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A review by ellingtonfeint
The Shuttle by Frances Hodgson Burnett
4.0
DAMMIT I JUST LOST THE WHOLE THING STUID KEYBOARD EW
Ok SO. Let's summerise what I was up to for lack of ability to do anything else at this point.
Betty: The best and most noble girl, a queenly bearing and an American head for business.
Mount Dunstan: A strong, proud man, with a bad family who left him with nothing but a bad reputation and a ruining house.
Together: They make the most impressive and magnificent couple to ever tread the earth.
Their Obstacle: His pride and her money.
The other main plot: Betty comes to save her sister from her dispicable husband.
Rosy: Has been crushed and imprisoned by her awful husband (more on him later) but was and can be again a loving beautiful trusting girl.
Side Characters: Ughtred, what a name! Rosy's son who found himself born into a terrible situation requiring him to grow up almost as soon as he was born.
G. Selden, the typewriter salesuuuuman who becomes the string drawing them all together.
Mr Penzance, Mount Dunstan's personal friend turned prophet.
The villagers; Mrs Welden, Old Doby, Kedgers, Betty's relationship with them and her businesslike care of them all is lovely. Betty was born to look after and run a small English village.
The Villian: Sir Nigel Anstruthers. Boy have I got a lot to say about him.
At first he was the perfect villain to love to hate, but as the story progressed he became little better than a lunatic, driven out of his own mind by his selfish desires and schemes which he was so confident in but which were baulked at at every turn. In the beginning his motivation was greed for the millions his wife's family had and his plan was to dominate her and crush her till she gave it all to him. but later, ten years later, his wife's allowance was under his control being squandered, and Betty arrives.
At this point the psychological war begins. But rather than two strong minds warring, we have a desperate, delusional mind, going mad as his schemes get deeper and deeper and yet don't fully work, and a young, strong mind, which is clear and backed by logic.
So rather than Sir Nigel being a villain with a clear motivation, he simply disintegrates into a madman, so that he is pitiable rather than the cold terrifying villain he started out as. He never manages to pull himself out of the abyss, but, proud in his own way, he continues in his own path, determined to succeed until the bitter end.
and although as a madman he is dangerous with the danger of a obsessed unreasoning mind, he is not unbeatable since his mind is at that point, not capable of the clear scheming that he would need to conquer Betty, not that anyone could.
Conclusion: So that's that. I would read this book again for Betty and Rosy and Mount Dunstan and the Village and the heroics and the Garden and the nobilty of the whole occasion. I would not read it again for the sake of a well done victory over the villain because of the reasons stated above. Actually I'm a little annoyed that Sir Nigel took up such a big part of this review when he was so annoying and this book was so good!
Ok SO. Let's summerise what I was up to for lack of ability to do anything else at this point.
Betty: The best and most noble girl, a queenly bearing and an American head for business.
Mount Dunstan: A strong, proud man, with a bad family who left him with nothing but a bad reputation and a ruining house.
Together: They make the most impressive and magnificent couple to ever tread the earth.
Their Obstacle: His pride and her money.
The other main plot: Betty comes to save her sister from her dispicable husband.
Rosy: Has been crushed and imprisoned by her awful husband (more on him later) but was and can be again a loving beautiful trusting girl.
Side Characters: Ughtred, what a name! Rosy's son who found himself born into a terrible situation requiring him to grow up almost as soon as he was born.
G. Selden, the typewriter salesuuuuman who becomes the string drawing them all together.
Mr Penzance, Mount Dunstan's personal friend turned prophet.
The villagers; Mrs Welden, Old Doby, Kedgers, Betty's relationship with them and her businesslike care of them all is lovely. Betty was born to look after and run a small English village.
The Villian: Sir Nigel Anstruthers. Boy have I got a lot to say about him.
At first he was the perfect villain to love to hate, but as the story progressed he became little better than a lunatic, driven out of his own mind by his selfish desires and schemes which he was so confident in but which were baulked at at every turn. In the beginning his motivation was greed for the millions his wife's family had and his plan was to dominate her and crush her till she gave it all to him. but later, ten years later, his wife's allowance was under his control being squandered, and Betty arrives.
At this point the psychological war begins. But rather than two strong minds warring, we have a desperate, delusional mind, going mad as his schemes get deeper and deeper and yet don't fully work, and a young, strong mind, which is clear and backed by logic.
So rather than Sir Nigel being a villain with a clear motivation, he simply disintegrates into a madman, so that he is pitiable rather than the cold terrifying villain he started out as. He never manages to pull himself out of the abyss, but, proud in his own way, he continues in his own path, determined to succeed until the bitter end.
and although as a madman he is dangerous with the danger of a obsessed unreasoning mind, he is not unbeatable since his mind is at that point, not capable of the clear scheming that he would need to conquer Betty, not that anyone could.
Conclusion: So that's that. I would read this book again for Betty and Rosy and Mount Dunstan and the Village and the heroics and the Garden and the nobilty of the whole occasion. I would not read it again for the sake of a well done victory over the villain because of the reasons stated above. Actually I'm a little annoyed that Sir Nigel took up such a big part of this review when he was so annoying and this book was so good!