My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.
Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below.
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett B
This is, of course, a very well known book, with the story adopted half a dozen times over the years in film, TV, and the stage. It concerns a 10 year old orphan, Mary, whose neglectful parents both die, as Europeans often did, in India of cholera or some such thing. She is then sent home to live with her uncle in England; in a great house on the moors of Yorkshire. Unloved Mary is a very unpleasant you child, raised by servants that she could boss around, and did. She now finds herself in a strange house of a hundred rooms, most of which are unused. Her uncle, with a bit of a twisted back, is still morning the death of his wife ten years before, so he's rarely at home, roaming the world, half mad with sadness. He has a son, who fears he will end up crippled like his father, and much like Mary is used to getting his own way. However, in this house, Mary slowly discovers the love she was denied, as well as, a mentor in the form of a 12 year old boy, Dickon, who is one with the moors and the out of doors. And she steps up to give her cousin the love and courage to move beyond his fears and discover the wide world outside his windows.
Lots of nature, lots of gardening, lots of inspirational writing, with a touch of Gothic atmosphere, as two unloved children began to blossom with love, friendship, and a healthy helping of the bracing life of the Yorkshire moors. And did I mention, gardening? A nice uplifting story. I enjoyed it.
A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett B-
Like The Secret Garden, this is a book for younger readers, a century ago. Which is not to say I disliked it, but I could see children enjoying the riches to rags and riches again story of Sara Crewe. The story opens with Sara's father, a British Army Officer, comfortably supplied with money, bringing Sara to a London boarding school at the age of nine. Her mother had died, and he felt that India was an unhealthy place to raise a child, so he reluctantly arranged for her to say at this boarding school, lavishing her with fine things, including a pony and a maid. Sara is a very thoughtful young woman, gifted with imagination and much given to making ups stories to the delight of some of her classmates, but far from all. She is envied by some because of her privileged position as the daughter of a rich man, and is the pride of the school. But all good things must come to an end, and end they do, when her father, investing seemingly unwisely in a diamond mine, runs out of money, falls ill with fever, and dies penniless. Sara must now work for her room and board, and living in an attic room with a tame rat, she is very ill treated by all. And yet she is able to maintain her spirits and dignity by imagining herself as a princess, and only doing what a princess would do.
Once again, it's a nice story with lots of uplifting moral messages. Sara is a very nice and interesting character. A enjoyable read, if somewhat predictable. And it did, I am quite sure, improve my character.
Robin by Frances Hodgson Burnett DNF 16%
Now, this one is not a children's novel, but rather one about a young woman, Robin, whose mother, a widow is the mistress of a man reputed to be a rake and as such, not acceptable in polite society. Her rakish lover, however, sees that Robin is raised and educated in order that Robin can make a living, suggesting that he isn't all bad. The inciting incident of the story is when Robin as a young child, raised without love by servants, a running theme in Burnett's books to date, meets a boy in the local park and they spend a few days of playing together... until the boy's mother realizes just whose daughter Robin is, and after doing so, whisks her son away. They never forget those days, and meet again when Robin is 20 years old, when the world is on the brink of World War One. This is when the main part of the story kicks in. A promising romance set in a haunting time.
Alas, this adult novel still has all the moralizing and mush of her children-focused books. More of it, in fact. Indeed, I found it filled so much of the characters' conversations, and musing on the phycological and moral effects of the early months of that war that the story just dragged on and on. It was very much a novel of its time. I found that I didn't care enough about the characters to wade my way through all the talk and anguish to carry on reading it.
All in all, I believe I've sampled enough of Frances Hodgson Burnett to check her box and move on.
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