British Author Challenge April 2021: Love is in the air

The End of the Affair (1999)

April's theme is one of love and romance. Romance writing is often looked down on as trashy stuff you find in the supermarket check-out line, but many classic works of literature feature a love story at the center of the action. You can read anything from the latest Mills and Boon release to George Eliot's Middlemarch, where much of the action is directly related to characters making truly disastrous marriages. You can choose fiction or non-fiction, poetry or prose, as long as love or some sort of romantic entanglement is a major part of the book.

Suggestions

Works
Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
Daniel Deronda by George Eliot
Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters
The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
Behind These Doors by Jude Lucens
The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding
Maurice by E. M. Forster
Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
Possession by A. S. Byatt
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
Lady Chatterley's Lover by D. H. Lawrence
Girl Meets Boy: The Myth of Iphis by Ali Smith
Portrait of a Marriage: Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicolson by Nigel Nicolson

Authors
Jane Austen
Georgette Heyer
KJ Charles
Fanny Burney

I will be reading The Foundling by Georgette Heyer. I'm glad for an excuse to pull this one off the shelf to read!

I'm going to try to read at least two:

Miss Mackenzie by Anthony Trollope: "Miss Mackenzie, a spinster long past her first bloom, with the sudden possibility of a fortune, is beset by suitors and personal choices."

and a re-read:
Adam Bede by George Eliot--two brothers make their proposals

>3 cbl_tn: You were quick off the mark! I've pulled down Heyer's Lady of Quality for a possible April read.

>4 kac522: Another speedster! I haven't read Adam Bede, by I was impressed by the two other Eliot books I've read.

Here's a different take on Love - THE MASK OF APOLLO by Mary Renault.

>7 m.belljackson: Mary Renault was almost one of this year's author selections. Thanks for the rec!

I started but stalled this month with These Old Shades, this challenge is a good reason to pick it up again.

>9 fuzzi: Adding that one to my tbr list.

I've just finished The Snow Song by Sally Gardner which fits this theme. I loved this modern fairytale.

She's written some wonderful children's books, and mostly writes her adult novels under the pen name Wray Delaney, this one seems to be an exception.

Amanda - thinking far ahead to "Awards" - Will Rabindranath Tagore work?
He lived (1861-1941) when India was still part of the UK.

>11 avatiakh: Oh, that looks interesting. I'm fond of books inspired by fairy tales.

>12 m.belljackson: Yep, he can count.

Thornyhold by Mary Stewart

Geillis "Gilly" Ramsey inherits a house in the country from her cousin Geillis Saxon, who may have been a witch. There are lavish descriptions of the countryside, some strange goings on with the neighbors, and a hint of magic (or maybe just the machinations of a very perceptive woman). I almost didn't count this one for April because the love interest didn't appear until well into the book, but at the end we learn many of the actions taken by one of the characters are motivated by her romantic aspirations.

Thornyhold was a very pleasant book with which to spend an afternoon, and the descriptions of the countryside alone make it well worth reading.

The Corner Shop by Elizabeth Cadell

A silly and vastly over-complicated plot, but it's a fun screwball romantic comedy.

I finished Miss Mackenzie by Anthony Trollope. Margaret Mackenzie is a middle-aged spinster who has spent her life caring for her elderly father and then an invalid brother. At age 35 she suddenly becomes an heiress and the object of 3 different suitors.

Trollope creates one of his funniest stories that includes his standard elements of courtship, clerics and lawyers. Littlebath residents Miss Todd and Miss Baker from The Bertrams are featured, and for Palliser fans, Lady Glencora makes a cameo appearance. I thought the last quarter of the book was a bit drawn out, but overall I enjoyed this book, with both laugh-aloud and teary-eyed moments.

>17 kac522: Glad you found a good one! I haven't read Trollope yet, but I was recently gifted a lovely copy of The Way We Live Now which I plan on reading for June's Victorian era theme.

So, how's everyone doing? I'm currently enjoying D. E. Stevenson's Miss Buncle Married, the sequel to the marvelous Miss Buncle's Book.

I'm about 25% through Adam Bede by George Eliot. It's a re-read from about 20 years ago, but I have forgotten quite a bit, so it's like a new book.

>19 amanda4242: I loved all the Miss Buncle books, but the first two were the best imo. :)

>19 amanda4242:

MASK OF APOLLO, while strange to find a man in love with his mask, held many intriguing love moments with his roving partner.

>20 kac522: I have forgotten quite a bit, so it's like a new book.

