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emtees's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I can’t say I really enjoyed this book, but it was a great character study.
This is a short novel that revolves around Chris Baldry, a soldier who returns from WWI with “shell shock,” and the three women in his life. Chris’s condition takes the form of amnesia; he has no memory of the last fifteen years of his life, including his successful career, the son who he lost, or his marriage to the beautiful, socially appropriate but distant Kitty. Instead, he remembers being a young man, in love with an innkeeper’s daughter named Margaret. This woman has long since married herself and settled into poverty and drudgery, but Chris’s condition draws her back into his life and that off of his home.
The book is narrated by Chris’s cousin Jenny, an unmarried woman who still lives in the family home with Chris and Kitty. It was Jenny’s POV that originally made me struggle with the book. At the start, Jenny is a deeply irritating character. She seems to have no interests or passions outside of her relationship with her cousin and his wife; she speaks of Kitty as if the two of them are jointly Chris’s wife, and their sole goal in the world is his happiness. Her entire life centers on a maintaining the beauty and class of the home, not even for her own enjoyment, but purely because she believes that this is what Chris wants. She speaks dismissively of women who are capable of desiring things outside caring for a man. She is also extremely disdainful of people poorer than she is; in her initial encounters with Margaret, she is viscerally disgusted by Margaret’s shabby clothes and work-worn hands.
But as the book goes on, it becomes clear that Jenny’s simpering, judgmental POV serves a purpose, and that, while the main action may center around the “love triangle” of sorts between Chris, his wife, and the woman he loves, it is really Jenny who is the complex and nuanced character. I still didn’t like her and I found reading her inner thoughts sad and uncomfortable, but the layers of self-deception, pride and ridiculous fantasy that make up her conviction that she has a satisfying and meaningful life were fascinating. As her loyalties shift and the question of whether or not Chris will regain his memories, returning to his acceptable but less happy life as a husband and soldier, increasingly falls into her hands to decide, Jenny shifts from just the narrator to the main character of the story. It’s pretty brilliant but I wouldn’t call it enjoyable.
This is a short novel that revolves around Chris Baldry, a soldier who returns from WWI with “shell shock,” and the three women in his life. Chris’s condition takes the form of amnesia; he has no memory of the last fifteen years of his life, including his successful career, the son who he lost, or his marriage to the beautiful, socially appropriate but distant Kitty. Instead, he remembers being a young man, in love with an innkeeper’s daughter named Margaret. This woman has long since married herself and settled into poverty and drudgery, but Chris’s condition draws her back into his life and that off of his home.
The book is narrated by Chris’s cousin Jenny, an unmarried woman who still lives in the family home with Chris and Kitty. It was Jenny’s POV that originally made me struggle with the book. At the start, Jenny is a deeply irritating character. She seems to have no interests or passions outside of her relationship with her cousin and his wife; she speaks of Kitty as if the two of them are jointly Chris’s wife, and their sole goal in the world is his happiness. Her entire life centers on a maintaining the beauty and class of the home, not even for her own enjoyment, but purely because she believes that this is what Chris wants. She speaks dismissively of women who are capable of desiring things outside caring for a man. She is also extremely disdainful of people poorer than she is; in her initial encounters with Margaret, she is viscerally disgusted by Margaret’s shabby clothes and work-worn hands.
But as the book goes on, it becomes clear that Jenny’s simpering, judgmental POV serves a purpose, and that, while the main action may center around the “love triangle” of sorts between Chris, his wife, and the woman he loves, it is really Jenny who is the complex and nuanced character. I still didn’t like her and I found reading her inner thoughts sad and uncomfortable, but the layers of self-deception, pride and ridiculous fantasy that make up her conviction that she has a satisfying and meaningful life were fascinating. As her loyalties shift and the question of whether or not Chris will regain his memories, returning to his acceptable but less happy life as a husband and soldier, increasingly falls into her hands to decide, Jenny shifts from just the narrator to the main character of the story. It’s pretty brilliant but I wouldn’t call it enjoyable.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Classism
Moderate: War, Mental illness, Misogyny, and Infidelity
The main plot centers on a man with a fictional form of PTSD. As part of his condition, he is emotionally unfaithful to his wife. Classism is a main theme and there are cruel statements made about a character who is poor. The main character also displays internalized misogyny.
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