Review: A Woman of Influence by Rebecca Ann Collins
Bibliographic info: A Woman of Influence by Rebecca Ann Collins, Pride & Prejudice sequel series, Book 9, Sourcebooks Landmark, Pub. Date: June 1, 2010, ISBN: 978-1-4022-2451-5, 336 pages, List: $14.99. (Amazon: $10.19 / Kindle $9.99)
I came late to this series, so I first met Rebecca “Becky” Tate in Recollection of Rosings where she seemed a bit like one of those women who, at loose ends, trys to take charge of the lives of those around her. Becky, throughout that book, tried to impress upon her sister Catherine that her daughter was making the wrong match. Over the course of the novel, Becky began, as she became closer to her sister and reacquainted herself with Huntsford and the surrounding area, to realize that her London friends were not really friends at all. She began to question her values and just what she wanted to do with her life. Most of this story was in the background because Recollection of Rosings is Catherine’s story.
In A Woman of Influence, Becky Tate is the main character. She’s sold her London house and moved to Huntsford to the house that she fell in love with…Edgewater. She’s within walking distance of the small church that her father, Mr. Collins, preached at when she was a child, and to the home of her sister, Catherine, and also the school that she helped Catherine establish for children in the area. She’s changed her life and she’s content but feels restless and is often overwhelmed with grief when she thinks of the death of her daughter, Josie, and the estrangement that caused with the Darcys.
It is little wonder that Becky becomes embroiled in the life of a young woman and her child. The child was caught looking into the windows of Edgewater and he refused to say what he was doing there. The mother rushed up in time to explain that the child didn’t talk since his father was arrested. Becky thought the young woman was well-spoken and, concerned for the woman and her child found living rough, she employs the girl in her home. The girl’s story causes Becky to take an interest and she begins to unravel the threads of the story and to look into the facts. This task becomes difficult as Becky must find a solution that will bring the family together while managing to not let anyone involved know that she is looking into the legalities of the original arrest and testimony.
Becky’s quest to help this young girl is the thread that keeps you reading as she follows the clues and gathers information. There is a secondary love story as Becky once again meets a gentleman who had helped her through the worst of her grief after her daughter’s death. As they renew their acquaintance, they find that they pick up their friendship as if only a day had past rather than years. Will it deepen to true love? For that you’ll need to read the book.
Once again, Collins uses straight narrative from Becky’s point of view, mixed with letters, diary entries, and other material to lead us through the story and to fill us in on necessary information without having to resort to long information dumps. Though one could say the letters and the diary entries are just that — info dumps — they don’t feel like it to the reader because they fit so nicely into the setting of the story.
Rebecca Ann Collins’ writing is well paced but slower than many readers might be used to. However, it has much the same tone and pacing of the original Jane Austen Pride and Prejudice, which was the precursor to the series. Collins continues the characters of Pride and Prejudice, taking them forward in time and allowing them to change and grow with the changing times. The Appendix lists the main characters in the book and their relationships to each other. The main characters of Pride and Prejudice now have grandchildren and the world is changing around them.
Becky Tate was a women of her times with dreams and ambition that would be difficult to achieve for a woman. She married to achieve some of those goals. However, that marriage was a partnership rather than a love match and while she had much influence and did a lot of good with her charity work, she was dependent on her husband. In A Woman of Influence, you’ll see how much the world has changed and women have moved forward and gained some ability to steer their own course through life, but they are still not as free as women are today to be able to choose the life they wish to lead. It’s important to remember that Collins didn’t make up the rules that women in this period must live by, she’s only reflecting the historical period in which these books take place.
So, visit the world of the 1860s, take the time to slowing sink into the narrative and, for a while, enjoy a time when people took the time to talk to each other without a cell-phone or ipod in sight. Life was lived, at least on the economic level of our main characters, at a more leisurely pace. Curl up with this book and a cup of tea and enjoy.