desertcart.com: Forever Amber (Audible Audio Edition): Kathleen Winsor, Elizabeth Jasicki, Audible Studios: Books Review: The Great Unsurpassed Restoration Epic - This is the best of all the historic English romantic novels, the only book written by any novelist that is equal to the great classic American romantic novel Gone With The Wind. As with GWTW, you are hooked from the first page, but while you always root for the heroine Amber St. Clare, she is more cunning, seductive, and immoral than even the ruthless, self-absorbed Scarlett O'Hara. The Restoration era of the 1660s was as intriguing a time in English history as was the American Civil War of the 1860s, and Kathleen Winsor creates a drama that runs parallel to the heroine's story featuring the real historic figures of that time until the two stories intersect and merge into one great melodrama. This is the most fascinating aspect of this wonderful tome. Many of the people at the court of King Charles II, for whom the fictional Amber becomes the favored mistress toward the end of the tale, were likewise ancestors of the late Diana, Princess of Wales, her fourth cousin/sister-in-law Sarah Ferguson, and Diana's hated nemesis Camilla, now the Duchess of Cornwall. In fact all three were/are descendents of the King through his mistress Barbara Villiers (a main character in the novel as well as being Amber's most dangerous rival) and both Sarah and Diana had/have multiple lines leading back to the illegitimate children of Charles and the prostitute Lucy Walters. As such this novel may also serve as a reliable source for historical research. Winsor is said to have read every major work published on the Restoration period when her first husband did his graduate thesis on King Charles II, and spent four years writing the book. When it was finally published, it became an immediate best-seller, just like GWTW. By the time it was adapted for the screen, she was married to her second husband bandleader Artie Shaw, who divorced her amid acrimonious circumstances. Winsor did some major research and it shows in her expert crafting of time and place and her exquisite attention to period details and character portraits, both real and imagined. Knowing what I know now about Diana, Sarah, and Camilla, I'm certain that all three would have thrived at the decadent court of the Merry Monarch, as the philandering Charles was aptly called. Whether they could have dealt cleverly with a scheming vixen like Amber St. Clare, I'm not so sure. But then again, Amber is only a fictional heroine, and this is not a true story, but what a story it is! I think the book had such a great impact back in 1944 because women weren't as independent as we are now, and the main character had such a randy reputation and a sexual freedom unknown to most American women in the post-war years, outside of Hollywood, of course. Village-bred Amber is seduced at the age of sixteen (the same age Scarlett is at the beginning of GWTW) by twice-her-age Bruce, the aristocratic Lord Carlton, a titled rogue who rogers maids left and right when he isn't at sea (the true love of his life). Baron Carlton leaves her alone in London, unaware that she is pregnant with his son, although he leaves her some money to invest with his favorite banker. She ignores his advice, marries a scoundrel, and is soon dispatched to Newgate Prison for debt. There she meets a highwayman who engineers her escape from jail, and from there she manages to invest her ill-gotten gains more wisely, falls in love frequently, becomes a stage actress, marries a much older Puritan widower for his money (a friend of Bruce Carlton's), becomes pregnant with another of Bruce's bastards, all the while disarming her religious in-laws of their justly-held suspicions. The one she doesn't fool is her step-daughter Jemima, a beautiful fifteen-year-old virgin, who hates her young step-mother, but like her, is naive enough to be seduced and made pregnant by the gallant Bruce Carlton, a bounder of a baron if there ever was one. Another interesting aspect to this long, but never boring, classic is the relationship between Amber and Bruce Carlton, the great love of her life. She remains obsessed with him throughout the novel's progress just as Scarlett is hopelessly drawn toward the unobtainable Ashley Wilkes. But just as Ashley marries Melanie Hamilton instead of Scarlett, Bruce Carlton will also marry a woman other than Amber. But whereas the aristocratic Ashley (brave on the battlefield but not in the real world) is a weak character emotionally and financially dependent upon women, Bruce is so much like Rhett Butler, a strong, fiercely independent man who takes what life has to offer with both hands out and no regrets. Talk about an irony. There is more drama to this great novel than the blockbuster 1948 movie starring Linda Darnell and Cornel Wilde. Much of what is in the novel is not included in the film, except for the Newgate prison sequence, Amber's becoming an actress, and the real-life 1665 plague and the 1666 Great Fire of London. Indeed, the screen version is virtually rated PG compared to the rated R novel. They really had to tone things down. Back in the day, the Catholic Church warned people that they would be excommunicated if they were caught going to the theater to see this movie or reading the book. In the movie, the relationship between Amber and her middle-aged husband the Earl of Radcliffe (her third husband in the book) is likewise a union of ulterior motives and full-blown hate. The sinister old Earl meets the same fate in the book as in the film, but not before killing his only son who has an affair with Amber (this is also not in the film), thus setting the heroine free to have