4.5 stars.Although this was a very good book, it has several differences from THIS OTHER EDEN. The latter is a claustrophobic gothic-style romance. It has very few characters & centers around three points of interest (foremost being Eden Castle & its grounds). Despite a gut-wrenching web of plots & counterplots, there is a HEA -- though it comes with great consequence, the aspects of which are known to the reader more than the characters....Or so the reader assumes.PRINCE OF EDEN has a few gothic elements, but it's primarily a Victorian-style novel of sensation. There is a nominal protagonist -- Edward Eden, the bastard infant from Book 1, who is now grown to adulthood -- but this is a book that uses the protagonist as a folcrum for the other major characters, & those characters range from Newgate to London opium slums to Eden Castle to Shropshire to Roe Head School (attention Charlotte Bronte fans, watch for her cameo :)) to bitchy innkeepers across the way. Edward's own story affects all these people in a significant fashion. But like a Collins or Dickens novel, the ways he affects them aren't made clear to the characters. Harris frequently watches from a safe distance as her creations bumble around in the bleary fog of fate.The quickest way to describe this book is "flip-side to HEA." The reader knows Marianne's happiness in THIS OTHER EDEN must come with a price...and that price is THE PRINCE OF EDEN. Our hero is a lovable scamp. He's tender-hearted for the scum of the streets & generous with his friends, yet he has no concept of his blessed position in life. He's a bastard with little social standing, yet he holds the purse-strings & property of his long-standing family -- a footnote of Thomas Eden's guilt that allows him to do whatever he wants, even if what he wants has unintended consequences. (Very like his father, is Edward Eden.) He loves his mother. He tries to be kind to his brother. He encourages his sister to marry their childhood friend. He rescues hookers from Newgate. He funds Ragged Schools for orphans.But if Edward has a major flaw (besides that pesky opium addiction :P), it's too big a heart. He gives & gives until it causes a rift with his son, a haughty young lad who can't understand his father's passive approach to money. Such vehement charity also frightens his weak-willed brother James, who inherits nothing but the title "Lord Eden." James, for his part, is a supremely unlikable character...but it's not all his fault. Anyone in his position would resent such dependence. He has the will to be a Lordly-Lord-o-Doom, but not the spine; even his most token rebellions (e.g., attacking a servant girl) are pushed aside by the aging Marianne, a heroine who has grown tragically soft in her years of pampering as Lady Eden. Here, then, is another price of the HEA in Book 1 -- Marianne's fiery independence has been slowly eaten away by passive acceptance. The most she can do is be certain James marries a woman of wealth & respectibility, & that unfortunate young lady is Harriet Powels. Harriet is an unusual heroine in that she's sympathetic but not entirely likable. How much of this book's tragedy could have been prevented if she'd swallowed her pride & run away with Edward like they originally schemed? The book offers no answers. There are several other memorable characters floating around this sprawling plot: the incestuous Cranford siblings, Marianne's elderly sister Jane, Edward's bipolar sister Jennifer, the poncy solicitor Sir Claudius, the rescued harlot Elizabeth, the gentle giant Daniel Spade (another flipside from THIS OTHER EDEN, in that his father was Thomas Eden's enforcer & the man who whipped Marianne's back to shreds), the loyal coachman John Murrey...and of course John Murrey Eden, the blooded fruit of Edward's bastardy. It's with sad finality that the book closes around John Murrey Eden instead of his father Edward...but a fitting prologue to the next three books, or so I'm told. ;)As with all of Harris' earlier work, the writing is superb. I did think this one dragged a little in the London sections...but I'm wondering if that's because I was expecting a THIS OTHER EDEN clone of claustrophobic gothicness. Don't expect that here. Instead look for a tribute to elegant sensation novels -- with cameos from Bronte & Dickens, no less -- and a tangle of family drama. There are no easy answers to the problems posed in this book, nor should there be. Easy answers make for boring stories. ;)Recommended for those who enjoy epic historical doorstoppers & (sometimes) overwrought drama. This book contains incest, violence, & much tragedy that is just barely offset by (very) brief snatches of mellow happiness -- no HEA here. If any of these caveats offend your tender sensibilities, either bring your big-girl panties or avoid it altogether.
