Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by robinwalter
Mss Plum and Miss Penny by Dorothy Evelyn Smith
funny
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
The blurb on the cover of my copy is a quote from the Chicago Tribune: “An Enchanting Novel”. I’m not sure I agree, unless the enchantment is not benign.
This was my second middlebrow read, and a very different reading experience from D. E. Stevenson’s “The Fair Miss Fortune”. There’s much less whimsy, and much more candour in this story. It’s often funny, but the humour is often snide. The result was a little unsettling.
This was my second middlebrow read, and a very different reading experience from D. E. Stevenson’s “The Fair Miss Fortune”. There’s much less whimsy, and much more candour in this story. It’s often funny, but the humour is often snide. The result was a little unsettling.
The many wryly humorous observations in this story were mostly “It’s funny because it’s true” kind of lines, but they were not kind lines. I had the feeling that the reader is being invited or lured into laughing AT the characters, for foibles and failing that are very relatable. A gentle example, one of the mildest in the book:
" It just proved how futile it was to listen to gossip, Stanley thought severely and, it must be admitted, a little flatly. "
" It just proved how futile it was to listen to gossip, Stanley thought severely and, it must be admitted, a little flatly. "
Funny, but a bit uncomfortable, like a guilty pleasure.
Another difference between this story and Stevenson’s is the nature of the “villain”. The nearest the Stevenson story came to a ‘baddie’ was a possessive and manipulative mother. The antagonist in this story, Miss Plum, was VERY antagonising and she eventually brought out very understandable negative reactions from the protagonist, Miss Penny.
A nice summary of the tone of the book is this quote:
“Miss Plum had sprung the tenderest trap of all—the trap of compassion—and they were all caught in it”.
That sums up the bulk of the book – the idea that no good deed goes unpunished. One of the few times in the book when I actually laughed out loud was when a character was suffering for having (uncharacteristically) attempted to do the right thing and be helpful. Once again, the author succeeded in drawing laughs at the expense of a character’s pain.
That sums up the bulk of the book – the idea that no good deed goes unpunished. One of the few times in the book when I actually laughed out loud was when a character was suffering for having (uncharacteristically) attempted to do the right thing and be helpful. Once again, the author succeeded in drawing laughs at the expense of a character’s pain.
It’s a very well-written book, full of astute observations and amusing asides. The author very obviously knew her characters extremely well and drew them extremely well, but there is no sign she liked any of them that much. It was not what I was expecting or hoping for. Droll, yes, but more Dahl than Wodehouse. If you like humour that is acerbic almost to the point of being acidic, and depictions of ordinary life that are unflinching in their accuracy and unsentimentality, for you this may well be “an enchanting novel”.