I've certainly had that experience!

>21 fuzzi: I'm having a great time with them.

>22 m.belljackson: Definitely pulling that one off the shelf.

>24 amanda4242: I liked Miss Buncle, but I have to say I prefer the Mrs Tim books. I am currently on a "quest" to read all of Stevenson's novels that I can beg, borrow or steal. Some are really hard to find in the U.S., even through interlibrary loan. One stand-alone I enjoyed was Celia's House, which is a very loosely-based modern adaptation of Mansfield Park.

>26 kac522: I prefer Miss Buncle, but I've only read the first Mrs. Tim book so that may change when I get around to reading the rest of the series.

My library has a copy of Celia's House so I may have to check it out. Clearly this is another month where my tbr list is not going to shrink.

>26 kac522: I liked Celia's House!

I have the sequel waiting in the wings...

I finished Adam Bede by George Eliot. It took a bit to get into the book, but the last half just flew by for me. There are several different love stories/triangles of different sorts, with one having a tragic outcome. I closed the book thinking that there were no truly "evil" characters in this book, only regular humans with flaws and sometimes making terrible decisions. Eliot presents all the main characters in a sympathetic light, even while acknowledging their tragic mistakes.

The May thread is up!

https://www.librarything.com/topic/331790

I finished My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier. Although mostly suspense/thriller set in 19th century Cornwall, there is an obsessive love story at the center. Perhaps not as good as Rebecca, it still kept me turning pages and had, of course, an ambiguous ending. Du Maurier really knows how to get us inside a person's head, whether we like them or not.

>31 kac522: I've been meaning to read My Cousin Rachel for ages. Off to see if the library has it.

Here's a great website dedicated to du Maurier: https://www.dumaurier.org/

There's an interesting review with background info of My Cousin Rachel, but it does have spoilers.

I finished The Foundling by Georgette Heyer. There isn't as much romance as in most of her Regency novels, but there is some so I'll count it! It's really more a coming-of-age story.

>33 kac522: Thanks for the link!

>34 cbl_tn: I keep meaning to give Heyer another chance; I've only read Friday's Child and wasn't blown away by it. Any recommendations on what to try?

>36 amanda4242: Try The Unknown Ajax.

>36 amanda4242: I've had the same underwhelming experience with Heyer, but I do have The Grand Sophy and The Unknown Ajax still on the TBR shelf. I don't think I'll have time to read them before the month is out, but maybe can slip one in during May.

>36 amanda4242: I gave Sylvester 4 stars, so that one I'd recommend.

>36 amanda4242: My favorite Heyer romance among the ones I've read is Cotillion. I like mysteries much better than romance so I'm a bigger fan of Heyer's detective novels.

>37 quondame: >40 fuzzi: >41 cbl_tn: Thanks for the recs!

>39 kac522: I think part of the reason I didn't click with Heyer is because I was expecting something different. She's constantly being put on recommendations lists for fans of Jane Austen, so I thought I would be getting irony and social commentary mixed in with the romance.

>43 amanda4242: Heyer isn't Austen, but she does do some social commentary.

I keep forgetting to come back here and post, but I used this month's theme to read Georgette Heyer, who I used to read at my grandmother's house when I was a teen, but not since. So I read Regency Buck, because I had a copy, and then decided to keep going with an audiobook of Faro's Daughter. I definitely felt like it was some good escapism. I want to reread The Bath Tangle which for some reason I remember quite vividly reading multiple times as a high school student.

>44 fuzzi: I think now that I now what to expect I'll be better able to judge Heyer on her own merits.

>45 AnneDC: Glad to hear they held up to rereading.

>46 amanda4242: that's good to hear. I didn't like the one Heyer mystery I attempted but most of her reads are 3-4 star reads for me.

>48 fuzzi: I do like to give authors a fair try before giving up on them. The Unknown Ajax was first in from the library so that'll be next up.

I'm so glad I decided to give Heyer another try! The Unknown Ajax is perfectly enchanting entertainment.

>50 amanda4242: Oh good! You might try The Toll-Gate next or go for one of the City books like False Colours or the most often favorited Frederica or Arabella.

>51 quondame: And the tbr list grows again...

>26 kac522: If you're still on your quest to read all of Stevenson's novels, you'll be happy to hear Furrowed Middlebrow/Dean Street Press have eleven of her novels coming out in January.

https://furrowedmiddlebrow.blogspot.com/2021/08/cover-reveal-new-d-e-stevenson-t...