Nancy Mitford

The Pursuit of Love: Fast, merry, and delightful.  The entire story reads like a friend gossiping to you, without becoming trite in any way.  Though it took place during wartime, the tone consistently stayed bright throughout, and delivered plenty of humor to keep me engaged as I sped through every sentence.  The contrast between the narrator and Linda was just right, too, I think, and I really do think that Mitford is a very engaging storyteller.  This is very much a woman's novel, and I could imagine it to be the equivalent of chick lit today in its day, but it's in no way a guilty read.  The way it ended!  Hilarious! "The doctors who said that Linda ought never to have another child were not such idiots after all.  It killed her."  Bam. She died. So to the point out of nowhere when the whole story was about her.  So randomly brilliant, I'm still recovering.

Love in a Cold Climate: If Linda is a whirlwind, Polly is a stone.  Unlike the Alconleighs, who were so personable and warm, the Montdores are distant and chilly.  With The Pursuit of Love, I felt drawn in and included, whereas with Love in a Cold Climate I felt distant and a bit melancholy.  It felt, too, a bit older (matured), like our eyes were opened to the truth whereas in Linda's story we were all (quite obviously) blinded by youth and romance.  Mitford's wit was still there, and there were spells of humor from the first story that would occasionally peek out, winking at you, but altogether, the two are very different stories curiously spanning the same periods.  With Lady Matdores' superficiality, however, Cold Climate felt a little more mainstream to stories of aristocracy, and therefore slightly less original.

The biggest mystery to me though, is why everyone loves Davey so much, and seriously, how isn't he gay?