Mount TBR - Henry Tilney's Diary by Amanda Grange

Tuesday, June 4, 2019

Mount TBR 2019
Title: Henry Tilney's Diary
Author: Amanda Grange
Genre: Fiction
Publication Year: 2011

If you read or watch Jane Austen, then you know Henry Tilney is the hero in Northanger Abbey. It's funny, but I was never really a fan of that story until I listened to THIS radio drama set from Audible. I absolutely adored their Henry Tilney, decided to re-read the book, and have been a fan of the story ever since.

Amanda Grange does a fair job of bringing the characters in the Tilney household further to light than Austen, simply because Jane focused on the heroine instead of the hero, per the usual with all of her works. I appreciated getting to know a young Henry and Eleanor Tilney before their mother died. Henry's inner dialogue is charming and quirky, just like him.

I don't always agree with Amanda Grange's interpretations of certain characters. I hate Captain Tilney, Henry's older brother, and always will. No, I don't think his heart had been destroyed by an early love that left him. I believe him to be utterly selfish, with no thought whatsoever given to proving to Catherine's older brother that he was in love with a fickle woman and would be better to find out now than later. Captain Tilney is a cad, there's no other description for the man.

I'm not sure how whimsical Eleanor would have been as a child, but anything is possible since her mother was still alive at that point. One thing I did love was getting to know Mr. Morris, the man who eventually was permitted to marry Eleanor. He's just this random name in Northanger Abbey but is given a character in Henry Tilney's Diary and I liked that a lot.

I've owned 5 or 6 of Amanda Grange's Austen retellings since May 2018 so I'm thrilled to finally buckle down and get at least one of them read. This book truly is charming, effortless escapism for the anglophile who craves Austen, but maybe from a slightly different perspective.

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