Brilliantly Observed - simple story that says so much about society of the era.

I love Von Armin and this is an interesting exploration of the meaning,and different interpretations or manifestations of love through mixed age marriages. Five main characters play out the story, a religious one, 2 young, 3 old who represent values, class, morality, issues of female medicine, etc. it is beautifully written and a joy to discover the subtlety of her writing. The plot is uncomplicated but effective, though I felt she slightly lost her way towards the end. Did she stretch it to meet a word count. Memorable for its precise observations of psychosocial matters and underlying feminist message.

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Cracking good read

Why have I never heard if this author before!
These are the extra six words

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Hated it... Loved it

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After an hour I wanted to put it down, I had no idea how, it attained a 5 star rating from a reviewer I had happened upon. On it’s opening it reads as I would imagine a bad Mills and Boon but without the sex. The main female character is always giggling and happy and the man appears to be slightly less than a man, more a boy, let’s not call it LOVE, maybe it should be more appropriately called CRUSH, or FOLLY. Why did I not like the beginning, had it been the accent and intonation of the narrator? No the reader’s voice only matched the lack of emotional depth in the text, the one hundred year old text does seem dated, while I don’t doubt that people did used to speak in that frightfully correct way, I do not believe that people thought frightfully correctly, this rankled me as the characters were not real and rounded. All this said I had paid for the novel so I was going to listen to it. However after a few hours something happens and that’s that an engaging story starts to emerge, the characters begin to flesh out, unexpected turns of events come about and some of the fluff disappears. The female lead becomes a real woman with real emotions, the male character finally does something other than just fawn. Finally the societal pressures that are talked about all throughout the book become real and have real life consequences for the characters and I found my self intrigued and a firm fan of the novel from at least half way through to the ending. I found my viewpoint flipped around from one ‘side’ to another and then to the point that I didn’t know what I thought but finally like the characters in the novel I realised that life and love is complicated. A worthwhile read, it’s a story called Love but it doesn’t read like a love story, I hope you enjoy it if you decide to give it a go.

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18 people found this helpful

Thoroughly enjoyable

Thanks to audible I was led to this author and loved this book as well as the narration and story.

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Wonderful book

Loved this book and one I would enjoy reading again. It was well written and a very clever but in a way sad story.

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3 people found this helpful

Captivating

This story was great as an audible book. I think I’d have got bored if I’d read it. It is beautifully narrated and is a wonderfully reserved tale that is relevant today although society is more accepting.

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The writer excellent

I thought this was brilliant the writing the reader the message so modern and write so many years ago

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Beautifully read

interesting book. I really enjoyed it. The narration was so good I didnt really notice it!

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Thank you Audible

Great story and so well read by Eleanor Bron. According to the author’s page on Wiki the book, like many she wrote was semi-autobiographical, she had an affair with a man 26years her junior. Knowing that made it even more enjoyable and added another chapter at the end for me.
Was led to this author through another book which referred to The Enchanted April, thanks Audible for including these in the Plus Catalogue.

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Love this author

This story about a love between an older woman and a younger man raises issues that are relevant today and although I found the character of the young man rather annoying, I enjoyed the book as a whole. Eleanor Bron is the perfect narrator

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