It's a matter of life after death.

Current book: Rebecca
Pages read: 167-324 (end)

This book was incredibly entertaining, I have to say. I kind of tore through it and didn't have time to write. It stopped being just a workout book and became my primary book, too, so it got finished more quickly than I intended.

I was totally right about Maxim killing Rebecca. It turns out that she was totally evil and manipulative, and also, apparently, sexually transgressive. The narrator finds out about Rebecca's murder after a ship runs aground in the bay near Manderley, and the diver who's sent down to check out the underside of the ship discovers Rebecca's body in the cabin of her sunken sailboat. Since Maxim already identified Rebecca's body, months ago, things seem a little fishy. While he confesses to the narrator, he doesn't confess to the police, and, after an inquest, is found innocent. Weirdly, the fact that the narrator finds out about the murder brings the couple closer together, and she and Maxim are finally able to be completely in love with one another and happy. Mrs. Danvers, however, devastated and unconvinced, burns Manderley down while Maxim and the narrator are away dealing with the legalities. The end.

Drama! Murder and arson and sex and crazy people! How can you not like this book? Honestly, I feel bad calling it a great novel because it's so damn entertaining, but it's also an interesting and innovative twist on the society novel that reveals the darker underpinnings of the moneyed class and the repercussions of marriages in that world. Nice, Du Maurier. Very nice.