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mschristy 's review for:
Rhett Butler's People
by Donald McCaig
Positives:
A solid and pleasing parallel story to Gone With the Wind, answering many of the questions that remain despite GWTW's thousand pages of epic storytelling. Simply having other view points beyond Scarlett's is a relief, considering that Scarlett O'Hara could very well be the perfect literary example of a person with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Daring to raise the veil on many of the alluded to events in GWTW, McCaig builds on Margaret Mitchell's vision and characters, making them fuller and more solid, adding additional background, story and secondary characters as needed, even when what is behind the veil is grotesque, morally reprehensible or simply pathetic. With Rhett Butler's People, the tragedy that is Gone With the Wind finds believable resolution and a sense of hope in the power of love.
Now for the negatives:
Absolutely no mention of Rhett knocking Scarlett down the stairs and her subsequent miscarriage was made in this book and the events surrounding Bonnie's death are relegated to a single letter. These were HUGE to the plot of GWTW and it's rather distressing that they're so mildly treated when Rhett is the one who was most severely affected emotionally by both events. There were a few inconsistencies between GWTW and RBP, but even with reading GWTW just recently, they were not so great as to stand out in my mind while reading, other than peripherally on a few occasions. It is hard to see how anyone would be able to read this book if they hadn't already read GWTW...it does not stand firmly on its own merits, but is strictly a supplement to the GWTW epic.
A solid and pleasing parallel story to Gone With the Wind, answering many of the questions that remain despite GWTW's thousand pages of epic storytelling. Simply having other view points beyond Scarlett's is a relief, considering that Scarlett O'Hara could very well be the perfect literary example of a person with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Daring to raise the veil on many of the alluded to events in GWTW, McCaig builds on Margaret Mitchell's vision and characters, making them fuller and more solid, adding additional background, story and secondary characters as needed, even when what is behind the veil is grotesque, morally reprehensible or simply pathetic. With Rhett Butler's People, the tragedy that is Gone With the Wind finds believable resolution and a sense of hope in the power of love.
Now for the negatives:
Absolutely no mention of Rhett knocking Scarlett down the stairs and her subsequent miscarriage was made in this book and the events surrounding Bonnie's death are relegated to a single letter. These were HUGE to the plot of GWTW and it's rather distressing that they're so mildly treated when Rhett is the one who was most severely affected emotionally by both events. There were a few inconsistencies between GWTW and RBP, but even with reading GWTW just recently, they were not so great as to stand out in my mind while reading, other than peripherally on a few occasions. It is hard to see how anyone would be able to read this book if they hadn't already read GWTW...it does not stand firmly on its own merits, but is strictly a supplement to the GWTW epic.