Thank you so much! I like historical fiction but religion bores me a lot, I wasn't sure if it was major in like a huge focus of the book or if Will is a side character or something. I think this is probably not for me.
I am from the most atheistic country in Europe so I am not religious myself but there is not much religion. Not really. It is more about Will´s inner struggle where he tries to fight the superstition with a reason, not faith. There are about four short lines in the church and one religion vs science discussion between Cora and Will. Where you find out Will is more of a reasonable person who happens to believe in the God but in more ..."he is in trees" way than in the Bible. Not sure if it makes sense. It is so well described in the book
It is a bit weird animal, this book. I think it is much more about an identity than anything else. The main heroine, Cora, is not exactly fitting her times, either. She is excited to discover but was trapped in the marriage, she doesn´t want to love. And doesn´t know how to do it. There are hints that she doesn´t know how to behave as a *woman* and then she meets Will, who is a faithful husband, thinks similarly to her and yet...he doesn´t. Really, as I said, I can definitely see why Tom is drawn to that character and why he probably spent some time analyzing the book
There are also other characters, who are intersting and as I said, it is more about a description of lives of several people at a certain point of time.
I think the fascinating part is that the "relationship" between Cora and will is partially in letters. Big chunk of the book are letters and they even move story froward. Cora is not even much at the end of the book and spends majority of the time communicating in letters.
I am not trying to convince you to try and read it but it is really beautifully written and it would be a shame to miss it just because there are about twenty lines about religion, where the word "God" is not even mentioned that much
There is one part of a chapter where Will doubts his faith (at that point, it makes total sense) but it is, again, internal emotional struggle.
Even at the time when I read it, Will was the most interesting character for me (I didn´t know Tom was going to play him). He is consistent, steady, yet full of doubt after he meets Cora but remains true to himself. While Cora is....not so consistent and falls a bit into "unlikeable" sometimes but I think it was intentional because it was supposed to show her emotional immaturity given she was 19 when she got married and never really got much of a chance to learn about *how* to feel. I can definitely see why any actress would be drawn to her as well.
And for the record, I think Claire Danes is much better choice than Keira Knightley who was originally set to play her.
Gosh, that´s long, sorry! But you can see how much I enjoyed the book
I usually get to read about 4 books per month so when something gets me so much and I remember that much, you can say that I really loved the book
