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A Countess Below Stairs

3.83 of 5 stars 3.83 · rating details · 9,777 ratings · 1,174 reviews

After the Russian revolution turns her world topsy-turvy, Anna, a young Russian Countess, has no choice but to flee to England. Penniless, Anna hides her aristocratic background and takes a job as servant in the household of the esteemed Westerholme family, armed only with an outdated housekeeping manual and sheer determination.

Desperate to keep her past a secret, Anna is...more

Paperback, 383 pages

Published May 10th 2007 by Speak (first published May 10th 1981)

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Nov 13, 2012 Jennifer Wardrip rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: trt-posted-reviews

Reviewed by Amber Gibson for TeensReadToo.com

Anna Grazinsky is a member of the Russian aristocracy, or White Russians, during the Russian Revolution. Her family is forced to flee from their comfortable life in Russia to England, where they are safe from the revolutionaries. But in England, the Grazinskys are left with nothing. Anna has a very resilient spirit, and instead of moping around and wishing for her old life, she is grateful for the safety of her family and secretly takes a job as a mai...more Reviewed by Amber Gibson for TeensReadToo.com

Anna Grazinsky is a member of the Russian aristocracy, or White Russians, during the Russian Revolution. Her family is forced to flee from their comfortable life in Russia to England, where they are safe from the revolutionaries. But in England, the Grazinskys are left with nothing. Anna has a very resilient spirit, and instead of moping around and wishing for her old life, she is grateful for the safety of her family and secretly takes a job as a maid so that her little brother can still attend school. With her take-charge attitude, Anna proves that not all rich girls are snobby brats, like modern heiresses lead us to believe.

While many of the servants at the Westerholme residence are skeptical of the new foreign girl, Anna quickly charms her way into their hearts. With her deep curtsies, bright smile, and cheerful demeanor, Anna is beloved by all. She does each task assigned to her as best she can, never slacking on the job.

When the young and handsome Earl of Westerholme returns home from World War I, Anna is immediately drawn to him. And it seems that he feels a similar attraction to her. But Anna's identity as a countess is still a secret, and she does not have the social standing that she once held in Russia. Plus, the Earl is already engaged to the beautiful but vicious Muriel Hardwicke. Muriel nursed Earl Rupert back to health when he was wounded in the war, and he proposed to her. But that was before he met Anna.

In the weeks leading up to the wedding, Muriel begins to take over the Westerholme household, arbitrarily firing servants that do not fit in with her vision for Westerholme. None of the servants or neighbors are fond of Muriel, and as the wedding date approaches, all of Rupert's friends and family are leery of the impending marriage.

At the costume ball thrown prior to the wedding, Anna's true identity as a countess is revealed, and Anna and Rupert dance the night away. Everyone can see that they are a perfect couple, but can Rupert and Anna come to terms with their feelings for each other before his marriage to Muriel?

Although A COUNTESS BELOW STAIRS has a very fairytale-like romantic plot, Anna is far from the typical princess. She has a feisty spirit and genuinely fun personality that immediately draws you in. Eva Ibbotson does a great job in breathing life into the generic fairytale plot. Anna's story is very similar to what much of the Russian aristocracy experienced during the communist revolution, and Ibbotson shows that even though life is unpredictable and rarely kind, if you embrace all opportunities and make the most of your situation, you will find happiness. (less)

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Nov 02, 2008 Claire Scott rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: historical-fiction, middle-grade, ya

I love Eva Ibbotson, and I nearly always think her characters are delightful and her stories lovely. That was true for this book as well. I frequently recommend her books to my enthusiastic readers and to parents reading aloud with their elementary-aged children. She's my favorite of all the authors I've discovered in the last few years.

But I couldn't help my stomach churning at the unnecessarily nasty descriptions of the unpleasant family, the Herrings... these descriptions depended almost com...more I love Eva Ibbotson, and I nearly always think her characters are delightful and her stories lovely. That was true for this book as well. I frequently recommend her books to my enthusiastic readers and to parents reading aloud with their elementary-aged children. She's my favorite of all the authors I've discovered in the last few years.

