The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen (1938). When orphaned teenager Portia Quayne comes to London to live with her effete, older half-brother Thomas and his cynical, sophisticated wife Anna, she finds warmth only in a crusty family servant—and in the inappropriate attentions of family friend Eddie, who toys heartlessly with the girl’s emotional adoration. Bowen brings Jamesian subtlety to bear on Portia’s revivifying loss of illusions and steady growth toward maturity. The result is a triumph of analytical precision in this tragedy of innocence endangered by unfeeling adults.
Total Points: 4 (GG 4)