How Do I Love Thee?

April 20, 2009
The newest historical romance from Christy-winner Moser (Time Lottery
) is an imaginative biography of the 19th-century Victorian poet Elizabeth Barrett on her way to becoming the wife of fellow poet Robert Browning and the author of the sublimely romantic sonnets from the Portuguese, of which the titular poem is best known. After her brother died in a sailing accident, the grief-stricken, sickly Barrett became a recluse who was spirited from her attic hideaway by Browning; the two wed and fled to Italy, and Elizabeth's control freak of a father disinherited her. The outlines of her life make a great story, but Moser is really challenged to make dramatic hay out of Elizabeth's recluse period. As a guilt-stricken Victorian invalid, Elizabeth leads a highly interior life, so the reader awaiting a grand love story needs patience. The name of her future husband doesn't enter the action until more than a third of the way into the book. Moser has done wonderful homework and shares snippets of what she found in an appendix. The text of Barrett Browning's sonnets are a true bonus.

June 1, 2009
Poet Elizabeth Barrett is chronically illso much so that, under doctors ordersand her familys direction, she leaves London for the milder climate inTorquay, on the Devonshire coast. Although Elizabeths ill-fated brother Edward acts as her main caregiver, her tyrannical father tries to rule her life from afar. In her lonely room, Elizabeth pens verse and letters to friends as she languishes, certain her lot is that of a short-lived spinster. Then Robert Browning reads her poetry and begins corresponding with her. Thus begins one of the most famous love stories in history. Christy Award winner Moser tellsthe tale of Elizabeth and Robert from Elizabeths viewpoint, using the vernacular of the era. What makes her version unusual is her emphasis on Elizabeths great religious faith, not just her legendary romance, an approach that enforces the belief that a good poet is one of Gods singers.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)