Blue Wolf Reviews

Tag: wife

  • HIS ONLY WIFE

    HIS ONLY WIFE

    Peace Adso Medie is to be congratulated on an engaging and well-crafted first novel, His Only Wife. The characters are all interesting and many faceted, while the customs of the Ghanaian people are seamlessly relayed. The direct style of writing places the reader alongside the main character and narrator, Afi. She is a modern thinking woman who has a gift for sewing and creating women’s fashions.

    The opening sentence of the book shows us that Afi is a nervous and worried bride. According to tradition, an arranged marriage is to take place. The groom is a very wealthy man whose mother is a power in the village. She employs Afi’s mother and dictates the rules by which her community live.

    ”Elikem married me in absentia,” states Afi, setting the scene for mystery that is soon to be revealed. This young woman who has lived in humble surroundings is soon to be taken to an apartment owned by her husband where she will have every luxury including a car and driver at her disposal, and a large monetary allowance. But no husband.

    Weaving through time we see Afi beginning to reason and formulate her life path. She goes to a sewing and fashion school to develop her skills: her husband comes to visit her every so often. As she begins to understand the planning and plotting of her husband’s family, she realises that she will have to make a stand and establish her own path in life. This goes against all the customs and ways of her culture.

    Afi begins to realise that the husband who has become the love of her life, cannot share her feelings. The characters are good people, who grow and change as the story unfolds. Afi is a captivating character as is her story.

  • A Net for Small Fishes

    A Net for Small Fishes

    The year is 1609:  the city where A Net For Small Fishes is set is London. A foreign King rules over a court whose extravagances take the breath away. For favourites of the King and Court, there are jewels and land grants and titles. For the poor there is disease, dirt, and the threat of starvation.

    Frances Howard is the wife of an Earl, a member of the Court, who can barely stand to look at her and beats her. Ann Turner is a doctor’s wife with a happy marriage and is mostly content. She is always curious about what happens at the Court but is discouraged by her husband as he believes it is a den of corruption.

    Always busy, Ann has taken an interest in her husband’s apothecary and helps him mix his herbs and drugs. She also has a wonderfully keen eye for fashion and style, understanding how a design of clothing can flatter a figure. One day she is summoned to Court and meets Frances’s mother. The angry woman believes her daughter could avoid being beaten if she dressed more becomingly and asks Ann to help Frances. The two women develop a friendship that grows with the years.

    While looking at the early days of the ruling class, A Net For Small Fishes shows how friendship, loyalty, and trust between two women from different spheres can transcend the evil around them. As time passes and their friendship remains steady, each is faced with great hardship and loss. They can always be sure of the support and encouragement from the other.

    Many years later, one of the women is visited by the adult daughter of the other who understands the greatness of the friendship between the two women and passes on a memento. All that trust in each other was not lost, and the love passes on to the next generation.

    A Net For Small Fishes is an intriguing look at the early days of Court life, and the contrasting life of the poor.

  • The Clergyman’s Wife

    The Clergyman’s Wife

    Ahhh, it is a marvellous thing to be reintroduced to the characters of Jane Austin through the medium of The Clergyman’s Wife by Molly Greeley. This is the story of Elizabeth’s friend Charlotte, with the main characters from Pride and Prejudice making an appearance, but not playing a major part in this tale.

    Charlotte tells her story in a gentle but compelling way, with much reflection and thoughtfulness. Because her story is told in the first person, we are confronted with the most intimate thoughts and feelings of a young woman whom society guided into life choices.

    Mr William Collins, the obsequious parson who offered for Lizzie and Jane Bennett, and was refused, offers for the hand of Charlotte. She has to weigh up the pros and cons of such a marriage. It will give her security and a position of responsibility as a married woman.

    She is a thoughtful and practical woman who knows that her life as a spinster will be one of hardship. She would have to live with her brother or family member, as an extra, in a household. The intense man William, who has proposed to Charlotte, is a well- meaning man, who would always be kind, but never really an intimate friend.

    The decision is made to marry the Clergyman, and Charlotte begins to keep her own house and learn the role of a parson’s wife. She helps with the kitchen duties of preserving, and begins to learn about the needy people in the village. She begins to visit them and give them a few supplies. as well as her company.

    Her relationship with her husband has only changed in a few ways. At night, “she feels his weight upon her.” After a few years, she gives birth to a daughter, Louisa. As she meets more people in the village and begins to think of her daughter’s life, Charlotte realises that other people have more depth in their relationships.

    A local farmer comes to the Clergyman’s garden to plant some roses. An easy friendship begins between Charlotte and Mr Travis, the farmer. She becomes aware of the humour they share, and how he responds so naturally to Louisa. In rather melancholy reflections, Charlotte sees her sister falling in love, and the exchanged looks and smiles between Mr Darcy and Elizabeth. As many women in that time would come to realize, love has many depths.

    While rather a sad reflection of the times, the story is a pleasure to read. We are re- introduced to the Bennett family, and see that Lizzie has a baby and Jane is happily married to Mr Bingley. Lady Catherine de Bourgh, the overbearing family matriarch, is still as meddlesome as ever. However, this is Charlotte’s story and the author has done a grand job to continue Jane Austen’s work