A young woman thinks too well of herself.
Here is another novel by the great Charlotte Yonge (for whom see Novels 003, 053, 103, 155, 210, and 261).
Yonge “spares no pains to discover fresh varieties of character, or to define them sharply and distinctly. For these reasons her stories are generally worth a great deal of study. . . . ‘The Clever Woman of the Family’ is well written, and teaches a good moral. . . . Upon the whole . . . the book will be read with pleasure; and it has this great advantage over many recent novels, that the author has evidently had some personal acquaintance with the phases of society that she describes.” Athenaeum, April 8, 1865
“Unquestionably the best of her novels, and a book that any writer of the day might be proud to own. In the management of a large family no one . . . is equal to Miss Yonge; she absolutely revels in the pranks and frolics of ten or a dozen brothers and sisters, all discriminated in character with a nicety of touch that belongs to a woman’s pen alone.” New York Times, June 19, 1865
A contrasting view:
“We are transported into a somewhat mawkish paradise of earnest people. . . . The purposeless anatomy of small feminine scruples and self-communings is carried out to a tedious extent.” Reader, May 27,1865
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