Customer Reviews

The Favoured Child (Wideacre Trilogy 2)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Mysticism, romance, turbulence, rivalry, passion - a gripping historical novel. It is a shock to discover such a great author that I've been missing out on! What a great writer Philippa Gregory is.

The Favoured Child is a sequel to a book called Wideacre, but can equally as well be read on its own. I was over halfway through the book before I realised that I was reading the second book in a series. The story is set in late-eighteenth-century England, on a run-down landed estate on the South Downs, called Wideacre. The estate suffers from a legacy left by the previous Lacey landowner, Beatrice, who perished along with her beloved Wideacre Hall in a suspicious fire a few years previously. The estate is now bankrupt, the village poverty stricken, resentments are felt throughout the estate and this is the inheritance of the next two Lacey heirs, cousins Julia and Richard. The cousins have been growing up together under the protection of Julia's mother and family, in the shadow of the blackened ruins of the Hall, and with little money and just each other for company - friends, rivals and secretly betrothed since childhood, their relationship is a tempestuous one. Although they are to inherit jointly, there is an old saying in the village that only one can be the favoured child, only one of them can have the mystical relationship with the land traditionally passed down to each generation, a connection with the land that can bring fertility and prosperity back to the Wideacre estate; in truth only one of them can be the true Lacey heir.

I picked up this novel on a whim and am so glad I did. I used to read quite a lot of historical fiction and then gave them up when I found the plots were becoming quite thin and reedy, or too similar to each other. But now I've discovered Philippa Gregory I shall definitely be reading some more of her novels. There is nothing predictable about The Favoured Child. The historical background is superb (without being overly detailed) - the history does not intrude on the novel, it just adds to its richness and sense of drama. I'm looking forward to reading the final book of the trilogy, Meridon.

Having been introduced to Philippa Gregory via the brilliant and compelling 'Other Boleyn Girl' I was keen to get my hands on as many of her other books as possible. So far so good until I started reading the Wildacre trilogy. The first title in the series was gripping albeit dominated by unlikeable characters and miserable plotlines of incest and murder! I began 'The Favoured Child' in the hope that with the villains of the first book out of the way it would be a little more light-hearted and hopeful. Nope, still thoroughly depressing! My biggest issue is how Julia, the 'heroine' of the story keeps harping on about how much she loves Richard despite the fact he is a bully, rapist and serial killer. I liked her much more in the Bath chapters and was hoping that she would develop into a stronger and more powerful force in Wildacre. Instead I became increasingly more irritated with her as the book went on.

The Wildacre Trilogy was written much earlier in PG's career and I would recommend sticking with her more recent books, particularly those based around the Tudors. I am as yet undecided about reading the third Wildacre novel, only because I want to know how it all ends.

When I stumbled over "the other Boleyn girl" a few years back I was delighted to discover Philippa Gregory. I gulped that book up in a few days and read the whole Henry 8th series in one go. Since i have dipped into some of her earlier work and also recently bought a few of her newer ones ("the white queen" and others) but have been very disappointed. Her newer work retain her flowing prose but have become slightly dull. The earlier stuff is pretty terrible though. The Favoured child initially caught my interest but it is veeeeery long and about one third into the book i was struggling. The story is unbelievable and inconsistent throughout. The prose is unsure and there are too many repetitions of phrases and even long sections. It was lightly entertaining but stick to the Henry the 8th stuff and you will get Gregory at her best

Florid and overblown, with predictable characterisation and plot twists that an 8-year-old could see coming a mile off, this novel isn't a patch on Gregory's other books. Julia Lacey, the narrator and - apparently - heroine, is an irritating sap, and the other characters are 2-D mock-ups straight from a GCSE student's creative writing paper. The epilogue feels tacked on, and any initial sympathy for Julia quickly evaporates, leaving the reader dying to get to the end just so they can read something else!

If you thought it would get better with the next generation...Wrong!!
You need to read the first book in the trilogy to really get this book, and even then you will want to throw it across the room! Ok there was no psychological profiling in those days, but...hang on!! There is apparently no "oh dear, this small child seems to be a control freak/utter nutter" gut feeling going on either! I read it through gritted teeth! But it made an impression!

I read this having first finished "The other Boylne girl" and loving it, but I warn prospective buyers who also enjoyed Gregory's much better known book that her earlier work is just not up to standard.

"The favoured child" starts off promisingly, with the kind of deep emotional writing that Gregory does so well, but after the first half of the book (which, by the way, seems far too long for the relatively simple story that unfolds) it descends into the kind of melodramatic, mournfully escapist claptrap that gives historical novels such a bad name. Isn't a story that involves incest, insanity and betrayle exciting enough without resorting to vague hints at magic and prophecy? In fact I found it a little patronising, as if Gregory thought we couldn't handle the idea that this sort of thing could happen in the real world.

I was also irritated by the heroine's persistant refusal to grow a spine. Yes, I love my siblings too (not in the same way), but if they raped me, murdered my best friend and sabotaged my only chance at a loving relationship, I might not take their word as gospel.

