May and Amy: A True Story of Family, Forbidden Love, and the Secret Lives of May Gaskell, Her Daughter Amy, and Sir Edward Burne-Jones
Starred Review. The Victorian era's convoluted romances are famously entertaining: men and women, married (but not to each other), exchanging passionate letters and whispering endearments yet frequently remaining virtuous in their actions. May Gaskell, a proper British society woman at the turn of the 20th century, was no stranger to these fervent friendships. For six years, the unhappily married Gaskell corresponded romantically with Edward Burne-Jones, the pre-Raphaelite artist. Each promised to destroy the other's letters, but Gaskell, comforted by rereading them, preserved hers for "those who come after." These letters—as well as period novels, Burne-Jones's paintings and family photographs—reveal Gaskell family secrets and tragedies, including the strange death of Gaskell's daughter Amy ("all anyone seemed to have been told was that she had died young,  'of a broken heart' "). Cookbook author and food columnist Dimbleby became obsessed with unraveling the mysteries of May (her great-grandmother) and Amy, and she successfully draws readers into her dramatic search. The facts of daily late-Victorian life  are captivating enough, but add to this Gaskell's circle of friends—including Henry James and Rudyard Kipling—and the intrigues surrounding Amy's love life (her younger sister married a man who pined for Amy), and this family memoir is riveting. Photos, drawings.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.