The story delves into Lucy's life from the moment she stays with her Godmother as well as further guests. Later in Lucy's journey, she crosses paths with these guests and while in Vilette starts various relationships, both platonic and love. This is a lengthy and heavy book, exploring love and heartache.


I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review. ( )

While this was as well written as one would expect, I found this third Charlotte Bronte novel too slow and have given up on it around 70% of the way through. The main character Lucy Snowe is an English teacher at a girls' school in the fictional city of Villette in the fictional country of Labassecour (which feels rather like Belgium). I enjoyed some of her passive aggressive clashes with Mme Beck, the headmistress, who was probably the most interesting character in the novel, but was rather bored by the romantic manoeuvrings (and it's not that I never like romance as a plot element, it just didn't work for me here). This novel was a reworking of the first novel Charlotte wrote The Professor, but which was published posthumously; the theme and plot is similar, but characters and setting different. ( )

Jane Austen’s older, darker sister ( )

My love for Jane Eyre isn't enough to keep me reading this book. It draaags, and there's a big detail that Lucy keeps to herself that has given me pause. If this isn't an oversight by Brontë, Lucy is either very careless in her recounting (which doesn't feel like the case) or she really doesn't like the reader. But then, she seems not to like a lot of people, so why should the reader be any different? Still, not enjoyable, so I'm calling it quits.

Upon re-reading this, I grew even more attached to Lucy Snowe than before--and this in spite of the fact that she holds you off with an insistence on her nothingness for a full third of the book.
Villette is probably a polarizing read: I can see that some people don't like it. It is not a neat package. It's a book that plays tricks on you. And each of the two men Lucy falls in love with subvert expectations so much that some readers will be disappointed. So don't read this for the plot--don't read it for a love story--don't read it for your favorite tropes. If you're going to read it, read it for the puzzle box character of Lucy Snowe, the girl who seems to have no feelings. Read it patiently, even though you may not like her or understand her at first. She doesn't think she has a lot to say, but she does. And if you know something about Charlotte Bronte's life and loves, so much the better.

Perhaps my Kindle highlights demonstrate at least a little of how powerful a read it is.

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Original review follows:

I went through many different feelings about this story and its central character, and even yet, I can't fix on just one impression. Lucy Snowe repelled me at first; she relates what she observes about others, and in a slightly judgmental manner, but gives no hint about herself. She is not exactly alone in the world, but the people in her life are not her friends. This isn't totally their fault: she seems unknowable.
When she needs to become self-sufficient, she alights at a girls' school to be nursemaid and later teacher. She's scarcely less thorny there. But there's an occasional thaw, a growing vividness within her. And to describe any more of the plot would be to rob the reader of the journey.

As a narrator I found Lucy Snowe to be very difficult to pin down. She's not reliable. You come to realize that she's holding back items from you that she could have shared sooner. Her estimation of the people around her is also pretty suspect, from my point of view. Do I really believe that one man is shallow, while the other is a diamond in the rough? Those Brontes and their Byronic men! Intense, broody, and moody. But always somehow irresistible.

I don't know if I'll reread this...Lucy suffers from major melancholy and fatalism, and, oh that ending--good grief, why? :|
But, anyway, the book is totally atmospheric with that touch of Gothic shiver which one expects from a Bronte, and the fact that it can make you revise your opinion about Lucy and the other characters in each volume...now that's good writing. I unwillingly loved Lucy by the end. ( )