But I couldn't help my stomach churning at the unnecessarily nasty descriptions of the unpleasant family, the Herrings... these descriptions depended almost completely on their fatness as a symbol of their stupidity, squalor, and generally disgusting natures. I mean, jeez, Ms. Ibbotson. Here's an example from the first time we meet them:

Melvyn sighed and looked at his obese and pallid offspring, sitting on either side of the sticky kitchen table reading comics. Donald was methodically sucking a long black stick of licorice into his mouth. Dennis was licking at a dribbling bar of toffee. Like certain caterpillars whose short lives are dedicated to simply achieving the maximum possible increase in size, the twins seem to have done nothing but eat and burst out of their clothes since they were born. Watching them, Melvyn had to abandon another of his half-formed schemes -- that of smuggling them to Mersham in a cello case in the guard's van. Even a doublebass case would not take mor than half of either of his sons..."

That's fully a quarter of their first entrance in the book, as they're minor characters. The next time they intrude on the book, for two pages many chapters later, we get:

Melvyn rose and opened the door of the adjoining room. Owing to an unfortunate spot of bother with the sheriffs, the twins were sleeping in a mattress on the floor. Dennis was lying on his back; his full-lipped mouth hung open and, as he breathed, the mucus in his nose bubbled softly like soup. Beside him lay Donald, apparently overcome by sleep in the act of eating a dripping sandwich, the dismembered remains of which lay smeared across his face.
Melvyn stood looking down at the swollen cheeks, the pendulous chins and bulging arms of his offspring and his fatherhood, never a sturdy plant, withered and died.
"Meat," he said wearily to himself. "That's all they are. Just blobs of meat."

And in fact, that's what the author has made them to be, for these are the only descriptions of their characters that we get. They're thoroughly, effectively, dehumanized; and they're children! We haven't seen them doing anything cruel, even anything stupid, and yet we know that these twins are both revolting and to blame for their miserable state. Their fatness isn't just a trait: it's a moral failing, a character flaw, and symbolic of their general nastiness and lack of worth compared to other children in the book.

I thought these descriptions were simply hateful and cruel. I mean, my goodness, how many fat readers of all ages do you know? I'm one, and so are some of my diverse group of dedicated readers at my school. How much do they deserve to come across this on top of all the other body-hating junk that gets thrown at them, from school "pinch tests" to Seventeen magazine? And how valuable is it for other kids to hear one more throwaway remark that fat kids are lazy, smelly, and eat all the time? In other generations, my students might have had to read the above sort of paragraph with "savage" characters of color whose race stood in for character flaws.

The difference is that those casually racist descriptions are now generally recognized, if not debated and discussed, by teachers, librarians, and readers. Does that mean that we keep copies of those books out of kids' hands? Of course not. But we do give kids the tools to look critically at those descriptions and recognize them as dated and ignorant, and the culture has changed to the extent that they can spot them independently. Unfortunately, the fat-hating powers of our cultures are still going strong on the widely held belief that fat is unpleasant at best and a moral flaw at worst... and I haven't found many texts that counteract this kind of ignorance. I just wish an author I respect hadn't perpetuated it so unnecessarily.

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Jan 14, 2008 Rachel Romeo rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: romance

This is a good romance novel without being too mushy, or containing a lot of raunchy scenes. It's about how a young Russian Countess flees to England after the Russian Revolution and earns her keep as a servant for a wealthy family. She tries to keep her past from her employers and their very attractive son, the Earl of Westerholme who is engaged to be married. His future wife believes in the science of Eugenics and only in procreating "the perfect species." Needless to say, there is an attracti...more

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Nov 07, 2010 Chandra rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010_reads, historical-fiction, kids-young-adult, love-romance

Anna Grazinsky is a young Russian countess forced to flee her home country during the Russian Revolution. Once in England the spirited young lady nobly takes a position as a servant to earn money for her newly impoverished family. It doesn’t take long for Anna to charm her fellow servants, as well as the noble family 'above stairs' – including the dashing young Earl of Westerholme. Too bad he’s already engaged to the gorgeous and wealthy heiress Muriel Hardwicke. Beyond the obvious love triangle...more

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Aug 06, 2008 Fiona rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: childrens-and-young-adult, given-away, bought-new

With Eva Ibbotson, you can expect one thing: A fluffy feel-good read. I don't usually like fluffy reads, with Ibbotson I make an exception.

