First off, if you're a Bronte purist, you may not like this. If you don't consider yourself a Bronte purist but have a good working familiarity with "Jane Eyre," and if you appreciate creative re-imaginings of classics, you very well may -- I did.
Rather than Jane's original England of the 19th century, we are now in an exclusive suburb of Birmingham, Alabama, in the present day. Rather than a governess, Jane is a dog-walker (the original book's Adele, Rochester's ward, is a dog here -- super fun!). The mysterious "late" Bertha Mason Rochester is now Bea Rochester, a super-rich retail mogul who's built her fortune on designing "where DID you find that" jewelry, clothing, and housewares sought-after and desired by "real" women and "unreal" women alike. (Beyond gossip, the humorous group of former debutantes who inhabit Thornfield Estates have few challenges to surmount, unless you count the "challenge" of trying to decide if it's a good idea to decorate the neighborhood's front entry flower bed in Auburn and Alabama colors.) Throughout, Ms. Hawkins includes many creative, "see what a I did there" neat turns, especially with names and situations from the original.
I'd call this a re-imagining of "Jane Eyre" rather than a retelling, as it is not a play-by-play transfer of all of the events from Jane Eyre to a modern-day setting. I also would not go into this book expecting utter faithfulness to the original story.
I enjoyed the book very much even despite the fact that I mostly knew what was around the corner or, more specifically, what was upstairs. I might have even given it five stars were it not for two key things that earned it only four for me:
The character of Jane being drawn as having a very elastic conscience. She has no problem with theft (she regularly pilfers jewelry from her dog-walker employers) or lying (almost everything that comes out of her mouth when speaking to other characters is either a half-truth or an outright lie). The latter does make her an interesting unreliable narrator, but this kind of characterization is extremely out of step with Bronte's Jane, who has become famous over the centuries for her moral fiber. And while we do believe that Hawkins' Jane does have feelings for Mr. Rochester, she is also quite manipulative and conniving in her efforts to try to get him to "put a ring on it." (But don't worry, dear reader -- when super-rich, hot, extremely eligible Eddie Rochester chooses mousy, plain, churchmouse-poor Jane, it is every bit as bewildering here as it is in Bronte's original.)
My final reason for the lopped-off fifth star is the egregious saturation of profanity throughout the novel, as many, many other readers have already shared. I do NOT mind profanity -- and am sorry to say I use it quite often myself. But it is so over-the-top here, out of the mouths of almost every character, in spoken language and in internal thought monologues -- you can't go two pages without tripping over some form of an F-bomb, and that is not an exaggeration -- that it's disruptive, off-putting, and absolutely unnecessary. This is most evident in Jane, whose Olympic-league potty mouth only serves to make her appear crass, crude, and lacking in redeeming qualities.
If you like a good story, though, and admire creative re-toolings of very recognizable people and situations from the original, don't let the two above detractions stop you. Didn't stop me.
The Wife Upstairs: A Novel
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Fantastic Thriller from Rachel Hawkins
Reviewed in the United States on July 3, 2021
What a delicious, twisty suspense!I was intrigued when I saw it was a reimagining of Jane Eyre. I was also a bit nervous too….Jane Eyre is one of my all-time reads. Not all twists on classics are good things, but this one was! It had it all...secrets, lies, and betrayals. All the ingredients that make suspense so good!Jane has a past that she wants to not just overcome but escape. She sees her opportunity in Eddie Rochester. He is newly widowed after his wife drowned a year before with her best friend, even though their bodies were never found. He could give her the things she has always dreamed of. What she doesn’t expect is that Eddie has secrets of his own that might just be more dangerous than she could imagine.I enjoyed the way Hawkins wrote the storyline. She keeps you guessing, and I wasn’t quite sure who the enemy was. Of course, I was expecting a twist as it is based on Jane Eyre. However, I didn’t expect the twist she actually gave me! WOW!!!!If you are looking for characters that you are just going to love, don’t go looking for them in this book. You won’t get them! However, who is to say, you can’t love a good book with characters you don’t like? Rachel Hawkins taught me that you could! She still gave me characters that were full of depth and complexities!If you have a chance, you should also listen to the book. I did both, and the narrators did a phenomenal job of pulling you right into the story!Hawkins has already proven herself as a great YA author, and I’m glad to say that I think she has a bright future writing adult books as well!!!!!
Reviewed in the United States on July 3, 2021
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Top reviews from other countries
little bookworm
A fairly bland twist on a classic
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on May 8, 2021
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quick, fun and easy read
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Suspenful read with flaws but very enjoyable
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Loved it!
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