The Booker Prizewinning author of The Sea offers up another intelligent, beautifully written novel this time with a Victorian setting. The story flows along elegantly with each chapter a vignette. Nothing is over-explained, the descriptions are evocative and the thoughts of the characters well expressed. It is a stunning read from one of our finest novelists who also writes 1950s detective stories under the name of Benjamin Black (great reads!). Here he has a wealthy lady, Isabel Osmond, is a failed marriage from which she wishes to “purchase my emancipation – to suffrage if you like.” …. But this is in the Victorian era … However the suffragette movement and some independence for women is erupting. Isabel discovers her husband has deceived her for year and extracts a subtle revenge. Highly recommended. ~ Sarah Broadhurst
The Booker Prize-winning author of The Sea continues the story of Isabel Archer, the young protagonist of Henry James's beloved The Portrait of a Lady-in this masterful novel of betrayal, corruption, and moral ambiguity.
Eager but naïve, in James's novel Isabel comes into a large, unforeseen inheritance and marries the charming, penniless, and-as Isabel finds out too late-cruel and deceitful Gilbert Osmond. Here Banville imagines Isabel's second chapter telling the story of a woman reawakened by grief and the knowledge that she has been grievously wronged, and determined to resume her quest for freedom and independence.
