Agnes Grey - Anne Bronte (Book)

Agnes Grey - Anne Bronte.

I do a lot of pleasant mistakes (at times) when it comes to picking the right or wrong books :). Like last year when I was going through the used book collection at Blossoms, I picked up so many amazing names, without reading the blurbs or cover or back pages or any kind of research on writer or the book. That's typically me for you, if you do not know me. So, as soon as my eyes landed on a book with it's side wall saying "Bronte" I just picked it up and put it in my cart :) and what a brilliant decision that was, I must tell you post reading the book. She happens to be the youngest of the Bronte children and her other sisters have written some brilliant books like "Wuthering Heights" and "Jane Eyre" etc and they even had a lesser known brother too who was more a painter than a writer. Those two super known books are anyways in my radar to be read soon and I am glad that I started with Anne's Agnes Grey which turned out to be a brilliantly simple yet totally heart touching account of a maid to be young girl, who goes through her own set of struggles to make the ends meet from a lower middle class family back in the day. Now that is another thing which keeps pulling me (time and again) to British Authors, the way they play with the language, the details, the terms (which send me looking for a dictionary) and they always put a wide smile on my face.

Terrific story of Agnes Grey whose only aspiration is to become a housemaid to help her struggling family make the ends meet. She is good in a few things, knows multiple languages, fills up as a house tutor to young kids and to take care of the grown ups to make them better, how she handles all that for two opposite families is the entire book in her own words with a little of her own private story. Although the story is a proper British drama full of humor, philosophy, a little sadness and a little twist there but it is no less than a thriller if you ask me (about the ending), it almost had my heart in my mouth for once. These days and especially with the kind of books coming my way, I am never too sure as what to expect from a particular Author and Bronte sister (as far as I know) are exceptional in all departments. I loved the way she kept the reader in me involved with the story, it works wonders when she left so much for my own imagination and claims that she doesn't want to bore the reader with unnecessary details and I was delighted to see that she had offered so much in almost 300 pages (only) that I kept asking for more. The kind of families that she faces in her initial years of being a maid and the characters that she comes across from different walks of life teach us readers so much about the human behavior. It was an amazing experience to see that kind of story coming from such a young soul that too from her own personal experience, was simply too good. But the best part of the book is her own underrated love story which I totally loved but I refuse to talk about it :), you've got to read the book to know anything about it.

Have you read anything from the Bronte Sisters? Do let me know which one is your favorite as my next from them will definitely be Wuthering Heights followed by Jane Eyre :) giving me taste of the remaining two sisters. But if you haven't read nothing from them yet, I very highly recommend you start with Anne Bronte's Agnes Grey, enough to fall in love with.