First, please appreciate the beautiful cover. Isn’t it nice? Quite apart
from the cover, I picked it up because of the brilliance of another of her
novels, “I Captured the Castle”, but it didn’t have the same delight. In fact,
it was bordering on the dreaded genre of ‘Chick Lit’ which, although I have
little experience of, I know that it is not for me!
The main character, “Mouse”, tries to become an actress and ends up as a
secretary in a theatre. Here she meets the famous, but aging, Rex Crossway and
(inevitably) falls in love. She has the courage and stupidity to push herself
onto him which can be very cringey, particularly as I didn’t even like Rex. His
womanising ways were just accepted as part of him, as if they were inherited
and inescapable, leaving him blameless. By the end of the novel he effectively
had three women running around after him and, worst of all, they were all aware
of it! I found his character a little pathetic without any redeeming sense of
morality. I could have coped with this, if I felt that there was a reason for
it, if it seemed to be making some kind of valid social comment; I don’t have
to like characters! However, it felt as if you were supposed to fall in love
with Mr Crossway too.
The book ended slipping forward into old age. I think the combination of
how unsatisfactorily their lives turned out and the skipping of many years
seemed to say that after youth, nothing is monumental or exciting. How cheery.
Despite all this, if I squinted as I read so as to blind myself to the
things I disagreed with, I could enjoy this novel. It was a nice break from
some of the heavier stuff I have read, without descending into some of those
mindlessly churned out novels!
Just a quick note to say I hope to be uploading blog posts quite
regularly over the next week, as I have a ton of books stored up to write
about. It would be really great if you took the time to comment if you find something
interesting, or even if you disagree with me! Thank you for reading J
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