Marilyn Harris continues to amaze me with her ability to weave a compelling story with a cast of very flawed characters. I know it's clichéd to use words like "enthrall" etc., but really, that's how I can best describe it. This second novel in the Eden series is very different from the first in structure, but I enjoyed it just as much.Opening over 35 years after This Other Eden ends, the reader is tossed into the mid-life of Edward Eden, first-born and illegitimate son of Thomas Eden and Marianne Locke. His parents did an awkward Solomon split of the Eden Legacy: Edward got the money and land, and James - the younger, legitimate brother - got the title of Lord Eden. He is not at all happy with the situation, an attitude that has been shaped and fostered by the conniving Sophia Cranford, head housekeeper, and her brother Caleb. Youngest Eden child Jennifer is also a creation of the Cranfords, and the entire Eden family has plenty of misery and tragedy in store for them.Whereas This Other Eden was a dark romance with one character ruthlessly pursuing a goal and the plot was kept very linear, The Prince of Eden sprawled more in scope. It is really more of a family saga type novel -- but what a family, and what characters. Edward Eden holds it all together, as he makes a tremendous journey from rich and reckless wastrel who brawls so he can get tossed into Newgate for a night for fun, to a man cast into the depths of existence from opium and lost loves, to a man deeply-conscious of the world and his obligation and desire to help those poorer around him while creating a new Eden legacy from his own sweat and labor.It's impossible to distill it down to a pithy sentence or paragraph and do it justice. There is so much in this book. The early Victorian era really comes to life here, and the way the story is told has a very retro Victorian flavor to it: a man's life and influence, a vivid cast of secondary characters, melodramatic tragedies and devices, the scenery and atmosphere of both rural and urban England, the author's unflinching hand at crafting misery, etc. It was a book that I couldn't bear to continue reading because it was so dark and gloomy and tragic, but I couldn't stop reading because the characters got under my skin and I had to see what fresh hell would happen next.And there is plenty of fresh hell. I never thought it got oppressive, but I love sweeping, gloomy tragedies (even though I sometimes read them from between my fingers in a crouched, defensive position). The happy ending in This Other Eden is wiped out early on with the fair heroine Marianne now a woman over 60, lost and heartsick at the death of her beloved Thomas, and totally incapable of running the castle and her children. It's tragic, but I liked seeing this flip side to the HEA, where a couple's all-consuming love with each other can turn their children into collateral damage. While Thomas and Marianne went vacationing in Europe year after year, the raising of their children was left to the servants (as was common), and the Cranfords have cultivated the Eden crop into very bitter little seeds. It's a crushing failure that Marianne has to live with the rest of her life.Special mention here for the character of Jane Locke, Marianne's half-sister and bane of her existence in Book 1. Here, Harris has turned her into a geriatric firecracker who is wholly sympathetic without losing the hard-nosed toughness that propelled the character in the first book. The author knows her characters and knows how to write them naturally, even if decades separate their appearances.I loved every bit of this book and didn't think there were any dull spots. The history was woven throughout, from King William IV's death to the construction of the Crystal Palace and Exposition in 1851. It has everything one could want in a family saga: birth, lust, death, sacrifice, envy and greed, corruption, love, and a doozy of a moody cliffhanger that made me immediately grab for Book 3.
What do You think about The Prince Of Eden (1979)?
My copy just arrived after a big research work in order to find an affordable price.This is the second book of the Eden series.In the first book, This Other Eden, we are introduced to the first members of the Eden family, namely Lord Thomas Eden and Marianne Locke.In this second volume of this saga, their son, Edward Eden, starts this saga as The Prince of Eden. As the formal heir of Eden's fortune, even being a "bastard", he uses his money in order to create a school for poor and abandoned children in his London home with the help of his loyal friend Daniel.During a visit to the Eden Castle he falls in love with Harriet Powels, his brother's fiancé and then….I won't spoil the whole story, on the contrary, there is too much to be followed with the plot itself and by this marvelous style of writing of Marilyn Harris.The sequel of this book is The Eden Passion.
—Laura
If you're looking for a little light reading, this is not for you. If you're looking for a romance, this is not for you (there is a five-page hookup that ends in predictable misery; that's it). If you are looking for a a heavy, depressing orgy of self-centered angst in all its varied manifestations, maybe you'll like this. It's, well-written, historically insightful, but unrelenting in its gloom. The only reason I may read on to the next book is that I kind of want to see Harriet take it in the teeth. Problem is, I don't really trust Harris to deliver a satisfying story after reading this--and the first book in the series This Other Eden was among my favorites.This sequel gets two stars because Harris wrote well and the book is historically authentic. But she never did get me to actually empathize with any of the wretched characters. Instead I wanted to strangle most of them because there were obvious ways out of their afflictions and they chose instead to wallow.Maybe it's me--other ratings were much nicer. But if I weren't so compulsive, I wouldn't have finished this. If I want to be depressed, I do not need a book to help me get there.Now here's my dilemma: I bought the whole series on the strength of the first book. Should I read on hoping that the next one will be as good as the first, or assume that the story just goes downhill from here and ship the rest of them off to Goodwill unread?ETA, just reread the blurb on the front cover: "He was a prince among men and a god among lovers." HUH? I could get the prince among men bit, but as a lover... Exactly what happened in the book that would justify that?
—Elle
THIS IS NOT A CHEESY ROMANCE NOVEL! I had my doubts as well, just from looking at the cover, as well as seeing what other books it was placed w/. It's historical fiction, w/ a little romance. Not romancy-gonna-make u puke! Main character is Edward Eden. Even very rich, wears the title of" bastard" throughout 18th century England. Very honest, kind hearted man whom helps set up schools/homes throughout London w/ his vast fortune. Of course, their must be a villain! And there are several villains in this novel whom try to destroy Edward Eden, but fail. It's 2nd in a series of five books.
—Amanda Ellison
