A review by anneofgreenplaces
Behind a Mask, Or, a Woman's Power by Louisa May Alcott

4.0

3.5
Pacy Victorian quasi-thriller with shades of Bronte, Austen, and Wilkie Collins, and an interesting female lead. She was almost too good/bad to be true--a genuis manipulator--but had a certain level of nuance/humanity that rescued her from total femme fatale mastermind cliche (including class conflict and

Spoiler

actually winning at it, with the sense that although she wasn't really morally in the right, the duped aristocrats deserved it, and at the same time she still has some respect for the ones who treated her well

). The gradual revelation of her intentions and motives after the initial foreshadowing and the dramatic irony set up by the alternating perspectives kept me binge-reading, although I got a little wearied of the many intense looks and ephemeral moods and blushing/whitening cheeks, skillfully though they may have been written.