( 9 reviews )
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Posted: Jun 16 2009
Brilliant Idea: Write Adele Varen's tale. A+ Horrible execution and a Cat One loss of aircraft and crew, just past the fence. F Is For Failed. The start of the narrative, from Adele's childhood in Paris is well done; the exploration of Adele's, Celine's and Rochester's characters is just the sort of story I had been hoping for. Adele being an artistically gifted (and lonely) child, without being formally educated is well done, and her "French Defects" are largely the result of an early childhood spent as a kid of a showbiz legend, spoiled (then spurned) by Celine and her lovers- and sometimes, "customers". However, Ms. T hadn't followed the chronology of Jane Eyre well, and the departure from controlled flight begins with Adele's arrival at Thornfield. CB's chronology of important events at Thornfield is totally ignored. Adele had at least three months to be with Jane, prior to Rochester's arrival. By that time, Jane, Adele, and Sophie were effectively mother, daughter, and aunt, respectively, with La Fairfax as dotty control-freak Grandmere. This important relationship was not well developed, as it should have shown Adele and Sophie being reluctantly won over by Super Jane. Sophie is deliberately marginalized, on purpose. The idea of Adele, discovering Antoinette, (not to mention being drugged by Mrs. Alice Fairfax) being hidden from Jane and Sophie would have lasted all of ten seconds. Detective Chief Superintendent Jane Eyre would have nailed La Fairfax and Grace Poole after the next commercial. Threaten Jane's kid, and you would rather have ten thousand Helen Mirren's on your case, backed up by every Brit Super Cop (plus Holmes, Watson, AND Poirot) ever portrayed. Lord Bond, on the direct orders of Queen Victoria, would have been dispatched to liquidate Super Villain Rochester after a chase across the Caribbean, then Europe. Pursuing ship commanded by Admiral Of The Fleet Lord Horatio Hornblower, of course. Jane then happily marries Sir Ross Poldark's grandson (a senior partner at Rothschild's), and Adele is trained as a great actress by Bella Poldark herself. That would have been more believable and fun than what Tennant wrote. Plus, more explosions... The only sequences worth anything in the last half of the book are Adele's discussions with Nadar (well portrayed throughout), Rochester admitting Jane owns his empennage, and the admittedly excellent high-wire act where Adele faces up to herself (guided and saved by Jane's voice). The rest, rebuilding Thornfield, and one of the worst villainess monologues ever, is the final impact with the ground. Even the flight recorders are destroyed on impact. BOOOOOM! No survivors. This *could* have been a great book.
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Posted: Mar 19 2009
Not only is this book horribly written, but it is hard to follow. The author skips around, while changing the original premise of the book, so you are often at a loss about what is going on. It's as if she's trying to tell the "real" story of what happened in the original book. She throws in various hints at sadism and lesbianism, and I wonder if this was just to create a buzz about a book she herself knew wouldn't make much sense. The characters come off as disgusting, even making Jane a jello-headed twit. Adele is compared to Rochesters insane wife, and you will find it hard to find one sympathetic character. I wasn't expecting much from this book, but it was much much worse than I would have thought. Don't waste your time.
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( 5 of 5 found this review helpful ) Posted: May 24 2008
Having found this book, I thought the premise of a Jane Eyre retelling from Adele's, Rochester's daughter, point of view sounded interesting. The author's name sounded familiar, but I couldn't place her at the time. I was sure I had read one of her books before. If only I had remembered at the time, I would have never picked up this book, much less read it. Anyway, Rochester and Adele alternate the POVs in this novel (we also get narratives from Mrs. Fairfax and others) and it's about Adele's period in France, her somewhat cold and distant relationship with her father-slash-ward and her life in Thornfield Hall. Adele wants her parents to be together and sees Jane Eyre as a threat and an interloper. So she goes out of her way to criticize Jane and make her seem like nothing in Rochester's eyes... Does the plot sound absurd so far? Well, believe me, it gets much, much worse. If you feel at all tempted to pick up this horrible book, I will spare you from spoiler details, but I will nevertheless vent my frustration from having read it and for not remembering the author. (I must warn you that this is more like a rant than a review.) The whole thing with Mrs. Fairfax, such a kind and wonderful character, is beyond ridiculous. Talk about character assassination! Speaking of which, Rochester would never be that horrible to Jane or indeed anyone even if he is brooding and at times callous in Bronte's masterpiece. Adele's treating Jane like dirt is not worth mentioning, let alone get into detail. I will sum it up by saying that this Adele is depicted as a villain in a bad soap opera. The whole idea that Adele would dislike Jane so much is laughable. I could have appreciated Tennant's parallels in terms of feminism from Adele's viewpoint to that of Charlotte Bronte's if it hadn't been for the series of ridiculous plot twists that occur. The author takes so much artistic license it's unbelievable. It would be like taking a copy of Jane Eyre and ripping it to shreds, only that this author chose to do that in writing. I don't expect a sequel written by a different author to be as good as the original, but I do expect the work to at least reflect the original author's vision of the character and plotline, and not the new author's version of it. Take this wonderful example. Celine was pregnant by two men at the same time. Well, at least that's what it sounded like to me based on the author's explanation. Leaps of logic are found here, much like the other novel I had read by this author... Emma Tennant is the author of the atrocious Pemberley, a sequel to Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. As said earlier, if only I had remembered before picking up this book. The only good thing that came out of this is that I will most definitely remember Emma Tennant in the future. She is on my black list of authors never to read again.
