It's Wednesday, I'm in Love...

Image from here.

It's Wednesday!  So that means we're already in the middle of the week, Hump Day, if you will.  Everyone needs a little pick-me-up around this time, right?  We decided that to help us get through the week we would share our favorite fictional love stories.  It can be a favorite of all time or from the book you're currently reading.  As long as it involves love, come on over and share!

Monica’s Choice

Since I just finished Rebecca and it’s still fresh on my mind, I’ll go with Maxim and the 2nd Mrs. de Winter.  I wasn’t so sure about their romance for most of the book, but by the end and after a hefty revelation, a flip was switched and there was a new passion between the two of them.  I was satisfied the book ended where it did but I would have loved to see their relationship progress even more.  Especially picturing the handsome Laurence Olivier and the beautiful Joan Fontaine from the 1940 film adaptation.  Swoon. Worthy.

  

Lindsey’s Choice
Imagine a life where love does not exist.  With the absense of love there is also the absense of hate.  No hate in the world is a good thing, right?
That is the goal of the United Stetes in the book Delirium.  Love is a disease, one that they are working to eradicate.  Love is a weakness.  It is an emotion that cannot be controlled.  People die in the name of love.  So why not end the pain that love can create?
Lena is less than 90 days away from getting the disease removed from her body.  She can't wait to get rid of it, but there is another part of her that is starting to realize she wants to love.
There are times in everyone's lives that I am sure they would love (haha) to get rid of the pain that love can cause.  But what would you do if that were actually possible?  Would you be happy?  Isn't happiness just a branch from the tree of love?  What would we really loose by taking love away?

Julianne’s Choice

Who is your favorite couple in love this week?

Rebecca Review

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

4 Stars

Synopsis:

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again ... With these words the reader is ushered into an isolated gray stone manse on the windswept Cornish coast, as the second Mrs. Maxim de Winter recalls the chilling events that transpired as she began her new life as the young bride of a husband she barely knew. For in every corner of every room in the immense, foreboding estate were phantoms of a time dead but not forgotten — a past devotedly preserved by the sinister housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers: a suite immaculate and untouched, clothing laid out and ready to be worn, but not by any of the great house's current occupants. And with an eerie presentiment of evil tightening her heart, the second Mrs. de Winter walked in the shadow of her mysterious predecessor, determined to uncover the darkest secrets and shattering truths about Maxim's first wife — the late and hauntingly beautiful Rebecca.

<Review:</>

I really liked this novel.  I loved the haunting mystery that followed the second Mrs. de Winter around every corner and even in her own mind.  She obsesses over her new husband’s first wife and all the ways she doesn’t add up to this ghost of a woman.  At first, Mrs. de Winter, her first name is never revealed, seems whiney and very sulky.  I had a hard time connecting to her at first, although I did enjoy the story she told.  I could feel the same repulsion she felt concerning Favell and Mrs. Danvers.  I got the creeps when she did, upon entering the untouched West wing. Towards the late part of the middle, the second Mrs. de Winter started to find her voice and her strength.  And that’s when the story starts to get really good.

There are so many twists in turns in this book that caught me off guard, and in a good way.  I thought I had the whole story figured out, but I was way wrong.  The end is suspenseful and full of jaw-dropping revelations.  You’ll be sitting on the edge of your seat well after you’ve finished the last sentence.   

--monica