A review by bncarlozzi
Villette by Charlotte Brontë

dark emotional mysterious reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

 difficult one to rate for many reasons. Villette is often called Charlotte's masterpiece, though of course, Jane Eyre is read far more. I prefer the latter I think, as far as enjoyment goes (though it's been some years since I read it), but I respect Villette more in a strange way. Lucy Snowe is an unreliable narrator (plot twists in the book, created solely by Lucy's reluctance to share things with the reader right away!), she is visited by nightmarish visions of nuns at night, she is lonely, perhaps even depressed. There were some passages that wonderfully captured loneliness. Strangely, the beginning of the book is probably the strongest. There is almost no plot, we live in her head. I thought I'd enjoy it more; I am a big fan of plotless, internal, slow-burning novels, but I did find chunks of this book boring. That's not so surprising at 657 pages, though. I thoroughly enjoyed the last page and the openness of the novel, especially when so many 19th century novels tied things up so completely. Glad I read it, Charlotte is my favourite Bronte, I think, though it's rather unfair to compare her as she wrote so much more than her sisters. An intelligent, slow novel.

Is there, indeed, such happiness on earth? I asked, as I watched the father, the daughter, the future husband, now united—all blessed and blessing.
Yes; it is so. Without any colouring of romance, or any exaggeration of fancy, it is so. Some real lives do—for some certain days or years—actually anticipate the happiness of Heaven; and, I believe, if such perfect happiness is once felt by good people (to the wicked it never comes), its sweet effect is never wholly lost. Whatever trials follow, whatever pains of sickness or shades of death, the glory precedent still shines through, cheering the keen anguish, and tinging the deep cloud.