Negative Positive
Title: A "romance," alright
Review: I started to read Jamaica Inn in preparation for seeing the HItchcock film of it, so I could appreciate how much and how well or ill the adaptation of it was. I put the book down after about 140 pages. It has utterly no sense of period, just like the standard historical-romance novels of 2011. It's set some time shortly after the Napoleonic Wars concluded (1815), but might be happening in 1715, 1615, or even 1915, as long as the references to the nineteenth century were changed or expunged. Du Maurier's ear is strictly middle-of-the-road 1930s; she apparently couldn't even appreciate the Cornish accents among which she lived. The flatness of her diction makes the heavy sentiments that course through the book seem forced and artificial, and the characters seem hackneyed. If you're looking for richness of language and convincing realization of period and place, don't bother with Jamaica Inn.
Is the review positive or negative? 