Rebecca in A Book Walks Into a Bar

Oct 06, 2017 Travis rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

*******There are spoilers in this review.*******

If there's one thing we can say for sure about Daphne du Maurier, it's that she loved to write about trees, shrubs, and flowers--especially flowers. My god, the woman could go on and on about flowers--rhododendrons, azaleas, roses, daffodils, hydrangeas, etc., etc. In the early chapters of Rebecca, you will wade through a sea of flowery description, but be patient and enjoy the stroll because the mystery that is slowly building is well worth it.

As *******There are spoilers in this review.*******

If there's one thing we can say for sure about Daphne du Maurier, it's that she loved to write about trees, shrubs, and flowers--especially flowers. My god, the woman could go on and on about flowers--rhododendrons, azaleas, roses, daffodils, hydrangeas, etc., etc. In the early chapters of Rebecca, you will wade through a sea of flowery description, but be patient and enjoy the stroll because the mystery that is slowly building is well worth it.

As you emerge from the flood of flowers, you will find a host of fascinating characters: our unnamed narrator, young and naive and anxious about her new marriage to a much older man; her new husband, Maxim, brooding and mysterious yet devoted to his new wife; Manderley, Maxim's large estate, a character in its own right with its well maintained grounds teeming with, of course, beautiful flowers and looking out on an ominous sea and staffed with courteous but tight-lipped servants; Rebecca, Maxim's recently deceased, beautiful, sophisticated wife whose memory still haunts Manderley and its residents; Maxim's delightfully forward, friendly sister, Beatrice; Mrs. Danvers, Maxim's efficient, cold, sinister housekeeper; Jack Favell, Rebecca's cousin, a lecherous, brazen drunk and all-around troublemaker; and Frank, Maxim's estate manager and friend, a practical man, kind and understanding.

Du Maurier so wonderfully draws these characters that we readers become completely wrapped up in their lives and this mystery. The characters evoke very strong reactions: we love and worry over our narrator as she tries to find her way in a new world; we adore Beatrice; we fear and hate and then pity Mrs. Danvers; we despise Jack Favell; we are baffled by Maxim; we are entranced and allured by Rebecca but then come to hate her; we are drawn to Frank's calm resolve and unswaying loyalty to Maxim and the narrator; and we loathe Jack Favell.

Du Maurier builds on these characters' interactions to produce scenes of incredible tension and drama. There is a confrontation between the narrator and Mrs. Danvers after a disastrous ball that is pure emotion on the page: rage and jealousy and hatred and grief painted in vibrant, vivid dialogue so powerful that Mrs. Danvers nearly convinces the narrator to jump from a window to her death as we readers are left gasping for breath at the exchange.

In an equally powerful scene a day or two later, Maxim drops a bomb on the narrator and the readers when he reveals that he murdered Rebecca. I had no inkling this was coming. I literally screamed aloud upon reading this (luckily, I was home alone at the time). To this point, the novel, which had been growing incrementally more interesting as the story progressed, suddenly became absolutely riveting. Like the narrator, we readers had thought Maxim was still pining for Rebecca, so we are shocked and dismayed to learn that not only did he despise her but that he murdered her. And the genius of du Maurier is that we side with Maxim: we sympathize with him and his reasons for murdering Rebecca (even though he doesn't make them explicit), and although we don't condone the murder, we nevertheless hope he gets away with it.

And that drives the remainder of the novel: will Maxim get away with the murder? The confrontational scenes between our coterie of protagonists (Maxim, the narrator, and Frank as well as the magistrate, Julyan) and antagonists (Jack Favell and Mrs. Danvers) are some of the most engaging writing I have ever encountered: this is how to write a novel of suspense! Maxim's calling Favell's bluff and refusing to succumb to blackmail; Favell's attempts to bully Ben (the mentally challenged man) into saying that he saw Maxim at Rebecca's seaside cottage on the night of the murder; the hasty trip to London to meet with Rebecca's physician, Dr. Baker--all of these scenes keep the reader guessing and wondering: will he get away with it?

And this mystery in the final chapters persists in spite of the fact that the novel's opening two chapters, which are set in the time after the events in the subsequent chapters, show the narrator living a relaxed, if dull, life with her husband. But who the husband is, at this later point in time, is not clear: is it Maxim or perhaps Frank or maybe even someone else entirely? We don't know for sure. As we read the final chapters, all we know is that the narrator herself will survive this, but we aren't sure if Maxim will.

Even in the novel's final pages once Maxim has escaped Favell's efforts to exact justice for Rebecca, we know something terrible is still to come. Perhaps Favell or even Mrs. Danvers or the two working together will attempt to murder Maxim. We just don't know. Additionally, from the first two chapters, we know that Manderley is now a ruin, but we are not quite sure how this came to be. And then, in the closing paragraphs, the novel draws to a flaming conclusion as Maxim and the narrator arrive back home from London seemingly at the end of their ordeal only to discover that their home has been set on fire.

But for the flowery descriptions (which really are not bad), I loved everything about this novel. The characters, the plot, the mystery, the emotions, the suspense: it is a flawless thriller. In fact, I would go so far as to say that Rebecca is the mother of the modern thriller. Gillian Flynn, Liane Moriarty, Paula Hawkins, and a host of other contemporary writers are deeply indebted to the legacy of Daphne du Maurier and Rebecca. Rebecca is a novel that unquestionably deserves its reputation as a classic.

Thank you, Daphne du Maurier, for providing me with hours of literary delight as I submerged myself in this brilliant novel! ...more

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Nov 08, 2016 Becky rated it it was amazing

A young girl who marries an older man and has to deal with the ghost (not literally) of the dead first wife. A classic that is still a must read. In fact it will probably require a second read to pick up on all the small nuances lost in the first reading.

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