Wednesday, January 4, 2017

Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle ****

The Mortmain family lives in arguably romantic poverty at a ruined English castle. The father wrote a famous book years before, but now spends his time reading detective novels in the gatehouse; eldest daughter Rose laments her lack of prospects; our narrator Cassandra, a well-read and introspective teenager, writes in her journal. Their landlord dies and leaves his estate to his two American grandsons, whose arrival Cassandra immediately recognizes as similar to Mr Bingley's arrival in Pride and Prejudice.

There's not much plot in I Capture the Castle, but the story is thoroughly enjoyable because of Cassandra's charm. She is more insightful than a rural 17-year-old girl would be, but her feelings and actions sound genuine. The title alludes to her ability to capture the mood of the time and place. The book is is one of the few romance novels where the proper match for the heroine is not totally obvious from the beginning: Cassandra has complex feelings for multiple men. I also appreciated her observations about the differences between Americans and Englishmen.

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