Spoilerrific!
I came across a mention of Rebecca, by Daphne Du Maurier, as one of the great romance novels, and thought to myself, I should really read that and see what the fuss is all about.
So I checked it out from the library and took it with me on the latest plane-hop. It makes excellent light reading and was very enjoyable.
The unnamed narrator becomes the second wife of Maxim de Winter; Rebecca the brilliant and beautiful deceased first wife who haunts them both.
It's one of those books with a lovely twist in it; I wasn't surprised by it because, I realized about halfway through, I had in fact already read it.
It gets worse. I mentioned to my Mom what I was reading, and she said, "Oh, that's one of your favorites, isn't it?" Yes, at one point this was one of my favorite books.
My guess would be that I originally read it in high school or college (when I would have had most in common with the young and unattractive narrator).
Ten years later I don't even remember it was in my hands.
I am going senile.
This is why I started blogging, you know, if I don't write things down they just stream right through my brain!
Spoileriffic bits:
Du Maurier wrote this in the late thirties and gee, things sure have changed. Rebecca doesn't work nearly so well as a villainess in an age where the Prince of Wales has been divorced and promiscuity doesn't seem such a great excuse for murder any more. What about the poor wife? people will say, thinks the narrator, when it looks like Maxim will go down for his crime. Well, what about the poor wife?
I have no sympathy for poor murdering Max.
I do think it has one of the BEST ending lines.
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1 comment:
Is that not how it happens in the book?
Nope. He shoots her dead.
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