Yvonne Georgina Puig

Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth gets a retelling in modern day Houston here and I rather enjoyed it. The main characters of Vivienne Cally and Preston Duffin, made this a page turner and so did the supporting characters (to a lesser extent). Watching Vivienne live a life of keeping up appearances with a social bracket she couldn't afford was depressing but watching her basically pushed out of continuing as she began and also losing access to the hoped for family inheritance and forced to make her own way, made for a riveting read. I haven't read a book about a character so deeply addled with an arrested development in a while and this was very well done.

Preston, also had his own challenges but this was really Vivienne's story for me. I also have to give points to the writing for Karlie. She was the "friend" in the group that I never understood as she seemed to be a vituperative, grasping thing where everyone else was concerned (truly, why would Waverly, in all her saintly kindness express the insanity required to keep trying with her?). I never knew what to make of Karlie or her presence but I did want her to receive some sort of comeuppance for her deeds. In addition, I felt a bit let down on the Aunt Katherine front. She's expressed in this story as a tell not a show so she never much materialized as anything more than a spectre that loomed large in Vivienne's mind. I wanted more so I could form more of a sense of Katherine. Still, even with these two wants going unanswered, I very much enjoyed reading this. In random things I learned reading this, chewing tobacco is called dip & its result is called dip spit.

I bought this a while ago because it sounded great but the unfortunate cover (grey and pink drawing) made me pass it by over and over. I'm glad I finally picked it up and also see there's an improved cover for another edition that I think is much more attractive. Definitely recommended. Great weekend or lunchtime read (I warn you, I began this at lunch and couldn't put it down after so... at your own peril).… (mere)

"A Wife of Noble Character" is an unreadable, unenjoyable and boring book. Moreover, I don't want to read a book with an uninteresting, unlikable, maddening, rich and exceedingly beautiful, self-aware heiress who seems to have no redeeming qualities and yet has attained, unfathomably, the love of a man beyond reason, sense or even attraction. I abandoned this book a few chapters in. The writing has no art to it--you'd be better off reading "The House of Mirth" instead, or honestly any other book.… (mere)