I have very strong feelings about the interpretation of Jane Eyre, having read it multiple times in school, majored in English, etc. Still, I enjoyed this book. I tend to like anything that is in the aura of a book I love. I don't think it has to be identical or even very faithful, especially if there's no claim to copy or rewrite, or slavishly devote itself to the original.

Having said that, there are key themes missing from the original. My favorite parts of Jane Eyre are how it's her wresting control of herself in a largely powerless situation. How Mr. Rochester is blinded by the fire- his own failure really, and relinquishes the keys to the estate to Jane. How Jane, despite not being pretty, is true to herself beyond anything. There's a lot of interplay between Rochester and Jane regarding power, gender, and place in society.

In this book, the author doesn't really take those themes, instead she does a quite literal (not literary) reading of the original. I'm always playing a "what if" in my head with books, and I appreciate that the author did a good job of putting this in the 1950s, it's interesting to me, and the geological transplants are interesting too. In a way that science fiction is interesting. But still, she's talking about totally different themes. And, I don't agree with her original reading of Jane Eyre.

If you want to see some other interpretaitons of Jane Eyre, read Wide Sargasso Sea - a prequel/perspective of Jane Eyre from Rochester's first wife (yes, the one that fell screaming from the flaming roof). Historical and geographical placement of Jane Eyre are important to its themes- while interesting, it largely re-interprets the major ideas in the book.