It's this absolute refusal to create rationally behaving characters that lets this (and other works of Gregory) down; without the witchcraft her work would be gritty and emotionally challenging. With it, her books will be constantly labled as "chick lit", inferior versions of what Johanna Harris does so well.

'The Favoured Child' is the second book of the Wideacre trilogy, told from the POV of Julia, Beatrice's daughter. Julia, of course, doesn't known this. She's grown up believing that she's the daughter of her Mama, but as she says: 'Those are the facts. But there is also the truth.'

The truth is something which people avoid in this book. Lies surround Julia, and her cousin Richard. It's obvious from the start that something is not quite right with Richard: he bullies Julia, and he takes pleasure in her pain and fright. Taught by her mother that he is a boy and therefore is right to take the lead, Julia accepts his behaviour throughout their childhood, until the day when she has to defend him from the village children, scrawny and tough and ready to beat up any Lacey thanks to Beatrice's devastation of the estate. Julia comes through victorious, and it's an instance in a series of incidents where people prefer her to Richard. Whenever this happens - be it even with an animal - Richard becomes very jealous and angry, a lot like his mother. One of them is the Favoured Child - the one who will be blessed with Beatrice's ability to make the land green again. Richard is determined that this will be him, and the silent struggle is a constant theme thoughout the book.

However, despite the long flashbacks, the book nominally opens when Julia is twelve, and John McAndrew is finally returning home after some ventures in the East. He has earned some money as a doctor and is ready to set up Wideacre Estate once more. Julia and Richard are joint heirs, but they are both encouraged to marry people other than each other. The estate starts to slowly blossom again - and Julia blossoms with it, but in unpredictable ways. The past invades the present, and to make matters even more complicated, Ralph turns up. This is a great connection to the first book, and it helps you to see the contrast between Julia and Beatrice. Julia is at once far more conventional and far more gentle. She is not as mature as Beatrice was, and is more concerned about what people think. Julia's dreams become very lifelike and frightening. She manages to save a family from being killed in a fire, and it is revealed that she has 'the Sight', that is, the ability to see into the future.

This causes Celia and John to have a crisis discussion: Julia already resembles Beatrice physically, is she turning into her mentally too? Richard takes full advantage of the situation, refuses to tell Julia whether he's on her side or not, and the result is that Julia is packed off to Bath to take the waters and see the eighteenth-century equivalent of a psychiatrist. She misses Wideacre desperately, despite meeting a lovely young man and making friends. Her return to Wideacre is joyous, but the joy is short-lived. Richard is threatened by her new-found happiness, and his actions destroy everything, just as Beatrice's did. In the end, Julia must make a difficult choice, trapped both by her blood and her circumstances.

This book is rhythmic and haunting. It is sensual, but not as much so as 'Wideacre', and the ending is far more tragic. It is far easier to like Julia and to feel pity for her predicament. She really does go through hell. Once again, at the end, you realise that the Laceys are not quite through yet, although Julia's story is very much done.

This is the second book of the Wideacre series and this book continues to deal with the fallout of the train wreck that was Beatrice Lacy in the previous book. This time the protagonist is Julia Lacy, brought up as the daughter of the Henry and his wife Celia, but in reality is the one of the children of Henry and Beatrice, as is Richard, who is brought up as her cousin.

I liked the questions of the heir of Beatrice and so to the land that threaded through the book, and the early rivalry but affection between Julia and Richard. I also enjoyed that it wasn't so clear cut as to who it was in the end, both of them had her traits and connection with the land in separate ways. I liked the legend of Beatrice far better then I liked her as a protagonist so this was a welcome addition to the novel as was the appearance of Ralf for continuity. I did like Julia and she was a welcome change from Beatrice but I was also irritated by her inactively and passiveness when it came to the end of the novel. She does practically nothing to help herself after Richard rapes her, ruins her wedding to a man she loves, murders her friend and their guardians and then begins to ruin the estate. As a reader there was only so far sympathy and feeling sorry for the main charter can take the story so consequently I found the last part of the book very frustrating as Julia sits and lets her life be ruined by her husband-brother. I felt there were several opportunities both before and after her marriage to Richard for her to do something about the situation and she did nothing.

The novel also ended on what I felt was quite an implausible, erratic and generally odd note, which I won't spoil for people who haven't read it yet. Again there was more graphic incest, which I'm not the biggest fan of, at least in this book it began unknowingly, although unpleasantly Richard still forces Julia to stay married him after it is revealed. The historical scene was well set and the 18th century well described as in the previous novel, which I always like in historical novels.

Overall it is a good follow up to Wideacre and a novel that does grab the attention of the reader but the last part of the novel did fall quite flat for me unfortunately.

this book is fantastic, i highly recomend the other books to this trilogy. phillipa gregory is a genius in genral and i adore her books. I would recoment all her books, mostly the cousins war trilogy.

Another enjoyable read, although I found Julia a less interesting protagonist than Beatrice had been. She's much more of a victim and was too wet for my liking (particularly in relation to what she lets brother/cousin Richard get away with). There's also less story here than in Wideacre and it didn't really sustain the length of the book. Still, a good read but only really rewarding as part of the trilogy.