The good guys are always perfect, golden-hued flawless people who are gorgeous. The bad guys are usually horrible but never really truly evil. Everyone gets their happy ending.

That is what you get with Eva Ibbotson. She does it in the more forgiveable way. Each of her books are layered with cultural tit-bits, mostly musical. Many of her YA stories usually inv...more

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May 05, 2008 Cassie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fairytale, bookwyrm_chrysalis_reviews

This book was one of those predictable, fluffy books that is still somehow a charm to read because of the language and characters. The heroine is too good, the rival is too evil and silly, but I found myself enjoying every page anyway. The portrayal of Russian royalty on the run from the Russian Revolution is absolutely believable, and Ibbotson’s descriptions make the world come alive. Russian history and culture are things I never really studied, but have always been interested in, so I found t...more This book was one of those predictable, fluffy books that is still somehow a charm to read because of the language and characters. The heroine is too good, the rival is too evil and silly, but I found myself enjoying every page anyway. The portrayal of Russian royalty on the run from the Russian Revolution is absolutely believable, and Ibbotson’s descriptions make the world come alive. Russian history and culture are things I never really studied, but have always been interested in, so I found the book fascinating on that factor alone.

A cozy book, A Countess Below Stairs is rather predictable and will appeal to readers of Meg Cabot and Sharon Shinn. Setting and descriptions will draw the reader away for a few hours as they are immersed in post WWI England and the manor house’s society. Plotwise, this book is nothing extraordinary, a fairytale mixed with reality, and it’s not a fantasy book in the most pure sense. It’s more along the lines of Ever After or Just Ella – explaining a classic fairytale with how it could have happened in a world without obvious magic.

Anna is an adorable character, and you could never wish her ill will, but she also strikes me as a little too good. A few of the characters love to talk about her glowing aura, and Anna is set up as the kind of person you only meet once or twice in your life, the kind of girl so utterly nice that you can’t help but dislike her because you look so horrible in comparison. Other reviewers describe her as feisty, but I simply can’t see where they would get that from. She just accepts everything that happens and moves on with her life, whether it’s in a palace or servants’ quarters. A bit too much like Disney’s Cinderella for me to truly care about her.

My biggest problems with this book were its predictable nature (sometimes it was a bit too obvious) and the main villainess, Muriel, the fiancée. Now, I think she could have been a believable character, and the motivation of eugenics and wanting to create a perfect world could have worked, yet there was no reason to empathize with her, and I didn’t feel the reader could find a common ground with her or her beliefs. Petty and jealous, the villainess was set up to be the exact opposite of the heroine, but not in a well developed way. It’s just another love triangle where there is only one obvious choice and the hero/ine spends waay too much time debating over a choice they will obviously make in the end without regret. As much as it can frustrate me, I really love a book that sets up a believable love triangle. Nothing is coming to mind though, except the musical Wicked.

Read the rest of my review at Bookwyrm Chrysalis
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Mar 20, 2008 Angie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: good-uns, ya

What wordy, frothy fun Ibbotson's books are. Perfect going on a trip books. In fact, reading them makes me wish I was going somewhere, as her heroines always seem to be off somewhere new and exciting and exotic. But since I am not going anywhere (exotic or otherwise) in the near future, getting lost in them has proved a wonderful balm for my It's mid-March and Still Snowing blues.

Anna is a Russian countess whose family is forced to flee their wealth and their home after her father is killed in t...more What wordy, frothy fun Ibbotson's books are. Perfect going on a trip books. In fact, reading them makes me wish I was going somewhere, as her heroines always seem to be off somewhere new and exciting and exotic. But since I am not going anywhere (exotic or otherwise) in the near future, getting lost in them has proved a wonderful balm for my It's mid-March and Still Snowing blues.

Anna is a Russian countess whose family is forced to flee their wealth and their home after her father is killed in the Russian Revolution. Completely displaced, living in a flat in London with her former governess, she determines to support her ailing mother and younger brother by taking a job as a maid at the country estate of the Earl of Westerholme. Rupert, the young Earl, is recently home from the war, wounded and desperately trying to save the destitute estate he didn't want to inherit in the first place. You see, he promised his older brother just before he died that he would do anything in his power to keep the old place afloat. Ah, those pesky deathbed promises. They always come back to haunt you...

