Finished The Battle of Life: A Love Story, my 2012 Dickens read. Published in 1846, it's one of Dickens' Christmas Books. Like Alcott's Moods which I just finished, The Battle of Life features a threesome of young people in love, Alfred, and sisters Grace and Marion. Rather than marry the wrong person, Marion who is promised to Albert, stages an elopement with another man in order to set the scene for Albert and Grace to fall in love. Marion is then lost to her family for six years. She is thought to be the wife of Michael Warden, a questionable young man who has left England. In reality she has been living, unmarried, with her Aunt Martha until the lives of Albert and Grace are fully and happily entwined. She then returns to her family to reveal her selfless plan. While she loved Alfred dearly, she knew that Grace was the right wife for him, not herself.
I began reading this novella back in December, but put it down in the business of things. Having now finished it I can say it was a pleasant read with lovely illustrations by a variety of artists. The plot of misunderstandings had a decidedly Shakespearean lilt to it.
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