Book 2- A Company of Swans by Eva Ibbotson

2038-01-19T03:14:07Z

This was book two in my list for the What's in a Name Challenge, but I couldn't wait until the beginning of the year, so it's just a regular book review.

Summary
Set in 1912 Cambridge, England and the Amazon, A Company of Swans stars a ballet dancer, 19-year-old Harriet Morton. She is the repressed (oppressed?) daughter of a Cambridge professor who is almost engaged to be married to a not-entirely-objectionable-but-certainly-not-ideal colleage of her father's. She is offered a chance to be in the corps of a ballet company about to tour the Amazon. She escapes from her overbearing father and miserly aunt to join the company. They travel to South America to perform in an Opera House run by Rom Verney, an Englishman living in self-imposed exile. She and Rom discover a once-in-a-lifetime love that is threatened by the appearance of Harriet's almost-intended and Rom's former flame.

Opinion
Ibbotson wrote for these books (A Company of Swans, Countess Below Stairs, and other recently rereleased novels)adults in the eighties, and some of her books have recently been rereleased and marketed to young adults. I think this was a good move by the publisher (Speak, an imprint of Penguin) because the book is pretty simplistic. That said, it does have some adult themes and situations like SPOILER lust, exotic dancing, and premarital sex (highlight to see spoiler). Also, outdated romance fiction conventions feature prominently in this novel: helpless female rescued by male, one-dimensional "Other Woman" character, etc. I don't really have a problem with this, but I could see how people would.  I could also see how people would have a problem with the plethora of coincidences that carried the plot forward. Seriously, one Amazon review compared it to Charles Dickens' novels, and she is so right. At one point, Ibbotson blatantly announces that Rom encounters a deus ex machina, and I wanted to yell that her whole novel is one deus ex machina after another (if you are slightly liberal with the definition). Oh well, I got over it.

I really do love this book. The exotic locale and the 20th century time period are nice changes from the Regency and Victorian England settings I'm used to. I like Harriet's character, though some may find her too good, too sweet, too perfect for their liking. She's this innocent, joyful, loving girl that can do no wrong. I tend to like characters like that because a lot of romance novelists make their heroines shrews because they can't find that balance between independence and niceness. I much prefer too much niceness to too much shrewness (if that's a word).

Ibbotson infuses the book with classical references and vivid descriptions of the life of a ballerina and of the ballet. She is one smart, cultured lady, and her allusions and descriptions make the novel that much more enjoyable. Sometimes they can make things drag, as can the multiple points of view she writes in, but the story is worth the digressions and time away from the main characters.

All in all, I give the book 8.5 out of 10 for personal enjoyment, 7 out of 10 for actual quality.

Coming up: A Countess Below Stairs, and Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac

Books to change your life

Book 2- A Company of Swans by Eva Ibbotson