Book review the essex serpent7/8/2023 ![]() Sarah Perry avoids the usual depiction of Victorians as judgmental prudes, favouring a range of complex opinions and beliefs on politics and morality much as we are now. The novel is packed with incident and drama – like a classic Victorian novel, it is full of doomed love affairs, sudden and brutal changes of fortune, and a touch of the supernatural crashing hard into religious doctrine - but it is the characters that keep pages turning.Īs well as Cora, there is a wide cast of friends and relations each of whom has a rich inner life. Rumours of a vicious beastie lurking in the Blackwater are too much for her to resist. ![]() Striding about the wilds of Essex in her hobnail boots and man’s coat (it is the condition of this coat rather than her behavior that raises eyebrows), she is driven on by a passion for paleontology. A Victorian feminist in the tradition of Jane Eyre or Elizabeth Bennett, she is an awesome creation. The main character is Cora Seabourne, a wealthy widow who outlived a violently abusive husband and no longer Gives Any Fucks. ![]() ![]() Hard to know where to start, so I'll focus on a few elements that made this historical fiction sing to me. I find it tricky to review books I love as much as this one. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |