Edith Wharton Books

I really enjoyed this book by a former professor of mine at Michigan State University. I am not a seasoned book reviewer, but I have read a number of mysteries lately after a long stint with non-fiction, and this was a fun read. Nick is a character who isn't a super tough guy, who doesn't take himself too seriously, who doesn't burn through cliches of boot knives and emergency spare pistols taped to the underside of his car. He is a real person with real worries like tenure, his new office-mate, his relationship with his partner, and so on. There were some really funny moments surrounding the constant bickering of the two Edith Wharton factions, and I thought the author had about 5 really good ending possibilities, all of which would have made sense. Having taken two semesters from the author I can see his real-world sense of humor standing out in the book. A great read with some fun characters.

Edith who? I enjoyed this book as much as the first Nick Hoffman mystery, LET'S GET CRIMINAL. Nick and Stefan are flushed out more as characters, Nick's sarcastic wit is honed, and the overall effect is to make for a totally fun mystery. Mr. Raphael pens a story full of intriuge, "what if's", and "ut-oh's" that will delight any mystery reader. The fact that he takes broadsides at other contemporary writers is also amusing. And as for the mystery's "solution"...well, suffice it to say that Mr. Raphael does Agatha Christy proud.

Naturally I expected it was a mystery with murders in the title, but reading it felt like I'd stumbled into a literary novel about writer's Angst. One writer was so obnoxiously obsessed with jealousy and envy that I immediately rooted for her to be perpetrator or victim. A bit over 1/3 of the way into the book, there was a murder and the story evolved into a proper mystery with the appearance of a traditional character, a likeable cop, Lt. Valley, and later, Angie, a criminal justice student who helped with the detecting. Nick's pardner, Stefan, is the practical down-to-earth one. The relationship reminded me of Hall's Stanley Hastings and his wife, Alice. Alice brings Stanley down to earth from time to time, too. Thankfully, there are no details of the men's intimate relations which is as it should be. The largest number of consumers of mysteries are mature women (like me) and the majority of them abhor sex scenes, be they hetero or homo. The book's ending was a very satisfactory wrap-up.
As to Wharton, she serves as catalyst for the gathering, but we are not bombarded with biographical data. If you want more, read a biography, and if you come to southern New England, visit The Mount, Edith's beautiful home in Lenox, MA.

This is most definitely the worst mystery novel I have ever read. The characters are not two-dimentional--but one-dimentional. You will not care about anyone. There is also too much padding of incidental material, and enough red herrings to stock a Shanghai fish market. Though the lead character is supposedly gay, there is only a token gay content. He might as well be a Buddist missionary. The hero and his lover share only a Jewish ceremonial meal, all other forms of intimacy in their relationship seems to have vanished. We read mystery novels to get pleasure in discovering who dunnit before the detectives. It is impossilbe to do this when essential information is not revealed to the reader until after the culprit is caught. I feel I have wasted my time here. With an eternity of reading ahead of you, the time would still be too short to bother with this one. Read Wharton's Ethan Frome instead.

"The Edith Wharton Murders" has it all---good writing, a bright and charming amateur sleuth, and a fresh and ironic take on those well-worn groves of academe. Wait---before you groan and mutter something about "another campus mystery with cutesy cartoon characters as faculty members," give this one a try. You''ll find plenty of highly UNstereotyped profs---you probably had classes with some of them, maybe even Nick Hoffman himself. New t-shirt motto: I LUV LEV!

I thought Ethan Frome was an average book. At times though, I had to push myself to read it because I'm not really into romance novels. Edith Wharton (the Author) gives the book a lot of details at times and I think thats why I found the book to be only average. Although, I like the way that Edith Wharton brought Jotham into the story. He doesn't play a major role like Ethan, Zeena, or Mattie, but his character helped bring their house to life. The book was about a young lady who took care of Ethans mother in her last hours (Zeena) and Ethan and her begin to fall in love. The interesting twist to the story is that when Zeena begins to also have a life threatening disease, her cousin Mattie comes to live with them to help out around the house. Ethan and Mattie start to fall in love and the rest of the story takes off from there. I don't want to give away the ending because that is about the only part in the book that I actually liked and enjoyed reading.

Edith Wharton filled her novels with a feeling of ruin, passion and restriction. People can fall in love, but rarely do things turn out well.

But but few of even her books can evoke the feeling of "Ethan Frome," whick packs plenty of emotion, vibrancy and regrets into a short novella. While the claustrophobic feeling doesn't suit her writing well, she still spins a beautiful, horrifying story of a man facing a life without hope or joy.

It begins nearly a quarter of a century after the events of the novel, with an unnamed narrator watching middle-aged, crippled Ethan Frome drag himself to the post-office. He becomes interested in Frome's tragic past, and hears out his story.

Ethan Frome once hoped to live an urban, educated life, but ended up trapped in a bleak New England town with a hypochondriac wife, Zeena, whom he didn't love. But then his wife's cousin Mattie arrives, a bright young girl who understands Ethan far better than his wife ever tried to. Unsurprisingly, he begins to fall in love with her, but still feels an obligation to his wife.

But then Zeena threatens to send Mattie away and hire a new housekeeper, threatening the one bright spot in Ethan's dour life. Now Ethan must either rebel against the morals and strictures of his small village, or live out his life lonely. But when he and Mattie try for a third option, their affair ends in tragedy.

Wharton was always at her best when she wrote about society's strictures, morals, and love that defies that. But rather than the opulent backdrop of wealthy New York, here the setting is a bleak, snowy New England town, appropriately named Starkfield. It's a good reflection of Ethan Frome's life, and a good illustration of how the poor can be trapped.

Even when she describes a "ruin of a man" in a cold, distant town, Wharton spins beautiful prose ("the night was so transparent that the white house-fronts between the elms looked gray against the snow") and eloquent symbolism, like the shattered pickle dish. There's only minimal dialogue -- most of what the characters think and feel is kept inside.

Instead she piles on the atmosphere, and increases the tension between the three main characters, as attraction and responsibility pull Ethan in two directions. It all finally climaxes in the disaster hinted at in the first chapter, which is as beautifully written and wistful as it is tragic.

If the book has a flaw, it's the incredibly small cast -- mainly just the main love triangle. Ethan's not a strong or decisive man, but his desperation and loneliness are absolutely heartbreaking, as well as his final fate. Mattie seems more like a symbol of the life he wants that a full-fledged person, and Zeena is annoying and whiny up until the end, when we see a different side of her personality. Not a stereotypical shrew.

"Ethan Frome" is a true tragedy -- as beautifully written as it is, it's still Wharton's description of how a man merely survives instead of living, hopeless and devastated.

Edith Wharton is a wonderful author, but this is definitely NOT one of her better works. The story is not of her norm, and in my opinion she should have stayed with her standard story. The characters are not realistic: Mattie is perfect for Ethan, and Zeena is too overbearing and just plain evil. This book, although short, seems too long once you start reading it. Don't bother with this book.

I thought that this book was a great book. Instead of just telling the plot, Edith Wharton used a lot of symbolism to tell the story and show the characters emotions, because the point of view is that of an objective bystander. It isn't a very good book if you just want to read for plot, but if you want to read something a little deeper, it's a very interesting book.

Inside a bare Massachussetts farmhouse a century ago, a man and two women sit down to dinner. Observing the unhappy trio is a traveler, forced to take shelter with the strange family because of the blizzard that rages outside. Of the three, one is proud, stoic, and hard-bitten; one is shrewish and whiny, and one works silently at the tasks that must be done -- stoking the fire, setting the table for dinner. What brought these three to their present state, and what holds them here in this living hell? This book is an incisive character study with an unexpected ending. The portrayal of the three in the final chapter left me with chills.

A beautifully written story in which the two central female characters (Anna Leath and Sophy Viner) are alternate personas who struggle and are confined by the social order of the day. The genteel, older Anna -- whose rich interior life and deep introspection separated her -- as a young girl -- from other young women of her time who understood how to connect, particularly to potential husbands. And yet, Anna's early inability to form meaningful relationships cause other mothers of her circle to consider Anna the model of all ladylike virtues. Anna believes marriage will free her, yet it confines her. As a widow, she reaches back to the unrealized love of her early life and seeks to overcome the inhibitions of her past. Contrast that to Sophy Viner, young, vibrant and utterly naive, without the protection of family or fortune. The happiest time of her life is a brief, unwitting affair with the gentleman who was Anna's early love and who is about to return to Anna. How these three characters' lives intersect, and how they each struggle with conscience, character and social entitlement (or lack thereof) results in a thoughtful commentary on men, women and society. Wharton's beautiful prose and vivid scenes of both domestic life and nature add to the reader's experience.

I love Edith Wharton and have read many of her books, but this one is just BORING. It goes on and on and nothing ever happens. If the people in it could just be honest with each other instead of lying to try to avoid confronting difficulties the story would have been a lot better and a lot shorter. It is agonizing to read.

While "The Reef" is to my mind not on par with her other great works, it is nonetheless an entirely worthwhile read. The emotional drama is compelling, palpable, devastating. Altogether engrossing. The descriptive scenes are for the most part not as sharp as they might be, but the power of the novel lies in its dialogue-- in what is said, but more often what is not said. It concerns the inability to express in any meaningful fashion those things that most matter, the agony of non-expression as much as the agony of the primary feelings themselves. I enter, perhaps, too easily into the emotions of what are, after all, only fictional characters, but I was moved to tears by certain passages, on account of the emotional rawness that underlies the attempts to preserve decorum. A good novel, and thoroughly enjoyable.

Whatever you think of "The Reef," it contains one of Edith Wharton's most wonderful scenes. Our "hero" has been dallying for a while in a hotel with the young girl he picked up on the boat dock, and he's wearying of her. We see his boredom and disillusionment through his reactions to the mere sounds she is making in the next room. He is so familiar by now with her habits and movements that he knows what she's doing without actually seeing her. A gem of a scene, in a strange jewel of a book.

The Reef by Edith Wharton, with an introduction by Louis Auchincloss. Recommended.

In his introduction to The Reef, Louis Auchincloss notes that modern readers may not appreciate a moral climate in which a woman opposes her stepson's engagement to a girl who has had an affair with the man the woman is about to marry. The Reef, however, is as concerned with morality as with class.

On his way to France to see his beloved, the widowed Anna Leath, George Darrow receives a telegram telling him not to come "till thirtieth" due to "unexpected obstacle." As time passes and he doesn't receive an explanation for the delay, he experiences growing feelings of disappointment and humiliation. At one point, he imagines the umbrellas and elbows of his fellow travelers saying, "She doesn't want you, doesn't want you, doesn't want you."

As he waits undetermined as to whether to go back to London or to press forward, he encounters Sophy Viner, a recently unemployed servant of a woman whose dinners he once attended. She is on her way to Paris to look up old friends and to pursue a theatrical career. Darrow, who feels sorry for himself and the loss he thinks he is about to suffer, finds himself manipulating Sophy into staying with him to attend the theatre and finally into a short liaison. He is unaware that she has fallen in love with him and his kindness in her hour of uncertainty.

A year later, Anna Leath eagerly anticipates Darrow's arrival, for they are to be married and begin an overseas stint as part of his diplomatic career. She is also excited because her stepson, Owen Leath, wants to do something that they know will upset his aristocratic, old-fashioned grandmother; he wants to marry Anna's daughter's governess, who is none other than Sophy Viner.

Darrow and Sophy's secret is safe with one another, yet Darrow is faced by the uncomfortable fact that the ignorant Anna wants him to support Owen's choice of a woman he knows to be unsuitable but whom he pities. He tries to convince Sophy that Owen is not right for her. "You'd rather I didn't marry any friend of yours," she says "not as a question, but as a mere dispassionate statement of fact." Darrow's lack of feeling and poor conduct make Sophy an undesirable wife for Owen. She is a painful reminder that both of them have broken social conventions.

Auchincloss calls Sophy a "fallen woman" in the context of the times, but this is too simplistic. The real issue with Sophy, both before and after Anna finds out about her relationship with Darrow, is her class and lack of social background. After all, in The House of Mirth, extramarital liaisons are commonplace, understood, and accepted if they are discreet and do not upset the social balance. Within the correct parameters, such affairs become a comfortable topic of gossip and speculation.

Once Anna has finally divined that there has been something between Darrow and Sophy beyond the casual acquaintance previously admitted, he acknowledges it by saying simply, "She has given me up." This does not refer to Sophy's feelings, but to her expectations. Sophy has learned that, in the world she inhabits, the Darrows seek temporary solace from the Sophys, but permanence and stability from the Annas.

The issue that Anna keeps returning to is not that Darrow has deeper feelings for Sophy, but that Sophy has been there before, whether it is to the theatre with Darrow or in Darrow's arms--. True, the liaison happened while he was on his way to Anna and she is bothered by that, but it does not dwell so much in her thoughts as that the kiss he places on her neck has also landed on Sophy's-and that Sophy has been even more intimate with him than she has. Anna asks Darrow, "Do such things happen to men often?" (phrased passively, as though Darrow had been the pursued rather than the pursuer). "I don't know what happens to other men. Such a thing never happened to me . . ." The "thing" here is not the physical aspect of the relationship. Even the "fine" Anna knows that he has indulged because one of his relationships, with a mutual acquaintance named Kitty, drove her away from him in their youth. The fact is that this relationship is outside their social sphere and reflects a lack of discretion that may make him an unsuitable husband and stepparent.

Sophy, with her finely tuned perceptions, her delicacy, her generosity, and her genuine feelings (Darrow assures Anna that she is no adventuress, which Anna wants her to be), does not deserve her fate. She goes off to India to return to the service of Mrs. Murrett. In one of the weaknesses of The Reef, Anna's encounter with Sophy's fat, frowsy, common sister and her equally common lover, Jimmy Brance, puts the noble Sophy in her proper place for both Anna and the reader.

The Reef is in shallower waters than The House of Mirth or The Age of Innocence, and its structure is weakened by a forced reliance on dialogue. A large part of the final third consists of various characters talking to Anna in her room, coming and going what may as well be a revolving door. Sophy's fate further weakens the drama. Yet, who but Wharton could write, "Her frugal silence mocked his prodigality of hopes and fears"? Such elegant prose and insights alone distinguish The Reef.

(As an aside, it would be interesting if, in the same fashion Jean Rhys gave Bertha Mason from Jane Eyre "a life," a writer were to do the same for Sophy, whose viewpoint is never shown.)

Diane L. Schirf, 7 July 2003.

Be careful if you are thinking of buying this book. It is not a book of letters, as advertised, but a short story by Wharton called The Letters. I ordered it, realized their mistake, e-mailed them about it, and returned the book. I was given a refund, but Amazon has not changed the description of this book despite my warning. I understand that Amazon has thousands of books, but I really think it should be a priority to make sure the right information is matched up with the right book.

Although many of the lines contained in these letters have been well publicized for years, never before have Wharton's private and business correspondences been so collectively accessible. Interesting enough for their biographic aspects, the letters are also wonderful companion pieces to Wharton's books, particularly A BACKWARD GLANCE, THE AGE OF INNOCENCE, and THE HOUSE OF MIRTH.

This book contains about 400 of Wharton's letters, out of about 4,000 extant. It is a careful selection, including "major" letters that are often quoted, and for the first time (other than in a small university publication), a substantial portion of her correspondence with Morton Fullerton, with whom she had an affair while in her mid-40s. That particular correspondence did not surface until the 1980s, and added an entirely new perspective on Wharton's life and work. Unfortunately, nearly all of her correspondence with two of her greatest friends, Henry James and Walter Berry, did not survive, and the absence is felt. I applaud the editors (one of whom wrote a Pulitzer prize winning bio of Wharton) for a selection that is very readable and never trite or repetitive (a big problem when dealing with letters in their entirety). Reading the letters after having read the bio, I found they added to my understanding of Wharton as a person and a writer.

I read this book and also saw the TV movie a few years ago. I enjoyed the book very much. Very well written and I liked the ending as I couldn't see Annabelle with the stiff Duke. She belonged with Guy and they made a very adorable couple. In the movie , they changed some aspects of the book but it was still great. I recommend this book very much and the author who took over the ending due to the death of Edith Wharton did a commendable job. Well done.

It's a shame that Marion Mainwaring took such liberties with Edith Whartons style The closing of her stories was always in another direction. And usually not a happy one.
Edith had she lived, I believe would have had the Brief Love Affair between Guy and Annibel end at Laura Testvalleys family home with a sad but brief good-bye; Annibel to Amrerica and Guy to where ever. Laura succeeds in achieving a safe harbour for her well deserved ending. And the Duke is still the Duke and that's bad enough. This ending was unfitting a good storyteller as Edith Wharton was.

"Italian Backgrounds" by Edith Wharton is a somewhat charming travel book (a quick read) about her time in Italy as its veteran traveler. The piece is not written in a narrative, but is rather more thematically arranged. Wharton doesn't write about the Doges Palace or the Duomo, her milieu is the deeper background of the dedicated traveler.

The title comes from her theme derived from an analogy that traveling in Italy involves various areas of a painting. Italian paintings, she writes, have fore- middle- and backgrounds. The two-or three-day tourist in Venice spends all his or her time in the foreground, traipsing the well-established routes and keeping to the guidebooks. If one has more time, one can go farther into the "painting" by discovering more, and, of course, finally, as Wharton herself has done, one can dwell in the backgrounds, knowing the country well, understanding all its eras and its different brands of beauty.

Wharton is a harsh art critic, and much of the book deals with her assessments of lesser known (to me as the foreground tourist of Italy) artists and their works. My favorite chapter retold the story of her identifying some mislabeled statuary in Tuscany as belonging to a different artist and era altogether.

It was pleasant to read. For me, I am a fan of Wharton, so enjoyed this look into her experiences and the life of her mind.

Italian Backgrounds is comprised of nine, loosely coupled travel essays written by Edith Wharton over a four year period (1901-1904). Few readers are likely to possess her remarkable knowledge of Italian paintings, murals, frescoes, sculpture, and architecture, and in the hands of a lesser writer, these essays might easily have become tedious and overly detailed. Wharton's essays achieve a singular balance between scholarly analysis and captivating memoir.

Italian Backgrounds begins not in Italy, but at a small alpine posting-inn in Switzerland close to the Italian border. She contrasts a picturesque "toy chalet, with its air of self-conscious neatness" with the untidiness of nearby Italian villages. Despite this negative comparison, with little effort Wharton convinces us that we must take the dusty, windy road downward into that land where church steeples become campanili, liberated vines wrap themselves around mulberry trees, and far off across the hot plains domes and spires, painted walls, and sculptured alters await us.

Italian Backgrounds is not a conventional travel book. Edith Wharton's discursive essays are not arranged geographically, nor chronologically. The chapters could be read in any sequence with little loss of continuity. They might compare favorably with an extensive mural, one that draws your attention first here, then there, then elsewhere.

Despite the passage of 100 years, Italian Backgrounds should be mandatory reading to anyone planning to visit Italy, especially those with aspirations to write travel essays. Likewise, Italian Backgrounds would be ideal supplementary reading for a general art appreciation class, as well as targeted reading for art and history majors.

The chapters are titled An Alpine Posting-Inn, A Midsummer Week's Dream, The Sanctuaries of the Pennine Alps, What the Hermits Saw, A Tuscan Shrine, Sub Umbra Liliorum, March in Italy, Picturesque Milan, and Italian Backgrounds.

Ecco Travels specializes in re-publishing rare and hard-to-obtain travel writings by exceptional authors like Henry James, Charles Dickens, Andre Gide, Freya Stark, Augustus Hare, Aldous Huxley, V. S. Pritchett, Evelyn Waugh, and Edith Wharton.

It's been along while since I read this book but after the negative review, I must read again.
I remember her descriptions of Morocco and the people being quite fascinating but I don't remember them being racist......maybe, this world of Moroc was so far from the culture she was accustomed. Maybe this book encouraged people to visit and find out for themselves. I loved Morocco and it's people, but I also enjoyed the book back then.
Moroc was the most exciting place I had been as of 2000.
Maybe, we've come a long way, Baby! Let's only hope!

Fans of Edith Wharton who are hoping to see her usual insightful wit will be disappointed with this book. Likewise will those hoping to learn something about the real Morocco. Instead, what this book provides is a fascinatingly nauseating example of racist, orientalist cliches: the eroticization, the emphasis on mystery, decreptitude, etc. One classic bit is the description of the souks full of "savages" "consumptive Jews" and "lusty slave girls." But my favorite is when a windstorm in the Djmaa el Fnaa suddenly appears, "stripping to the waist the slave girls scudding home to the souks." There are some peculiar twists to her vision of Morocco, but I won't go further because I'm hoping to publish my paper on this subject sometime in the near future. Buy this book if you are interested in such things. But first read Said's Orientalism, if this stuff is new to you. If you are planning to travel to Morocco, buy the Rough Guide and Culture Shock: Morocco.

This delightful little volume is a compilation of articles written for American troops bound for France in World War One. While their effect on the average doughboy may be questionable, they give a powerful and invaluable insight into one of the most perceptive minds of the age.
Wharton, in her most engaging and always readable style, discusses First Impressions, and examines issues of Reverence, Taste, Intellectual Honesty, and Continuity, and, in her essay on the New Frenchwoman, reveals perhaps more about herself than her subjects.
Highly recommended as a fine introduction to the author.

(The numerical rating above is an ineradicable default setting within the format of the site. This reviewer does nor employ numerical ratings).

It's important to know that this edition (Publisher: Kessinger Publishing, LLC (April 10, 2007)) is a bound photocopy. That is, it has an ordinary softcover binding, but most of the pages are blurry photocopies of the original edition. (All of this is explained in a note at the start of the book, but is not mentioned in the ordering information.)

The background of the pages is dark, dotted gray and the print is not clear. Many of the pages also have underlining and notes (that is, the original pages that were photocopied have these marks). The dark gray background affects about three fourths of the pages; perhaps half the pages are marked with underlines or comments.

Needless to say, all of this affects the book's value. Most of the book is physically hard to read because of these problems, which are not (currently) mentioned in the book's description information.

My one star is for the physical problems with this particular edition, not the contents of the book itself. (Unfortunately, Amazon doesn't have any way to differentiate between them.) The book is hard to find and people who are interested in it may well be willing to put up with the ugly physical presentation in order to get an affordable copy, but you should be informed before you buy it that for reading purposes this isn't any better than a bad fax or photocopy of a real book.

Edith Wharton was a very observant writer and a great novelist. Her observations on the French in most cases are right on target. However, people traveling to France for work or pleasure need to understand that she is writing about a France in the early part of the 20th centur before and during World War I. When a person writes about a culture there observations only pertain to that particular time and that particular place. Another, thing to rember she is also writes about upper-class french life, which is a problem I find with almost all books on the French. Other then those two critices this is a very entertaining and insightful book on the French.

On parting coment, remeber that when someone writes about a diffrent culture they are using generalizations that may be true of the culture but not everyone in it.

