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A review by gymgirlreads
The Gray Chamber by Grace Hitchcock
5.0
I would like to thank Goodreads giveaways, the author and Barbour Books for an e-ARC in exchange for a honest review.
The story is set around the late 1800s in New York City. A New York City heiress, Edyth Foster is a forward woman of her times; she fences effortlessly, rides a velocipede instead of her carriage and makes her voice heard much to the chagrin of society around her, including her uncle Boris.
Edyth's uncle and his wife, who have a keen eye on Edyth's inheritance, devise an evil plan to forcibly subjugate Edyth to a mental asylum. Meanwhile, love is blossoming between Edyth and Raoul Banebridge, her fencing instructor, while both are completely unaware of the fate that is looming for Edyth.
While the novel is heavy in old Hollywood-esque romance, the crucial two underpinnings of the novel were: 1) how women were treated as property by the male family members and were forcibly subjected to a mental asylum without a proper diagnosis and 2) Mental asylums were run by corrupt and ineffective doctors and staffs who tortured asylum dwellers unbeknownst to the world outside.
This book was a work of historical fiction but the author discusses the true crime that was behind the making of this book in her epilogue, including some real characters that were inserted in this novel.
I enjoyed the old English dialect and structure in this book, which I sometimes miss in modern-day books. The book really got me thinking on issues of women's rights and the history of mental health.
The story is set around the late 1800s in New York City. A New York City heiress, Edyth Foster is a forward woman of her times; she fences effortlessly, rides a velocipede instead of her carriage and makes her voice heard much to the chagrin of society around her, including her uncle Boris.
Edyth's uncle and his wife, who have a keen eye on Edyth's inheritance, devise an evil plan to forcibly subjugate Edyth to a mental asylum. Meanwhile, love is blossoming between Edyth and Raoul Banebridge, her fencing instructor, while both are completely unaware of the fate that is looming for Edyth.
While the novel is heavy in old Hollywood-esque romance, the crucial two underpinnings of the novel were: 1) how women were treated as property by the male family members and were forcibly subjected to a mental asylum without a proper diagnosis and 2) Mental asylums were run by corrupt and ineffective doctors and staffs who tortured asylum dwellers unbeknownst to the world outside.
This book was a work of historical fiction but the author discusses the true crime that was behind the making of this book in her epilogue, including some real characters that were inserted in this novel.
I enjoyed the old English dialect and structure in this book, which I sometimes miss in modern-day books. The book really got me thinking on issues of women's rights and the history of mental health.