This is literature

A couple of (mostly) positive reviews of Clare B. Dunkle's The House of Dead Maids:

Everyone who's read Emily Brontë's classic "Wuthering Heights" has theories about the origins of Heathcliff and such supernatural elements as Cathy's ghost. Author Clare B. Dunkle has turned her theories into an intriguing, enthralling prequel. (...)
"House of Dead Maids" may be a prequel, but it's an original in its own right, and you don't have to have read "Wuthering Heights" to appreciate it. Beautifully written and compelling, it loses a little steam at midpoint but quickly picks up again. Tabby's tale will carry you along to its chilling end. (Sarah Bryan Miller in Saint Louis Post-Dispatch)

The San Antonio writer, known for her gothic fantasy novels and her dystopian science fiction, knows whereof she speaks. A glance at her website turns up the equivalent of a small dissertation's worth of research into every nook and cranny of Emily Brontë's life and her unlikely novel. Dunkle admits that "Wuthering Heights" snared her as child and that the spell remains unbroken. Thus did she come to write "The House of the Dead Maids," a prequel to Bronte's masterpiece. Herein we learn the mysterious origins of 19th century English literature's most mysterious character, Heathcliff. (...)
Given its "Young Adult" category, one is tempted to class "The House of the Dead Maids" along with other contemporary scary fiction of the "Twilight" variety. Except this is literature. As such, Dunkle leaves no literary allusion untouched, no symbolic leaf unturned, in her quest to reveal the origins of Heathcliff and his unearthly yearning for Catherine Earnshaw-Linton. And real literature is a generally a good deal more frightening, when it intends to be, than any pulp horror story could ever hope to be. (Bryce Milligan in San Antonio Express-News)

Deseret News reviews April Lindner's Jane. Take care because the 'review' contains several spoilers. The reviewer seems to be horrified by the differences between the original Jane Eyre and Jane which is a bit perplexing. If you want to read exactly the same novel, why don't you just pick up Charlotte Brontë's original?

Fans of Charlotte Brontë's gothic novel "Jane Eyre" will most likely pick up April Lindner's "Jane" with great anticipation.
The cover is perfect, haunting and lonely. And the idea, a modern retelling of Bronte's classic, intriguing. It's unfortunate, however, that "Jane" does not live up to expectations. (...)
From the first pages, readers will want to like this book, and they probably will — mostly. Lindner captures the ambiance of "Jane Eyre" perfectly. The mood and pacing are spot on.
Jane has the right amount of timidity and Nico (Mr. Rochester to Brontë fans) is arrogant and compelling.
But Lindner's characters are flawed, and this is where the story goes awry.
Spoiler: In Brontë's version, Jane is pure and holds fast to her morals. Her relationship with Mr. Rochester remains chaste. In Lindner's novel, Jane sleeps with Nico before he even proposes. Though tastefully told, there's more to this scene than necessary. The innocence that makes "Jane Eyre" a classic is lost, and that's disappointing.
The language in "Jane" is also jarring. The use of the f-word and other profanity feels out of place and slows the reader, rather than pulling them in.
There are so many positives in "Jane" that one wants to like it. And for those less sensitive to language or not as worried about staying true to source material, "Jane" will be an enjoyable read. But for many, the negatives will outweigh the positives. (Jessica Harrison)

The Telegraph (Calcutta) reviews Rabindranath Tagore — Portrayal of Memories by Avhik Kumar Dey and mentions this nice Jane Eyre anecdote:

Bela [Rabindranath Tagore's five-year-old daughter] wrote that as her mother had been reading all day, it was not possible for her to write to her husband. Mrinalini [his wife] could have been engrossed in a new story by her sister-in-law, Swarna Kumari Devi (one of the earliest Bengali women novelists), a Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay novel — or perhaps an edited version of Jane Eyre...  (Malavika Karlekar)

Read on Petronella Wyatt's column in the Daily Mail:

Why are people always talking about love? From Jane Eyre to Mad Men, it’s all the same. The trouble with the love lobby is that it trivialises all the more interesting possibilities life holds out, and distracts us from exploring them.

Decatur Daily talks about ghosts stories:

“The romanticism of ghost stories, especially to white women, appeals to a lot of people,” [Jessica Penot, author of a new book, Haunted North Alabama] said. “I think it connects with the same type of people who would like Gothic romance novels, like Wuthering Heights. (Paul Huggins)

The Star (Malaysia) mentions Jane Slayre in an article about mash-up novels; Laura's Miscellaneous Musings talks about the new Jane Eyre 1970 DVD release; The Occasional Sin reviews Wide Sargasso Sea; A Novel Idea: Confessions of book buying addict posts about Jane Eyre 2006. A curious picture on Flickr: the cover of a Portuguese 1965 edition of Jane Eyre by rgrant_97. Finally, ratoviejo has uploaded to YouTube a video with stills from Cumbres Borrascosas 1976, a Venezuelan soap-opera that adapted Wuthering Heights in... 48 one-hour episodes! The writer was Delia Fiallo.

Categories: Books, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, References, Sequels, Wuthering Heights