4.5 Exceeded my expectations (which had admittedly been lowered by the other recent Wharton-inspired novel, The Innocents by Francesca Segal).

Edith Wharton and her governess-turned-assistant Anna Bahlman share center stage in this novel, and it is a credit to author Jennie Fields that their stories are equally compelling. Edith has neither love, nor intimacy, nor even any longer affection for her husband Teddy; Anna does not see how Edith can treat "a good man" so carelessly and coldly. When Edith meets and begins a friendship and then a relationship with American journalist Morton Fullerton, Anna's disapproval - though barely expressed - threatens the women's lifelong friendship. However, as Teddy becomes moody, unpredictable, and eventually violent and irresponsible, Anna takes Edith's side again, and Edith, in turn, eventually concludes her affair with Fullerton.

Edith's decisions are not without consequences, but given the constrictions on women at the time, and her own mother's icy contempt (in part a mask for her own shame or ignorance, at least on the topic of marital relations), it is difficult for the reader to judge her harshly. Even Anna - though she intuits Fullerton's true character immediately - wants most of all for Edith to be happy.

It is not an action-packed narrative, though there is much travel - mostly between Paris, New York, and Massachusetts, though Anna has adventures of her own in Europe and visits her family in Missouri. There are also letters and journal entries throughout, some (all?) Wharton's own; Fields weaves these in so effortlessly that they blend with her own beautiful and observant writing.

I would recommend The Age of Desire to lovers of history and literature (Henry James is also a character), and those who enjoyed Wharton's own The Age of Innocence, Paula McLain's The Paris Wife, Ian McEwan's On Chesil Beach and Selden Edwards' The Little Book.


Quotes:

"So vigorously will I lean on life,
So strongly will I hold and embrace it,
That before I lose the sweetness of day
It will be heated from my touch." ("Imprint," Anna de Noailles, p. 47)

"What can be more tragic than someone destroying his own chance at happiness? It's the classic theme. The seductive glow of the wrong option. Wrong options always seem to have ribbons on them for me." (Fullerton, p. 50)

...restlessness without bravery means dissatisfaction. She wants something, but is she willing to take the risk to find it? (Edith, 66)

She feels dented by him. He marks her soul more than anyone she's ever known. (Edith, 86)

To get just what one wants when one wants it: has it ever happened to her before? How rare, how deeply satisfying it feels...she feels so utterly understood. (Edith, 129)

"I should like to be to you, friend of my heart, like a touch of wings brushing by you in the darkness, or like the scent of an invisible garden, that no one passes on an unknown road at night." (Edith, 131)

"The first time I was able to read a book, I thought, This is what I want to do every day for the rest of my life. I lose myself in reading." "I find myself in reading!" (Fullerton and Edith, 132)

"If only one could put a day into a potion and drink it whenever one likes," Henry says. "I would choose today..." (Henry James, 179)

And why should we worship purity, Edith wonders? Her own purity, or at least her blindness to the sensual, has happily and finally been removed like a stone from her shoe. An ocean can part her from Morton, and time can sway his heart from hers, but nothing can take away the power of the knowledge he's given her or the exquisiteness of its memory. (Edith, 193)

...her letters begin as one long howl of pain....Then somehow, she gathers herself...just to undercut the obvious grief written all over the first page. (Edith, 212)

Edith was born to be a lady. And a lady never pursues, never complains, never makes a scene and certainly never makes a fool of herself. (256)

She knows she must imprint this moment on her memory like a painting seen at auction but bought by someone else. (Edith, 305)

She has never been able to hide her feelings from him. She has never learned to dissemble. (Edith, 315)

...as a reflection is often infinitely more beautiful than the object it reflects. (Edith, 315)

Her joy has nowhere to go if she can't share it with him! (334)

But now, she feels nothing but the steady pound of her breaking heart. (336-337)

How ironic that a friendship so unwavering is the one more easily taken for granted. (346)

Perhaps there were no right options. Perhaps there never are. (346)