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Samantha Whipple, an American and the last living relative of the Brontės, is at Oxford ostensibly to study English literature. However, it is quickly apparent that she is more interested in studying her professor and a mysterious legacy left to her by her father than seriously analyzing works from the Western canon. In fact, Samantha seems to disdain all literature, much as many a freshman English student does. In fact, between her responses to her assignments and her blatantly-obvious-to-everyone-but-herself love of her professor, it's hard to decide which is the larger cliche. Of course there are also the overly dramatic responses to situations, lots of self-centered angst, the rift with her mother, the overuse of similes and metaphors, the choice of a dollar word when a nickel one would have done . . . the list of cliche techniques and situations just goes on and on. But - and this is a big but - in the end, it mostly works incredibly well.
Samantha is, after all, young (she's twenty but comes across as a teenager). Her father died in a fire several years earlier but appears to be leaving her clues to help find and solve the mystery of her inheritance--something he calls The Warnings of Experience--and she has quite a bit of emotional web untangling she needs to do. The fact that she does much of it by reading and analyzing poetry and novels, all while living in a tower at Oxford, gives the novel a great deal more appeal than it might otherwise have. Most of the interest in fact comes from the way author Catherine Lowell works literature and literary theory into the plot. Not much unexpected happens in the plot, or with the character development for that matter, but the journey through Samantha's coming to terms with her father's death and her family legacy is a pleasant one. The action pulls the story steadily forward, the characters are likable, and the questions that Samantha seeks answers to (calling it solving a mystery would be a bit strong) are intriguing enough to keep the reader involved. Add to that a clever plays on academic discussions and life - and even clever plays on and use of the cliches - and the novel is definitely worth reading.
However, do be warned. If you're looking for a body in a library - or any crime at all - you'll be disappointed. The mystery here is much more the general mystery of what it means to grow up and come to terms with loss (and love) than much of anything else. There are puzzles to be solved and clues to follow, but all are related to Samantha's growth as a person rather than really solving a mystery. The appeal of the novel will probably also be stronger if you're an English major than otherwise: Lowell captures the essence of that exceptionally well, leaving the reader to believe that she knows exactly what she's doing with her abundant use of all those stereotypes and cliches.
§ Meredith Frazier, a writer with a background in English literature, lives in Dallas, Texas
Reviewed by Meredith Frazier, April 2016
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