other affairs, specifically with the King himself. But in the film Amber does not become pregnant with the King's child as she does in the novel. Also, in the movie version, Amber has only one child out of wedlock with Carlton. The book is much more explicit. I know people think I have spilled too many beans about this story, but I've only scratched the surface. If they were to do a remake of the 1948 classic, we'd see the entire novel on the screen; it would be R-rated and nothing would be left to the imagination. Wouldn't Kathleen Winsor, who passed away in 2003, be amazed? Review: Could Have Been a Restoration Gone With the Wind . . . - Even though Kathleen Winsor wrote "Forever Amber" in 1944, the willful self-possession depicted in her protagonist, endows the she-devil courtesan Amber St. Claire with a permanent ranking as one of the all time most unforgettable divas of the historical romance genre. Over 900 pages long, "Forever Amber," stands the test of time, portraying the Restoration court of Charles II with a well-researched authenticity and pragmatic candor that needs not rely on the bodice ripping details of more modern romantic classics. Rather, Winsor's novel moves with the swift frenzy of the author's featured venues: the Great Fire of London and the undiscriminating Black Plague. Her main character glides toward her goal with the unstoppable force of a hurricane and whether worthy or not, the reader cannot help but applaud her ascent and breathlessly await and bewail her ultimate failure to learn life's greatest lesson. Sounds familiar? Change the venue to plantation America and another Civil War and you just might be skimming the pages of " Gone with the Wind ." Humble, Amber is not. She follows the archetype of Scarlett O'Hara--the beautiful woman who can have anyone but nevertheless relentlessly pursues her man no matter how badly he disappoints her. Lovely, ruthless and clearly conscience-free, she embodies the mores of a time when the most essential asset for a woman was not only her beauty but, her ability to utilize her brainpower under its guise. Instinctively knowing that a thrilling destiny lies ahead within the capital city, sixteen-year-old Amber gambles running off with cavalier Bruce Carlson whom she loves unconditionally from the very start. Whether or not her obsessive and sometimes reckless love for him self-serves to achieve further aggrandizement of the most esurient nature, the reader cannot help but applaud her expectations, revel in her successes and yet simultaneously understand her desire for the one thing she cannot obtain. Everyone admires and cannot help be fascinated by the beautiful villainess who will stop at nothing to achieve her goals. From the get-go, the reader knows all too well that Amber like Scarlett may get her man when the convenience of time and place is in her favor. The long run, however speaks for itself. The published novel supposedly is only one fifth of that which Winsor originally intended. At the end of the novel, Amber remains, at a few years short of thirty, at the top of her game. Winsor keeps her the one constant in her illustrative equation depicting yet another age of corrupt morals and wildly schemed machinations leading to the accrual of wealth and power. Her motivation steers her steadily toward what she thinks she desires most, position and privilege that will elevate her status to that acceptable for a marriage with Lord Carlton. In the course of the novel, Amber rises to the top of her materialistic world, but fails to change within; her soul does not transform in any way--she remains forever the hard yet outwardly beautiful substance for which she is named. For this reviewer, this is why Forever Amber, although a delightful read for many reasons fails to fully engage the emotions. Allowing Amber to realize her folly through some cathartic moment rather than continue along the same self-serving reiterative drive would have allowed some empathy to enter what is only an arena of self-destruction and disappointment. Better to have had Amber see Lord Carlton, as Scarlett eventually sees Ashley, for what he is--an unfulfilled dream with little substance. What is needed in Forever Amber is the Rhett Butler archetype--a man of character entering her life to show her what she needs to know for further inner development. Forever Amber fails to capture the full story of Amber St. Claire in a more satisfying literary way despite its historical accuracy and insightful portrayal of the ultimate in scheming females. Bottom line? "Forever Amber" will entertain on many levels and in many respects remains a classic of historical romance. In terms of story structure, it fails in that its main character, the at-times despicable and all-times superficial, Amber St. Claire really does not grow inwardly in any outstanding way. She remains a fixed entity in which the wonderful kaleidoscope of Britain's Restoration age wheels about her providing for her an illusory smorgasbord of all things material from which she can grab. Author Winsor creates a huge tome of a book of page-turning enjoyment that stands the test of best-selling time. Recommended. Diana Faillace Von Behren "reneofc"
K**R
The Great Unsurpassed Restoration Epic