Wharton's Worst Novel Yet! Paul Miller Senior Book Reviewer -------------------- Ethan Frome is by far, Edith Whartons worst novel so far. Edith Wharton lived a very dull life, which has obviously rubbed off on her work. She grew up in a lifeless New England town, which may be why this story takes place in a fictitious New England town, Starkfield. It's a stretched novel about a married man named Ethan Frome, who falls in love with his wives cousin. The plot of this book is nothing new. A married man falling in love with another woman. Ethan Frome slowly falls in love with his wives cousin, Mattie Silver. Mattie is working as a maid for Ethan and his wife, Zeena, because Zeena is ill, and needs a little help. The plot takes lifeless turns. Just when the reader thinks something good is going to happen, it just dies off, and becomes a forgotten part of the book. This plot could have been written in a paragraph. Had Wharton given the plot a few twists, maybe it could have been readable. Just like the life of Edith Whorton, the characters a very boring. The story is told by Ethan himself, which was not a good thing. He told it from his point of view, and that alone. From the main characters, to the minor characters that popped up here and there, none had a good story to tell. Finally, another weak point that every modern reader will notice, is Whartons boring writing style. Though she uses heavy detail (without which, this novel would have been 10 pages long), it is no fun to read. She is able to keep one point on focus, unlike other authors who drift from the point, however, it become tedious after awhile. To conclude my review of this book, I'd have to say the most exciting part was turning the pages. I found myself falling asleep quiet often while reading this book. Though other reviews have named it a classic, there are definitely much, much better books out there. Ethan Frome - By Edith Wharton (½* out of *****)

Ethan Frome is considered by many to be Edith Wharton's best work, although it is not in keeping with her traditional style. It is a melancholy story of a pathetic man in love with a woman who cannot have. This is an amazing tragedy full of hopelessness and despair. Though it is not a happy Reader's Digest story, it is one of the best tragedies I have read.

House of Mirth, though not as famous as Ethan Frome, is more representative of her writing. This is the tale of a young woman who, though she is used to high society New York, finds herself without money and who struggles to stay on top. Wharton is at her best in this novel, utilizing her peircing sarcasm and satiric wit. This was a great read.

Edith Wharton has written two books worthy of being read by everyone, "The Age of Innocence" and "A Motor-Fight Through France." Ms. Wharton was a wealthy New Yorker and in a day when most could not afford to do so (before WWI) she set out by automobile with her husband and her friend Henry James to tour the French countryside. This might not seem a "big deal" today, but visualize a country where one could only travel by train and out of the way places were inaccessible except by wagon or oxcart.

The book contains descriptions of several trips. One trip takes the reader in a big swoop from northern France to southern France and back. She visits the home of Madam Dudevant (George Sand) and a number of churches and other buildings of historic interest. There are only a few old photographs in the book, so one might need to consult another source to fully enjoy her descriptions of various places. I've taken a few courses on French arcitecture and visted France several times and I still had to consult other books--but it's worth it. Some of the French countryside has been altered and some of the older places are gone. The most memorable visits are to Nohant, home of George Sand. It is obvious Ms. Wharton considered Sand a spiritual mentor.

In her other books and articles, Ms. Wharton covered Spain, Italy and points of interest in the Mediterranean. She later visited the front during WWI and became a war correspondent for an American newspaper. This book covers the halcyon days before the carnage when the world was younger and more innocent.

A book of this title ought to be about the wind rushing through one's hair as the countryside flashes past. Instead we read only a tedious & obsessive account of church architecture, which renders the book's title extraordinarily misleading. It puzzles me how a writer with such immense human understanding can write a travel book with absolutely no mention of any encounter another human being; either native Frenchmen or her fellow traveller, Henry James. She wasn't to know this since cars were such new technology, but travel in cars cannot do otherwise than totally seal off the traveller from his environment. This was a huge and sadly missed opportunity to describe travel at the dawn of the motoring era: before traffic jams, before towns bordered by terrible bland industrial parks and out of town shopping malls, before ring roads, freeways, and ubiquitous Macdonalds.