From Publishers Weekly
In her debut, Gael makes a valiant attempt to blend fact with fiction as she transports readers to 19th-century England, where Charlotte Bront? conspires with her sisters to publish their works under pseudonyms. The publications aren't instant successes, and shortly after Charlotte's Jane Eyre creates a stir in London, a wave of deaths in her family leaves Charlotte as the sole caretaker of her aging father. That responsibility, combined with her average looks, seem certain to fate Charlotte to a life of spinsterhood—until a confession of undying love comes from an unlikely corner. Charlotte has a choice: will she settle for less than that all-encompassing passion she writes about? Or would she rather be alone for the rest of her life? Through letters written by Bront? herself and research on her life and life's work, Gael paints an accurate and intriguing depiction of the author, though her dedication to her material leads portions to read like straightforward biography. There are a number of good moments, though, and Bront? fans will surely enjoy this look at the author's life, even if it doesn't bleed like the classics. (May)
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From
Biographers have long examined the emotional life of Charlotte Bront?, as revealed in her novels (notably Villette) and correspondence. Here first-novelist Gael takes a fictive look at the last decade of the author’s life, during which Bront? sisters Anne, Charlotte, and Emily published poetry and novels as brothers Acton, Currer, and Ellis Bell, and Currer’s Jane Eyre took the literary world by storm. But the emphasis here is on Charlotte’s unrequited love, first for her French professor and later for her publisher, and the man whose love for her grows over the years. When curate Arthur Nicholls summons the courage to propose, Charlotte must overcome her father’s objections to the match and decide between a marriage lacking the passion displayed in her novels or a single life. Gael sprinkles Charlotte’s actual letters into this portrayal of the poverty and isolation of the Bront? family, and the tragedies that beset it, in language that seems true to the times. A moving view of a literary giant and the emotion that fueled her work. --Michele Leber