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priya_can_read 's review for:
The Clergyman's Wife
by Molly Greeley
Sobering and beautifully drawn portrait of how a woman's choices weighed on her in this period. I always liked Charlotte Lucas; Elizabeth's bewilderment of her decision to marry Collins always seemed so naive and idealistic to me.
You can feel how suppressed Charlotte is through her every word and sentence. Though she chose her life – and she knows it was the right choice at the time – the emptiness and dreariness of her days cut her to the quick. I thought the author handled this tension well, drawing out Charlotte's rich inner life and contrasting it to her cloistered, starched existence as a clergyman's wife.
Conversely, the love interest isn't of much, um, interest. Mr. Travis had the trappings of a good character, but compared to Charlotte, I just wasn't all that interested in him beyond his role as a way for Charlotte to escape her life.
The ending is sad, but I commend the author for sticking to the realistic path. Obviously, the only respectable way out of a marriage back then was widowhood or death, and I couldn't see that or any other path happening without my opinion of the book dropping considerably.
Anyway, this packed more of a punch than I expected from a P&P continuation. Worth your time if you're curious as to what happened to poor old Miss Lucas!
You can feel how suppressed Charlotte is through her every word and sentence. Though she chose her life – and she knows it was the right choice at the time – the emptiness and dreariness of her days cut her to the quick. I thought the author handled this tension well, drawing out Charlotte's rich inner life and contrasting it to her cloistered, starched existence as a clergyman's wife.
Conversely, the love interest isn't of much, um, interest. Mr. Travis had the trappings of a good character, but compared to Charlotte, I just wasn't all that interested in him beyond his role as a way for Charlotte to escape her life.
The ending is sad, but I commend the author for sticking to the realistic path. Obviously, the only respectable way out of a marriage back then was widowhood or death, and I couldn't see that or any other path happening without my opinion of the book dropping considerably.
Anyway, this packed more of a punch than I expected from a P&P continuation. Worth your time if you're curious as to what happened to poor old Miss Lucas!