Have you hugged your rapist today?

[dangermousie]

Spent most of the evening reading particularly horrifying passages of Ethel M. Dell's The Bars of Iron (a huge 1916 romantic bestseller) out loud to Mr. Mousie

Comments

[morwen_peredhil]

Nothing says True Love like brutalizing your pregnant wife. Ah, romance!

[dangermousie]

True love, such a rare flower...

It's not as if Husband n.2 didn't give fair warning to all and sundry as to how awesome he was going to be - Wifey meeting him was when in a temper he was beating his dog to death and to stop him she had to throw a jug of cold water over him.

Quite the romantic ideal...

[morwen_peredhil]

Wait, he beats his dog, too? WHAT THE HELL, ETHEL M. DELL?

[dangermousie]

That's how we first meet him. His dog and the dog of the family she works for get involved in a fight and he gets pissed off:

It was a brutal thrashing and wholly undeserved. Caesar, awaking to the

[main_hoon_emily]

in a temper he was beating his dog to death...

And she married him???

[dangermousie]

Clearly she is like those women who write to serial killers - no self-preservation.