Books and dramas...

[dangermousie]

I am reading Eva Ibbotson’s Countess Below Stairs and it’s delightful: a cross between an early Woodhouse, if he wrote romantic instead of purely funny, and Georgette Heyer if she wasn’t a snob. It’s a novel about Anna, an aristocratic Russian emigree after the Revolution, who ends up in England in 1920, and becomes a housemaid in a rural

Comments

[walkwithheroes]

I know! I'm totally peeved at the writers. That girl cannot lose another husband, darn it. And, you just know he'll try and push her away, so she doesn't get hurt. :(

[dangermousie]

I know, it would totally destroy her to lose a man she loves, twice. What is this, Misa? Ugh. And if they are going for 'this time she'll get to come to terms with it because she'll see him die' than I have only one thing to say to writers and it's unprintable.

[walkwithheroes]

It is not Misa. I cannot take another Misa. I think he has a blood clot, and not a tumor, though. Which makes it worse. And, I believe he got it because he always gets beat up. :/

[dangermousie]

Yeah, I couldn't take another MISA either.

And how sad that this is the result of his hard life. Eeek.

[vierran45]

I think you might enjoy Elisa DeCarlo's very Jeeves-and-Woosterish romps called Strong Spirits and The Devil You Say, where a young sprig of nobility suddenly finds himself haunted by ghosts. And he is assisted by a butler who is a very unreluctant medium.

Very much light fun, but they might be quite hard to find nowadays, since they were originally published in the 1990s.

[dangermousie]

Thanks for the rec, I'll try to locate them.

[main_hoon_emily]

I have A Countess Below Stairs in my to-read pile. I was thinking of starting it next. A Song For Summer made me wary of Eva Ibbotson's books; I hated how she lulled you into thinking everything was going to be warm and happy and cozy and then BAM! Everything was messed up.

There's a movie from the thirties called Tovarich with Claudette Colbert that is supposed to be very similar to Countess Below Stairs. I haven't been able to find a copy of it, but it sounds like it might be good.

[dangermousie]

It's very cute and fluffy, I promise.

Tovarch I saw, and it was very cute.

[lenabean]

Have read that book last year, and LOVED IT. (One of the, like, 5 FUN books I got to read last year.) Am glad you discovered it too!

[dangermousie]

It's so so adorable. I need more books by this author.

[_kirsty]

Countess Below Stairs sounds like something I'd enjoy. Thanks for the tip!

[dangermousie]

It really is very cute.

[_kirsty]

I've just been pottering about online because I can't sleep, and by way of friends of friends of, I saw that there's a new Vicky Bliss book due in September, "The Laughter of Dead Kings". Thought you might be interested.

[dangermousie]

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

I will love you forever now!!!!!!!!