Rebecca

My bookclub buddies, several of them have read this book and recommended it so I duly went about reading it. Now having finished this book I have nothing profound to say about it. Plot summary: young, middle class, pretty (enough) un-named servant in training, after a whirlwind Monte Carlo romance is married to a wealthy english, middle-aged estate owner, widower Maxim De Winter. Married, at the named estate she discovers that the dead wife, Rebecca, still looms large over all aspects of the couple’s living arrangements and the new wife feels inadequate to her new life-style and responsibilities. The landscape of the estate, the weather, the flowers, the cuisine and tea service are all recurring presences in the novel. The tension peaks at the “fancy ball” when our protagonist is tricked into wearing one of Rebecca’s outfits and she thinks its the end of her marriage. Then Rebecca’s boat is discovered in the ocean with Rebecca still in the cabin. Shortly after Max admits to having murdered Rebecca and to have scuttled the boat. Now the novel shifts from Rebecca almost-ghost-story to being one of suspense: will Maxim’s murder be found out? It was a fine story but too slow for me and its just too obvious that story would not exist without the arbitrary discovery of Rebecca’s sail boat. Its satisfying the way that cousin Favell’s blackmail falls apart, I guess I can appreciate the craft went into last third of the book. Anyway, that’s my mealymouthed opinion for now.