Finally, finally, after waiting through many, many holds, the Rebecca audiobook became available at my local library. Since I first dipped a tentative toe in the Gothic genre, Rebecca has sung a siren song. 

The narrator and protagonist of Rebecca is an unnamed, introverted woman with lots of book smarts and anxiety. While working as a lady’s companion to the loud Mrs. Van Hopper in Monte Carlo, she meets equally introverted Maxim de Winter, who broods like a chicken over of the egg of his past marriage and the decline of his family estate, Manderley. The pair get on famously. They enjoy avoiding large crowds, chatting to each other, petting dogs, seeing the sights, and encouraging the narrator’s new hobby of painting watercolor landscapes. Love is in the air. When Mrs. Van Hopper abruptly decides to leave Monte Carlo, the narrator and Maxim despair at ever seeing each other again. To avoid any separation, Maxim proposes that the narrator marry him. The nervous narrator accepts. While she loves Maxim, she already knows many more anxieties lay ahead. She’s never had much spending money, much less run a grand estate like Manderley. 

The above is possibly the silliest summary of Rebecca ever, but I wanted to emphasize how, underneath all the haunted house trappings, Rebecca is a down-to-earth, mid-20s-coming-of-age love story. I wish there were more ghost stories that wove together love and specters so beautifully. Throughout the book, little hints drop like breadcrumbs, revealing that Mr. and Mrs. de Winter are compatible from the get-go and do love each other. Their relationship struggles with their different socio-economic backgrounds, Mrs. de Winter’s social anxiety, and Mr. de Winter’s obliviousness to feminine expectations and social roles. They hold too much of themselves back; hemmed in by what they think the other wants. A certain duo’s outside interference doesn’t help. The twist was like dam explosion on an emotional level. Suddenly, the honesty and clear communication their marriage desperately needed burst readily available. While the novel ends in fire, I got the sense that the de Winters have the most felicitous of marriages. 

After the Monte Carlo sequence, the book moves to Manderley proper, and the plot dragged after umpteenth scene of Mrs. de Winter being embarrassed. Even the lush, spooky atmosphere couldn’t make up for it. Thankfully, the twist sped the pace back up. This issue with the pacing won’t diminish my 5 star rating. Like other reviewers have noted, Rebecca is the gold standard of the “haunted house without a ghost” genre. Mrs. Danvers is a lesbian literary icon for good reason. The audiobook performance is phenomenal, and I can’t help but think worth the wait. 

Happily, Rebecca more than lives up to its reputation. Du Maurier came into her art with this novel.