To avoid selling, Rupert proposes to a beautiful, very wealthy nurse he meets while recovering in hospital. Muriel is gorgeous, rich, and oh, just by the way, a passionate believer in eugenics--the philosophy of selective breeding in order to achieve a master race. That's right. The woman is Evil Incarnate and Poor Rupert doesn't know! As Muriel sinks her claws deeper and deeper into Westerholme, attempting to dispose of all of its lovely, offbeat, misfit inhabitants, Rupert and Anna strike up a friendship. Not fooled for a second by her maid disguise, Rupert is struck by how much Anna seems to love his home and family, how different it all looks when seen through her eyes. And, indeed, everyone from the other servants to the Earl's giant hound is enamored of Anna. But the path gets thornier and thornier as the wedding draws closer and pride and honor get in the way of everyone's happiness.

Ibbotson's books remind me of a cross between Anne of Green Gables and Jane Eyre, with a dash of Mary Stewart thrown in for good measure. A Countess Below Stairs has a wedding scene that had me laughing out loud. Best of all, though, it contains a truly wonderful rant delivered by the leading lady whilst standing in front of a formal dinner party, clutching a basket of rolls to her chest. Brilliant.

It also contains the best last line of Ibbotson's books yet.(less)

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Jul 14, 2007 Cara Marie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This was just lovely. I've never read Eva Ibbotson before, apart from the more junior Which Week?, and I really enjoyed it.

It was quite slow to get into, and written quite formally, but being as it was set at the beginning of the 20th century, it was appropriate. The story itself is quite old-fashioned, and also a genuinely heartwarming romance. I cried.

It was also well constructed: things would be mentioned that helped save the day later, without feeling unnatural. It was nice to have such a...more

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Feb 02, 2009 Haley rated it 4 of 5 stars

Cute storyline. I liked the story being told in so many different points of view, and also that not much is told from Anna's and Rupert's point of view. In this way the author shows you how they fell in love. Again, love the vocabulary the author uses in her novels, and also that it is a completely clean romance, but also so much more than a romance story. I loved all the different characters!

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Dec 09, 2010 Suna rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult, many-splendoured-thing, eva-ibbotson

I am emotionally winded by this book in the best possible way!

Whether it's the time of year and the bitter winter snow outside that made this book hit the spot the way it did I'm not certain.

But the poetic language, the sheer romanticism, the wit, the Shakespearean farce element, the astute social, historical, cultural, sexual, racial and class observations were all perfectly balanced to create one of the most richly feel-good romances I've read in years.

I've always admired Eva Ibbotson for hitt...more

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Jan 12, 2009 Adrienne rated it 2 of 5 stars

The only reason it's 2 stars is because it was a semi-interesting plot. However...

HOLY COMMAS, BATMAN!

The woman does not know how to write a normal sentence unless it's dialogue. She'd have these sentences with about 10 (no joke, I counted one) modifying phrases all contained within commas. It was so distracting that when I finally got around to the end of the original thought, I couldn't remember what she was talking about. So I'd have to read the beginning of the sentence, skip the crud in com...more

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May 16, 2013 Meg - A Bookish Affair rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, fiction, historical-fiction, ya-children, not-on-the-blog

This was my first bout with Eva Ibbotson. I had heard a lot of good things about her books (thanks to my fellow book bloggers!) so I was excited to finally get a chance to read one and see what the buzz was all about.

The book was sort of a mixed bag for me. I think I am beginning to discover that I like my historical fiction based in a little bit of actual history. I like there to be historical figures present. I like there to be real events involved. In this book, the heroine, Anna, does indee...more

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Nov 04, 2011 Chelsea rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2009, historicalfiction, own, romance, recced, youngadult

Oh, Eva, we are going to get along just fine.

I was a little disappointed by the last Ibbotson book I read (A Song For Summer), but this one was far better, and a return to A Company of Swans, which I adored.

