I'm am disappointed, I wanted another Sons and Lovers, but alas. I found the characters in the love-square unlikable (with the exception of Ursula, although she was pressing her luck throughout), and I didn’t really connect with (or really understand) the Gudern-Gerald relationship. There are still enough great moments, the whole water-party scene and the great Ursula-Birkin argument that ends with Ursula walking off down the road, ostensibly to leave, only to return saying ‘see what flower I picked you’.

However, most of the societal criticism (which is mentioned in nearly every blurb of this book) comes across as superficial and angsty. Especially, because it primarily comes for the mouths of well-off people who seem to be affected by western industrialization on a visual level: ‘This building is ugly, the miners are ugly, the pit is ugly, it is ugly that man is subjected to the machine and so on’. Coupled with rants from the (obvious) author-insert character, it makes the novel feel pompous and mean spirited.