Mrs. De Winter (Thorndike Large Print Basic Series)

Rating:
Summary: I wish that I had never picked it up!
Review: My mother introduced me to Rebecca when I was twelve. I've adored the book ever since. I never wanted the book to end, and longed to know what happened to the characters after the tragic fire at Manderly. I was so excited to pick up Mrs. DeWinter. Two chapters into the book, I knew that I had made a dreadful mistake. I felt an obligation to finish the book, and I did. Ms. Hill causes readers to loathe Maxim, to think of him as a boorish lout. The second Mrs. DeWinter reads as flat, neurotic and weak. If I could erase this book from my memory I would. It is a disgrace to the original.

Rating:
Summary: Dreadful dreadful book
Review: I can't think of a single good thing to say about it. It reads like an entry to those one of the Worst Writing contests--it is so bad, it's like a parody of pointlessly melodrama. Mrs. De Winter spent nearly the entire book inside her own head, sharing her thoughts, fears, and aimless existence and it sounded just like this: "I think I knew at once, in an instant, things would never be the same again, they couldn't be the same, not now, not ever, I was a fool to think otherwise, oh WHY didn't I see, why COULDN'T I see, that things were different but forever the same, always the same, they couldn't be otherwise, I know that now, I think I knew that then, but until that instant I didn't believe, didn't want to believe, that for me, things were just as before, exactly as before, forever haunting us, forever coming between us, just as before, unchanged........." Bleah.

Rating:
Summary: Mrs de Winter
Review: This book lacks the suspense and intrigue of the original. The entire first two thirds could have been condensed into 2 chapters. The characters have lost their original strength and become insipid. My high hopes were not met by this book.

Rating:
Summary: True to Du Maurier
Review: In reading both books subsequently close together, I must admit like many of the reviewers I too was dissapointed. Not because the book itself was bad but because I wanted a cookie-cutter story with a perfect ending, and did not get it. Still I believe if Du Maurier had wanted a "perfect" ending she would have written it in Rebecca, and *that* is what tantalized me into reading Mrs. De Winter. I found the book's characters true to their original form, even though I was muchly frustrated with the narrator's lack of self-assuredness. Yet, this was also true to form. I enjoyed being taken back into the lives of the De Winters and would recommend this book to anyone who loved Rebecca.

Rating:
Summary: Dreadful
Review: Since Rebecca has always been a favorite of mine, I was eager to read a sequel. I found Mrs. DeWinter to be extremely disappointing, however. The characterization was all wrong, and the descriptive passages were flowery and overdone. It felt like Ms. Hill was trying to impress her readers with technical skill, showing off her ability to write du Maurier-esque prose, at the expense of the plot. The storyline was trite and predictable and she seemed to have no grasp of the true nature of the characters in the story. The ending was simply awful and seemed tacked on. In short, while Ms. Hill is a capable writer, she should have studied Rebecca a little more closely before attempting to write a sequel. If you're a fan of the classic du Maurier novel, don't waste your money on this flimsy imitation.

Rating:
Summary: A huge disappointment
Review: It is rare when another author can take the characters from a classic book and engage the reader. This is not one of those authors nor one of those books. The author only suceeded in making me angry that I had wasted time reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent sequel to a classic novel
Review: I thought this was a great book-beautifully written and a worthy sequel to a great novel. I loved the idea that Mr and Mrs De Winter would eventually come back to England and try to finally lay the malevolent ghost of Rebecca to rest. As for Maxim's suicide, it made sense in a certain sad way to me, because Rebecca always won, even in death. Her shadow stretches long over this book, and in the end she gets her revenge. I'm amazed that so many people hated this book! Give it a chance, if you liked Rebecca.

Rating:
Summary: INSULT to the original Rebecca novel
Review: I couldn't wait for Mrs. De Winter to be available and was not only disappointed, but angered that it was allowed to be published. I have had the pleasure of reading Rebecca at least five times in the past twenty years and was always impressed with the main character's strength and maturity when she finally made her stand. In Mrs. De Winter, the author totally lost sight of this strength of character and expected the reader to accept a weak and frightened child bride again. For anyone who has read the original Rebecca, it is clear that this book (Mrs. De Winter) was published to make money on it's success. Shame on the publisher and the estate of Du Maurier for allowing this. Rebecca is probably one of the best gothic novels this century, it even is pivital in a fairly recent Ken Follett novel of the same title, Rebecca, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Rating:
Summary: If I could give it 0 stars, I would!
Review: Anyone who like Rebecca should not waste the effort on this..... It's poorly writen and NEVER should have been published. Isn't the ending of Rebecca good enough? Isn't Mrs.DeWinter smart enough to stay away from Rebecca's cousin? A waste of money! Don't buy it.

Rating:
Summary: HATED IT!
Review: I thought this book was absolutely awful! I loved reading Rebecca and I also enjoyed the movie tremendously. However, here there was to many long monologues and the ending was terrible. Maxim would have never ended things as in this sequel. As far as sequels, I will never read another one. I debated reading the sequel to Gone with the Wind, but after this, I definitely won't. I have to now re-read Rebecca in order to imagine my own sequel which will end with some happiness for Mr. and Mrs. de Winter. (I rated it 1 star because I had to enter something, otherwise it would have been a "0".)