It's a sweet, fun, fluffy book with a bit of a Cinderella feel to it. Probably not the most realistic take on England between the World Wars, and certainly not the most realistic when it comes to penniless Russian nobility living in exile, but you know what? It was charming and old fashioned,...more

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Feb 06, 2008 Bronte rated it 1 of 5 stars

Okay. This book was kind of a dissapointment to me. I felt really disconeccted from the story and like it was to narrarative. Like the author was telling the story herself, not through her charecters.

I felt like I was getting a lot of uneccissery information about every body. And nothing was really developing in you mind as you read it, but it was all piled on you all at the same time. Like every time some one new came into the story, everything stopped while the author gave a biography on this...more

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Apr 16, 2009 Clare rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: anyone and everyone

Recommended to Clare by: myself

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 18, 2008 Tommi rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book had a really cute story about a girl from Russia that goes to London after a nanny steals all their money and leaves her family poor. In London to make ends meet she decides to become a maid servant for a Rupert The Earl of Westerholm. The Earl has little money left and must face selling Mersham manor unless he marries a wealthy woman to keep it afloat. He becomes engaged to Muriel, a wealthy orphan who is quite obsessed with eugenics. Rupert's plans to marry Muriel are honorable and m...more

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Dec 04, 2008 Michelle rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2008, ya, historical-fiction, own

A sweet love story about a displaced Russian Countess, Anna and an English Earl set on marrying a (horrid) heiress to save his family seat. I am a sucker for all things Russian so I loved Anna and her efforts to become an able housemaid.

As usual, Ibbotson has created a set of unusual and extremely interesting cast of secondary characters that I would love to hear more about. I mean a body-building footman?! Who wouldn't want to hear his story? I think I could read her books if only for those wh...more

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Jun 03, 2009 Allison (The Allure of Books) rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2009, historical-fiction-ya

Sometimes its good to read something purely for FUN, to remind yourself what reading is all about - enjoying yourself. That is exactly what you get with this one. The ending is, of course, predictable...but the journey to get there is so fun (and at times maddening)!

Muriel, the "other woman" is ridiculous and cold-hearted, a little girl that lives in a neighboring home, 'Honorable Olive' will have your heart twisted in to knots, and...ALL the characters are just so fresh and enjoyable, no matte...more

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Oct 02, 2012 Corinne rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

As the daughter of a Countess, Anna has a fairy-tale upbringing in Russia, living a dream life with no wants and the adoration of her family and social circle. With the Revolution, however, comes the kind of change that could break a weak person, and Anna ends up in England, penniless, with nothing but her own will and a handbook on British houskeeping. So, she goes into service and in the house of the Earl of Westerholme, and Anna's natural abililty and desire to remain anonymous create a new s...more

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Apr 24, 2013 Eustacia Tan rated it 5 of 5 stars

I love Eva Ibbotson! Ever since I read Journey to the River Sea, I've been in love with her works. And this is no exception.

A Countess Below the Stairs is like The Star of Kazan in the sense that the protagonists are nobility that have somehow become servants. In this book, Anna is a Russian Countess who has lost all her wealth in the revolution. In order to support her family (they escaped to England), she becomes a maid, and learning from a book called, well I forgot but it's outdated and the...more

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Apr 07, 2013 Rosalyn rated it 4 of 5 stars

I try to save gushing reviews for more literary books, but I have to admit that I really adored this book--and it will likely go on my "to re-read soon" shelf. It's an escapist book, but it doesn't pretend to be anything else. Anna and her family, Russian nobility, flee to England after the 1917 revolution. Penniless and desperate to find work, Anna accepts a job with the Earl of Westerholme's family as a house maid. Although the butler and housekeeper suspect Anna's noble background, they give...more

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Oct 03, 2012 Beth Bonini rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: children-s-book-club

So often in Eva Ibbotson's novels there is a displacement, a shift in circumstances, which forces the protagonist to seek out a new home. The German take-over of Vienna in the 1930s forced Eva from her own ancestral home, and this was obviously a theme which never lost its emotional potency for her. In this novel, World War I and the Russian Revolution are the historical background. Anna, a young Russian countess, (and much-beloved by all who know her), becomes an émigrée in England. When her tr...more

