REVIEW: The Pursuit of Love (Nancy Mitford)

Book: The Pursuit of Love

Author: Nancy Mitford

My rating: 3.5/5.

Premise: Oh, the tedium of waiting to grow up! Longing for love, obsessed with weddings and sex, Linda and her sisters and cousin Fanny are on the lookout for the perfect lover. But finding Mr Right is much harder than any of the sisters had thought. Linda must suffer marriage first to a stuffy Tory MP and then to a handsome and humourless communist, before finding real love in war-torn Paris...

[⚠️CW: racist slurs of the era]

I was in the mood for something set in the 30s and this was a rather good choice. The story follows Linda, a naive girl who's in love with the idea of love. It reminded me of Emma in some ways. Linda is very sure of herself and thinks she knows what love is, but ends up falling in love with the idea rather than the man. That being said, Linda and her relationships were very relatable. There's getting into a relationship because it's new and you've always wanted one. There's going for the complete opposite of your ex. There's also the chance meetings. I loved the humour and found myself chuckling at times - the Uncle in particular came out with some cracking lines! Most of it was centred on quaint and outdated views. The only downside was that ending, while sad, was too abrupt to make a big impact I felt. A couple more pages would've hit the spot. But a good read overall!