This is the best of all the historic English romantic novels, the only book written by any novelist that is equal to the great classic American romantic novel Gone With The Wind. As with GWTW, you are hooked from the first page, but while you always root for the heroine Amber St. Clare, she is more cunning, seductive, and immoral than even the ruthless, self-absorbed Scarlett O'Hara. The Restoration era of the 1660s was as intriguing a time in English history as was the American Civil War of the 1860s, and Kathleen Winsor creates a drama that runs parallel to the heroine's story featuring the real historic figures of that time until the two stories intersect and merge into one great melodrama. This is the most fascinating aspect of this wonderful tome. Many of the people at the court of King Charles II, for whom the fictional Amber becomes the favored mistress toward the end of the tale, were likewise ancestors of the late Diana, Princess of Wales, her fourth cousin/sister-in-law Sarah Ferguson, and Diana's hated nemesis Camilla, now the Duchess of Cornwall. In fact all three were/are descendents of the King through his mistress Barbara Villiers (a main character in the novel as well as being Amber's most dangerous rival) and both Sarah and Diana had/have multiple lines leading back to the illegitimate children of Charles and the prostitute Lucy Walters. As such this novel may also serve as a reliable source for historical research. Winsor is said to have read every major work published on the Restoration period when her first husband did his graduate thesis on King Charles II, and spent four years writing the book. When it was finally published, it became an immediate best-seller, just like GWTW. By the time it was adapted for the screen, she was married to her second husband bandleader Artie Shaw, who divorced her amid acrimonious circumstances. Winsor did some major research and it shows in her expert crafting of time and place and her exquisite attention to period details and character portraits, both real and imagined. Knowing what I know now about Diana, Sarah, and Camilla, I'm certain that all three would have thrived at the decadent court of the Merry Monarch, as the philandering Charles was aptly called. Whether they could have dealt cleverly with a scheming vixen like Amber St. Clare, I'm not so sure. But then again, Amber is only a fictional heroine, and this is not a true story, but what a story it is! I think the book had such a great impact back in 1944 because women weren't as independent as we are now, and the main character had such a randy reputation and a sexual freedom unknown to most American women in the post-war years, outside of Hollywood, of course. Village-bred Amber is seduced at the age of sixteen (the same age Scarlett is at the beginning of GWTW) by twice-her-age Bruce, the aristocratic Lord Carlton, a titled rogue who rogers maids left and right when he isn't at sea (the true love of his life). Baron Carlton leaves her alone in London, unaware that she is pregnant with his son, although he leaves her some money to invest with his favorite banker. She ignores his advice, marries a scoundrel, and is soon dispatched to Newgate Prison for debt. There she meets a highwayman who engineers her escape from jail, and from there she manages to invest her ill-gotten gains more wisely, falls in love frequently, becomes a stage actress, marries a much older Puritan widower for his money (a friend of Bruce Carlton's), becomes pregnant with another of Bruce's bastards, all the while disarming her religious in-laws of their justly-held suspicions. The one she doesn't fool is her step-daughter Jemima, a beautiful fifteen-year-old virgin, who hates her young step-mother, but like her, is naive enough to be seduced and made pregnant by the gallant Bruce Carlton, a bounder of a baron if there ever was one. Another interesting aspect to this long, but never boring, classic is the relationship between Amber and Bruce Carlton, the great love of her life. She remains obsessed with him throughout the novel's progress just as Scarlett is hopelessly drawn toward the unobtainable Ashley Wilkes. But just as Ashley marries Melanie Hamilton instead of Scarlett, Bruce Carlton will also marry a woman other than Amber. But whereas the aristocratic Ashley (brave on the battlefield but not in the real world) is a weak character emotionally and financially dependent upon women, Bruce is so much like Rhett Butler, a strong, fiercely independent man who takes what life has to offer with both hands out and no regrets. Talk about an irony. There is more drama to this great novel than the blockbuster 1948 movie starring Linda Darnell and Cornel Wilde. Much of what is in the novel is not included in the film, except for the Newgate prison sequence, Amber's becoming an actress, and the real-life 1665 plague and the 1666 Great Fire of London. Indeed, the screen version is virtually rated PG compared to the rated R novel. They really had to tone things down. Back in the day, the Catholic Church warned people that they would be excommunicated if they were caught going to the theater to see this movie or reading the book. In the movie, the relationship between Amber and her middle-aged husband the Earl of Radcliffe (her third husband in the book) is likewise a union of ulterior motives and full-blown hate. The sinister old Earl meets the same fate in the book as in the film, but not before killing his only son who has an affair with Amber (this is also not in the film), thus setting the heroine free to have other affairs, specifically with the King himself. But in the film Amber does not become pregnant with the King's child as she does in the novel. Also, in the movie version, Amber has only one child out of wedlock with Carlton. The book is much more explicit. I know people think I have spilled too many beans about this story, but I've only scratched the surface. If they were to do a remake of the 1948 classic, we'd see the entire novel on the screen; it would be R-rated and nothing would be left to the imagination. Wouldn't Kathleen Winsor, who passed away in 2003, be amazed?
D**N
Could Have Been a Restoration Gone With the Wind . . .