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Sep 25, 2012 Lois Bujold rated it 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed this... familiar romance tropes, but intelligently applied, and with a keen sense of time and place and detail from an angle less and less known, I suspect, to many younger 21st C. American readers. The tale does not feel to me to be about events of a whole century ago, but I realize somewhat bemusedly that they now are. The social setting, actually utterly alien-to-me in real life, is, as they say, still strangely familiar from dozens of beloved books, both from the period or attempti...more

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May 03, 2012 Angelene rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

My daughter got this book for her birthday and it looked good and I was so excited to read it. It took me so long to get through the first half. I was so disappointed. It was actually hard to follow and understand what was going on at times. Eventually it picked up and was a very entertaining at parts. I was so tempted at many times to stop reading but wanted to give it a fair shot. At times I couldn't believe that this book was geared for younger readers because it was so slow and hard to follo...more

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Mar 20, 2012 Michele rated it 4 of 5 stars

Taking place in post-WW I England, Anna and her royal family have escaped Bolshevist Russia and are forced to start over again in a foreign country. A sweet, historical romance, it is told from the view of multiple characters including Rupert, the young Earl of Westerholme, who is trying to keep his family manor afloat; his wealthy fiancee Muriel, who nursed him back to health after a war injury and is much more interested in his title that she is in him; the Honorable Olive, a seven-year-old ne...more

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Feb 23, 2012 Alison rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: romance

The only reason I gave this book a two instead of a one is because despite the horrible writing style, I still managed to want to read it through to the end. The story, although very predictable, was cute and happily ending, as to be expected. Also, the fact that I am currently very into the tv show Downton Abbey kept me reading, as I used a lot of imagery from the show to imagine Westerholme and it's inner workings. However, if grammar and sentence structure matter greatly to you, I would not r...more

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Feb 17, 2012 Alex rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: historical, rainy-day-reads, romance, teen-ya

When the revolution hits Russia, Anna’s family doesn’t fare well: her father dies in battle, her mother is torn by grief and yet tries to do the best she can, and they are all in danger. Soon Anna and her family find themselves making the long journey to England – with the help of Anna’s governess – determined to make a new home for themselves.

There is only one problem: money, and the lack thereof. Anna’s family lost almost everything in the revolution and the few jewels they had left were lost....more When the revolution hits Russia, Anna’s family doesn’t fare well: her father dies in battle, her mother is torn by grief and yet tries to do the best she can, and they are all in danger. Soon Anna and her family find themselves making the long journey to England – with the help of Anna’s governess – determined to make a new home for themselves.

There is only one problem: money, and the lack thereof. Anna’s family lost almost everything in the revolution and the few jewels they had left were lost. For Anna, the solution is pretty simple: She’ll get a job and support her family. Everyone tells Anna she can’t, she’s a countess! But Anna reasons that no money means no food and she’s willing to do anything – honest of course – to secure her family’s well being.

That’s how Anna finds a job as a maid at Westerholme, home of the new earl of Westerholme, Rupert, who’s just being released from the hospital after being wounded in the war (The WW1) and he's about to marry a rich heiress – partially because he truly thinks he loves her and partially because he does need her money.

Anna and Rupert like each other immediately, of course, everyone likes Anna and everyone likes Rupert, yet this time is different…

I won’t say much or I’ll spoil it for you guys, I’ll just say that I really liked this book, it’s the first by Eva Ibbotson I’ve ever read so I can’t compare to her other works but, as for this one, I can say that it’s a warm, enchanting romance; light and sweet.

I liked both lead characters a lot, Anna has that quality some heroines have, you know the ones, they are so sweet, so full of virtues, such paragons of everything good that you think it’s going to be impossible to actually like them – let alone believe them – but Anna’s optimism and good sense (even in her naïveté) shine through and you actually do like her and do root for her and her family. Rupert on the other hand is a very honorable and kind man, he’s trying desperately to do the right thing for himself and for his family, he just happens to realize he isn’t in love with her fiancé and that it might very well be too late.

