul (based on Constantin Héger who Brontë was in love with though unfortunately unrequited), and that Charlotte got her happy ever after in book form (okay maybe not right at the end, but still for the most part mutual love was there). She also had feelings for her publisher (who John is heavily based on) and accepts and buries these feelings in the book too.
Still I'm basic and I liked Jane Eyre more
The redeeming part of this is that Lucy (based on Charlotte Brontë herself) ends up with Paul (based on Constantin Héger who Brontë was in love with though unfortunately unrequited), and that Charlotte got her happy ever after in book form (okay maybe not right at the end, but still for the most part mutual love was there). She also had feelings for her publisher (who John is heavily based on) and accepts and buries these feelings in the book too.
Still I'm basic and I liked Jane Eyre more
slow-paced
Well I felt like I didn't understand the book. I don't normally hate a book because of an unlikable character so this one wasn't that. As a narrator, there are so many details we need to know of Lucy's life but what we get instead is are pages full of unnecessary details of her acquaintances and the setting. I loved the wordings. I loved the concept of solitude and the theme of God and religion. But it still wasn't enjoyable.