Book #27 - Becoming Jane Eyre by Shelia Kohler

This was a book I had read about in a magazine and decided to include it as part of my challenge. The novel follows the life of Charlotte Bronte, her sisters and her writing of her most famous novel, Jane Eyre.

I don't know much about any of the Bronte sisters, other than that they were all struggling writers. This novel brings to life the hardship they faced in getting their novels published because they were women. It also uncovers the competitiveness between the sisters, albeit through Kohler's imagination and not facts. The parallels between Charlotte and her famous heroine Jane Eyre are present throughout the entire novel - her suffering, her rejection from her male companion and ultimately her success.

The story spans a period of nine years - the remarkable time during which Charlotte frees herself from obscurity and becomes one of the most celebrated writers of her day. As the reader, we follow her memories of her deadly boarding school; we see her studying and then teaching in Brussels. And we also see her home life and the tensions between her sisters. We witness the delusions of her father and the self-destructiveness of her brother. But as I was reading, I never stopped rooting for her. Despite all of the hardships that befell the Brontes, it's a satisfying moment when Charlotte eventually attains the wealth and domestic happiness she always wanted for both herself and Jane Eyre.