Wentworth Hall

by Abby Grahame

Anyone who loves Downton Abbey, will love Wentworth Hall.

Wentworth Hall is one of England's oldest estates and the Darlingtons are among the elite class of British society. But under all that wealth, there are secrets they do not want told.

18 year old Maggie and her mother have just returned from a year aboard where Lady Darlington has had baby boy, James. But he is not the only new addition to the house. They have also brought back Therese, their new French tutor, as well as welcomed the orphaned teenage twins, Teddy and Jessica, who have just lost their father aboard the Titanic. This adds to an already crowded house or Darlingtons and staff, all of whom have a penchant for gossiping about their employers.

As time passes, it becomes clear that Teddy and Jessica would rather be anywhere else and that Maggie is a different person then the one that left Wentworth. Her family's financial future rests with her finding the best husband and her parents are sure that is Teddy. When scandalous satires start appearing in the newspaper with details suspiciously similar to the goings on of Wentworth Hall, the Darlingtons are determined to keep their secrets to themselves and the affairs (both private and public) in order. And the first order of business is finding the culprit. But where to start? Downstairs? Or Upstairs?

• ISBN10: 0857079166
• ISBN13: 9780857079169
• Publish Date: 5 July 2012 (first published 1 May 2012)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 22 April 2015
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Ltd
• Imprint: Simon & Schuster Childrens Books
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 288
• Language: English

Reviews

[readingwithwrin]

See reviews first at Readingwithwrin

2.75 stars

"But you still won't run away with me because being a Darlington is not only about things. It's about family, too. You told me yourself, nothing means more to the Darlington's than keeping the family lineage clean and prestige."



This book had just as many scandals as I was expecting it to. With the Darlington family has two of the same type of scandals going on. It’s just one is Lord Darlington’s and one is Maggie’s.

This story follows Maggie, Lila and Nora (servant). It also has a rather funny newspaper story about the Darlington family.

When Maggie and her mother return home from France after, an unexpected long trip due to Lady Darlington “having a baby”. Maggie is ready to return as life to normal, or is she. Instead of being her old happy and adventurous self she is now cold and shows no interest to anyone, nor does she enjoy her favorite old past time horse riding.
Lila is happy her sister is home and that things can go back to being fun again, except Maggie wants nothing to do with her and instead ignores her. Leaving Lila feeling, just as alone as before.
Nora is the girl’s maid and is also the houses source of the best gossip. She learns everything which can be good and bad, because as the story goes on we realize how little wealth the Darlington’s have left meaning more staff will be cut.


When father’s old army friend dies he sends his twin children Teddy and Jessica Fitzhugh to live with them until they turn eighteen and can get their inheritance.
With Teddy seeming to fall madly in love with Maggie, she does not feel the same even though she desperately tries in order to help the family maintain their wealth. While Maggie is trying to court Teddy, Lila ends up falling for him, if she could only just get his attention to not be on Maggie. While both sisters are trying to get Teddy's affection. They can't seem to breakthrough Jessica's ice-cold personality towards them and the English in general. Jessica can't wait to turn eighteen, get her inheritance and move back to South Africa.
While all of this is going on a series of story in the newspaper called “The Worthless Saga” is being written and it seems to be extremely similar to the Darlington’s life, meaning that someone in the house is writing this scathing story and it must immediately be stopped. The only problem is, no one well fess up to it and while most seem to think it’s a certain Fitzhugh doing it no one can prove it.

With the “Worthless Saga” threatening to spill all of the Darlington's secrets and the family itself seeming to fall apart this story was fast-paced and interesting, but at times was far to rushed due it to it being a standalone. If this has been a doulogy I think I would have liked it more because we would have been able to connect with the characters and have a little bit more development of some events.

Now does this book bare any similarities to Downton Abbey? Well a few it has some of the same scandals and the family has financial trouble (much worse than in Downton Abbey). As for the girls will Maggie seemed to be a little like Sybil and Mary at times. As for Lila well I would say she was like Edith for most of the story.

[rakesandrogues]

Not going to lie, I basically did nothing for an entire week and went through two seasons of Downton Abbey. (I was also bedridden at the time, but that’s not my point.) I was basically obsessed and I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the scene. I’m a sucker for drama and period pieces and Downton just had the right mix.

So when I stumbled upon Wentworth Hall, I just had to pick it up. The book was pitched as perfect for Downton fans like me. I should have realized that was a bad sign. Despite my initial excitement to read Wentworth Hall, it turned out to be a poorly written book that tried to latch onto the Downton fever.

Obivously, I’m a girl who likes period dramas, but there’s a line where drama becomes excessive. I think that Grahame tries to pack too much in one book. Everything bad that can possibly happen is happening to the Darlingtons. Wentworth Hall is a pretty quick read, and I didn’t feel like anything was developed enough. There was little to no suspense or mystery. I basically figured out all of the secrets as soon as I met each character. Drama isn’t very dramatic when you know what’s going to happen.

I think that Wentworth Hall by Abby Grahame could have been passable with the excessive drama if the writing was up to par. Sadly, I just couldn’t overlook the bad quality. The dialogue was poorly written and it made me want to constantly roll my eyes. How can I sympathize with any of the characters when they are constantly whining and being overdramatic? I felt like I was reading a telenovela… and not in a good way. I never really connected with any of the characters, so my interest level in the book wavered as I progressed.

The ending was rushed and practically came out of nowhere. If I had been enjoying this book, I would have been really disappointed by the ending. To be honest, I was just kind of relieved that this train wreck of a book was finally over.

Wenthworth Hall by Abby Grahame was just trying too hard to appeal to Downton Abbey fever.