June 2022: Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Our author for June is Mary Elizabeth Braddon (4 October 1835 – 4 February 1915)

She was one of the Victorian authors who popularized the sensation novels (together with our February 2022 author Wilkie Collins) and her most recognizable work (by far) is Lady Audley's Secret.

So... what are you reading this month?

Run to Earth sounds intriguing.

Oh I liked that one and pretty much everything of hers I've read. I think I have a "new" one in my library somewhere. Ah there it is Fenton's Quest - haven't read that one yet.

Here's a link to a cool site about Mary Elizabeth - https://yellowbacks.wordpress.com/types/fiction/women-writers-2/m-e-braddon/

I plan to read The Doctor's Wife (1864). I have read only one other Braddon, Lady Audley's Secret, which I enjoyed.

I read Aurora Floyd and enjoyed it, though it lacked some of the sparkle of Lady Audley's Secret. Like that one it also concerns a respectable woman with, at least by the standards of the mid 19th century, a disreputable secret in her past. Despite it lacking the sparkle of the other novel, it still contained moments of drama and tension and some interesting characters. There is a murder central to the mystery of Aurora's past, though the identity of the culprit is hardly a surprise and I was slightly hoping for a last minute twist.

As an author of Victorian sensationalist novels, Braddon is for me almost up there with Wilkie Collins, though she is undeservedly far less well known.

Run to Earth is the first book I’ve read by Ms. Braddon. In fact, I had never heard of her until this challenge. The story is a page-turner, all right, but I was really disappointed in the ending. The storylines were resolved a little too quickly, and all at once, especially for the time spent leading up to them, and then ended in such an unsatisfying manner: the villains didn’t get what I think they deserved, and most everyone else ended up unhappy anyway. Regardless, except for near the end I enjoyed her writing very much and intend to give her another try and am glad for the opportunity to have come across this author here.

I am at the midway point of Like and Unlike and the story has just taken an unexpected turn. If only I wasn't so busy at work – I'm afraid I won't finish it this month.

Oh, I did manage to finish it!

Like and unlike is the strange tale of twin brothers. Strange, because the pacing is so uneven and the author seems to change horses in midstream. She was known for strong, criminal women at the beginning of her career, as in Lady Audley's secret, which we do not get here. In this respect it is a disappointment. Instead we have the brothers, one physically delicate who loves intellectual pursuits, and his younger, stronger brother who hunts, shoots, rides, plays cards and behaves selfishly and callously. And yet he is his mother's favourite from beginning to end. Normally such a character would also display charm and be the reader's favourite, not here. He is drawn in all his egotism. And there are many shallow people like him in this book. London society in the 1890s has much in common with our age, only nowadays the bad guy would not get his just deserts, I suppose.