The Bolter

A time piece into a period of English aristocracy history.

The writing, coming from an English major, from one of England's finest institutions, was shockingly poor. The book was a satisfying airplane book. It rounded out the edges from a familiar upper crust society, decadent with morals, self-absorption, entitlement and grandiosity. Their meaningless and purposeless lives, heavy in judgement and criticism of others that they thought less of, their sense of entitlement to all good things, left me cold. I found The Bolter less than a sympathetic character. She made bad decisions, used people relentlessly, lacked depth and insight into her own behavior and actions, and was not at all surprised by her deserving reputation, her loneliness, loss and abandonment at the end of her life.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

What more can be said?

Osborne's book, in which she gathers the viewpoints of two branches of the family that haven't had contact in nearly a half-century, points out a few notable things about Idina "The Bolter" Sackville that the novels she inspired or the previous chronicles of her life apparently skimmed: her early life affected her later years. She grew up as a child of divorce -- which, back then, was more than just scandalous, it could lose you playmates overnight and force you to endure the whisperers that loved to bring up the scandal every time you ventured into any kind of major social setting. Idina's mother divorced her father to prevent him from wasting HER family's money on his live-in mistress, breaking an unwritten, accepted code among the American and European aristocracy: couples stayed together, even if they hated each other, because marriage for love was a 20th-century notion among their set; up until then, marriage was a contract uniting families of property and/or title, and affairs were just one of the ways couples endured being married. Idina, in a way, had been set up to fail -- her husband indulged his roving eye much like he was expected to do, but Idina, traumatized by her father's desertion, saw it differently. When the divorce came, the husband asserted his rights under the law at that time, married the sister of Idina's own sister's husband (a witch with a capital B who saw to it Idina was erased from her two sons' lives until, one by one, they sought her out as adults in the months before each of them died), which caused the two sisters themselves to be estranged until the sister got divorced years later. Idina would seek love, either romantic or parental, for the rest of her life, one of the few times she came close to finding it being in her relationship with her eldest son, who was enough like her that he was unable to fit into the world his father and stepmother had established after the divorce; he got on a religious kick that made even his father take notice and, ironically, it would be "Dina", with whom he had established secret ties, that would indirectly influence him to move away from religion and into art history. He went to Greece, married, periodically reunited with Idina, and died in the early part of the war. A daughter from one of Idina's later marriages would, ironically, end up having to break off ties with Idina because of the same whisperings Idina endured in her childhood.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Great Read!

Interesting, fast-paced, and intriguing at every turn.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

You have to read this!

I like the fact that the author didn't try to get you to side with Idina in the choices she made, good or bad, she simply tells you about her life. I love the picture she paints of how life was for her.

Eye Opening

This book is an interesting read, and though it began a bit slowly, it did pick up toward the latter half of the book. What I found most compelling about the story is the secretive lifestyle of the Victorian-era English (and the few Americans the book touches on). While I'd always expected those (especially the upper-class) living during the Victorian age to be prudish and the picture of morality, I was stunned by the self-indulgent, highly promiscuous, and morally depraved behavior these "pillars of society" displayed. People have talked about the selfishness, as well as the outlandish and self-destructive behavior of those who were coming of age during 1980's and 90's....but I'll tell you, in my opinion (especially being one who was in her teens through her 20's during that time, and certainly not leading a "sheltered" life) that the latter portion of the 20th century couldn't hold a candle to what was going on during the early 1900's! Those folks took partying to a whole different level! So, if you'd like a peek into the over-indulgent, decadent lifestyles of the rich and famous of the Victorian age, this is book to read.

Learned more about Victorian era

I found the information about life in the upper class Victorian era in Europe and Kenya very interesting. However, the story itself was not as compelling as I had thought it would be. The writer never delves deep enough into Idina's state of mind regarding her children or the choices she made. I kept waiting for more.

I loved this book

"The Bolter" was fascinating, compelling, and a really interesting book. I am impressed with the research that went into it from so many years ago, and would reccommend it to book clubs.

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