I found the antagonistic characters well done in a way that, though silly to my thinking they made sense to themselves and as a reader I appreciate that. Friends and family add depth to the story, they all had stories to tell, some of which were glimpsed at in an unobtrusive way that added to the story without feeling like it was dragging on and on.(less)

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Oct 28, 2011 Amy rated it 2 of 5 stars

Recommended to Amy by: Emily

Book deprivation is a very bad thing. It causes people to do crazy things…like, reading till 4:44 am on a Thursday night because they haven’t had fiction in their hands for such a long time. Which may or may not have just happened to me.
Be warned! If you’re sending your kid off to college, or are going to college, keep them/yourself at least occasionally supplied with something mindless!!! The repercussions are scary and may involve falling asleep in class the next day.

Plot
Once upon a time i...more

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Oct 03, 2011 Liz B rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: ebook, historicalfiction, romance

4.5 stars

Oh, I really liked this book. I knew Eva Ibbotson only as an author of kids' fantasy, but I came across a blog post that referred to her romances, and I bought this one on impulse. I'm so glad I did. It's hard to point to why, exactly; maybe it's because it embodies the characterization of romance as fantasy. Not that this is speculative fiction, by any means--but it really does feel like a fairy tale, where the magic is found in the ordinary goodness of people.

It's one of my favorite h...more

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Jul 23, 2011 Parvathy rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: romance readers, feel good book lovers

Recommended to Parvathy by: goodreads

Shelves: chick-lit, favorites, family-drama, glued-till-the-last-page, living-vicariously, movie-material, strong-females, feel-good

It is the same repetitive formula which has been encountered in entertainment from time on. The English lord in this case an Earl, the kind and spirited housemaid and a disgruntled, cruel fiancee and an ever supporting and lovable background characters. Yes, the same old stuff but what makes this one worth a read is the way in which this same old story is presented. Eva Ibbotson's writing is very imaginative and captures one's attention from the very first page. Her description of simple unimpor...more

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About Eva Ibbotson

Eva Ibbotson (born Maria Charlotte Michelle Wiesner, 1925, Vienna, Austria) was a British novelist specializing in romance and children's fantasy. Eva Ibbotson was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1925. When Hitler came into power, Ibbotson's family moved to England. She attended Bedford College, graduating in 1945; Cambridge University from 1946-47; and the University of Durham, from which she graduat...more Eva Ibbotson (born Maria Charlotte Michelle Wiesner, 1925, Vienna, Austria) was a British novelist specializing in romance and children's fantasy. Eva Ibbotson was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1925. When Hitler came into power, Ibbotson's family moved to England. She attended Bedford College, graduating in 1945; Cambridge University from 1946-47; and the University of Durham, from which she graduated with a diploma in education in 1965. Ibbotson had intended to be a physiologist, but was put off by the amount of animal testing that she would have to do. Instead, she married and raised a family, returning to school to become a teacher in the 1960's. Ibbotson was widowed with three sons and a daughter.

Ibottson began writing with the television drama Linda Came Today, in 1965. Ten years later, she published her first novel, The Great Ghost Rescue. Ibbotson has written numerous books including The Secret of Platform 13, Journey to the River Sea, Which Witch?, Island of the Aunts, and Dial-a-Ghost. She won the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize for Journey to the River Sea, and has been a runner up for many of major awards for British children's literature. The books are imaginative and humorous, and most of them feature magical creatures and places, despite the fact that she disliked thinking about the supernatural, and created the characters because she wanted to decrease her readers' fear of such things. Some of the books, particularly Journey to the River Sea, also reflect Ibbotson's love of nature. Ibbotson wrote this book in honor of her husband (who had died just before she wrote it), a former naturalist. The book had been in her head for years before she actually wrote it. Ibbotson said she dislikes "financial greed and a lust for power" and often creates antagonists in her books who have these characteristics. Some have been struck by the similarity of "Platform 9 3/4" in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books to Ibbotson's The Secret of Platform 13, which came out three years before the first Harry Potter book.

Her love of Austria is evident in works such as The Star Of Kazan and A Song For Summer. These books, set primarily in the Austrian countryside, display the author's love for nature and all things natural.

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Quotes from A Countess Below Stairs

“And so they played some of the world's loveliest piano music - the exiled homesick girl, the humiliated, tired old man. Not properly. Better than that.” — 63 people liked it

“She's like snow in Russian," said Anna. "Snow in the evening when the sun sets and it looks like Alpengluhen, you know? And if snow had a scent it would smell like that [the rose]....” — 57 people liked it

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