Even though Kathleen Winsor wrote "Forever Amber" in 1944, the willful self-possession depicted in her protagonist, endows the she-devil courtesan Amber St. Claire with a permanent ranking as one of the all time most unforgettable divas of the historical romance genre. Over 900 pages long, "Forever Amber," stands the test of time, portraying the Restoration court of Charles II with a well-researched authenticity and pragmatic candor that needs not rely on the bodice ripping details of more modern romantic classics. Rather, Winsor's novel moves with the swift frenzy of the author's featured venues: the Great Fire of London and the undiscriminating Black Plague. Her main character glides toward her goal with the unstoppable force of a hurricane and whether worthy or not, the reader cannot help but applaud her ascent and breathlessly await and bewail her ultimate failure to learn life's greatest lesson. Sounds familiar? Change the venue to plantation America and another Civil War and you just might be skimming the pages of " Gone with the Wind ." Humble, Amber is not. She follows the archetype of Scarlett O'Hara--the beautiful woman who can have anyone but nevertheless relentlessly pursues her man no matter how badly he disappoints her. Lovely, ruthless and clearly conscience-free, she embodies the mores of a time when the most essential asset for a woman was not only her beauty but, her ability to utilize her brainpower under its guise. Instinctively knowing that a thrilling destiny lies ahead within the capital city, sixteen-year-old Amber gambles running off with cavalier Bruce Carlson whom she loves unconditionally from the very start. Whether or not her obsessive and sometimes reckless love for him self-serves to achieve further aggrandizement of the most esurient nature, the reader cannot help but applaud her expectations, revel in her successes and yet simultaneously understand her desire for the one thing she cannot obtain. Everyone admires and cannot help be fascinated by the beautiful villainess who will stop at nothing to achieve her goals. From the get-go, the reader knows all too well that Amber like Scarlett may get her man when the convenience of time and place is in her favor. The long run, however speaks for itself. The published novel supposedly is only one fifth of that which Winsor originally intended. At the end of the novel, Amber remains, at a few years short of thirty, at the top of her game. Winsor keeps her the one constant in her illustrative equation depicting yet another age of corrupt morals and wildly schemed machinations leading to the accrual of wealth and power. Her motivation steers her steadily toward what she thinks she desires most, position and privilege that will elevate her status to that acceptable for a marriage with Lord Carlton. In the course of the novel, Amber rises to the top of her materialistic world, but fails to change within; her soul does not transform in any way--she remains forever the hard yet outwardly beautiful substance for which she is named. For this reviewer, this is why Forever Amber, although a delightful read for many reasons fails to fully engage the emotions. Allowing Amber to realize her folly through some cathartic moment rather than continue along the same self-serving reiterative drive would have allowed some empathy to enter what is only an arena of self-destruction and disappointment. Better to have had Amber see Lord Carlton, as Scarlett eventually sees Ashley, for what he is--an unfulfilled dream with little substance. What is needed in Forever Amber is the Rhett Butler archetype--a man of character entering her life to show her what she needs to know for further inner development. Forever Amber fails to capture the full story of Amber St. Claire in a more satisfying literary way despite its historical accuracy and insightful portrayal of the ultimate in scheming females. Bottom line? "Forever Amber" will entertain on many levels and in many respects remains a classic of historical romance. In terms of story structure, it fails in that its main character, the at-times despicable and all-times superficial, Amber St. Claire really does not grow inwardly in any outstanding way. She remains a fixed entity in which the wonderful kaleidoscope of Britain's Restoration age wheels about her providing for her an illusory smorgasbord of all things material from which she can grab. Author Winsor creates a huge tome of a book of page-turning enjoyment that stands the test of best-selling time. Recommended. Diana Faillace Von Behren "reneofc"
S**K
A book I had meant to add to my personal book collection but never managed. Arrived carefully packed and secure. A brilliant read, a famous story about a young woman looking to improve her situation in life, becoming along the way, mistress of King Charles II. She experiences terrifying events such as the Great Fire of London, and the plague that infected and killed so many people. The book arrived, carefully packaged and secure, in perfect condition and the driver followed instructions, for which I am well satisfied. Thank you for a great service, much appreciated to Amazon. This is a great read especially for this cold time of year.
L**H
Based on the two tragedies that took place in the 17th century during the reign of Charles II, this historical novel based on the character of Amber is a masterpiece; the twists and turns are numerous and the suspense is so gripping that it is difficult to put down. I hardly ever give 5 stars but this one deserves it. I highly recommend it
E**1
Brilliant book! Every woman needs to read it for survival. Amber is a survivor, As a heroine she is unique. It is the best "Can't put it down" book I have even known. Try it on your adolescent female teenager.
R**L
Nice book worth reading 📚 👌
L**S
Having read this book as a young girl I thought it would be lovely to read again as an adult. I also bought it for my granddaughter Amber for when she is older.
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