This book was a mess, and it’s too bad. The protagonist had some similarities to Anne Shirley, which was very welcome, but the book was all over the place. The tone shifts confusingly. The middle bit reads like a Victorian “Emma”, with dances and matchmaking and dresses and balls. The mystery isn’t much of one, and it is hardly Gothic. It was too many things smashed into one novel and none of them were able to shine.