Review: Reader, I Married Him

Reader, I Married Him

Publisher: William Morrow

Pages: 304

Format: ebook

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  This collection of original stories by today’s finest women writers—including Tracy Chevalier, Francine Prose, Elizabeth McCracken, Tessa Hadley, Audrey Niffenegger, and more—takes inspiration from a line in Charlotte Brontë’s most beloved novel, Jane Eyre.

A fixture in the literary canon, Charlotte Brontë is revered by readers all over the world. Her novels featuring unforgettable, strong heroines still resonate with millions today. And who could forget one of literature’s best-known lines: “Reader, I married him” from her classic novel Jane Eyre?

Part of a remarkable family that produced three acclaimed female writers at a time in 19th-century Britain when few women wrote, and fewer were published, Brontë has become a great source of inspiration to writers, especially women, ever since. Now in Reader, I Married Him, twenty of today’s most celebrated women authors have spun original stories, using the line from Jane Eyre as a springboard for their own flights of imagination.

Kritters Thoughts:  A collection of short stories with the prompt - Reader, I Married Him.  Each author took that line and went with it!  I loved the set up in the beginning with the forward by Tracy Chevalier, she describes what these authors were given and kind of a small glimpse of what the authors did with that prompt, I appreciated that little spoiler.

Many of these authors this was my first time reading them and this is one of my favorite parts of reading short story collections.  I have a list of authors that I now want to seek out their full works after reading just a small bit of what they can do.  In this collection there was only one or two stories that I didn't enjoy and could have skipped over, but this was probably the highest percentage of liking stories out of a collection.

It was interesting to see a few authors take on legit Jane Eyre.  There were flips on the point of views or "sequels" of sorts and I liked seeing an author take on the original work in a different way.  I am glad I had recently read Jane Eyre and was close to the original work and had it fresh on my mind!

I have enjoyed reading short story collections here recently and this one just sealed my feelings and I will continue reading them the rest of this year and into next year.


Rating: definitely a good read, but can't read two in a row