The narrator frustrated me so much when I read du Maurier's Rebecca that I picked this book up in hopes that Susan Hill had taken the main character and transplanted a spine into her body. Unfortunately this is not the case. The second Mrs de Winter is still a pathetic, submissive little twit with no authority. She has no name, so let's just call her what she is: Wimpy Pushover de Winter.

I truly hope I never have to read another book with such a poor excuse for a woman as a main character. If Susan Hill had killed her off I would have been appeased; someone needs to put this creature out of her misery
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Quite honestly, I'm not entirely sure whether this novel failed me as a reader or I simply failed to comprehend what the author trying to accomplish. Written as a sequel to Du Maurier's classic "Rebecca," Hill's novel does a creditable job of capturing the sense of darkness in it's precursor. Hill has also done a good job of capturing the tone and flavor of duMaurier's language. However, overall, the books is, for me, a fail. It was not compelling; not even interesting. I was, in fact, hard pressed to continue reading. The pacing of the book is glacially slow. I suspect that is purposeful--a part of Hill's effort to recreate the tone of du Maurier's book, but is ill-suited to the modern reader and that may be the explanation for why a writer as accomplished as Ms. Hill should have fallen so far short of the mark in this particular work. ( )

Susan Hill does a good job of mimicking Daphne du Maurier's writing style...but that's about it. Ms. du Maurier was a master at not wasting words and developing a really tight plot. I've read about halfway through Hill's sequel, and I'm still waiting for something to happen! So far, she's used lots of words to describe how traumatized and unhappy Mrs. de Winter is. ( )

I spent the entire book waiting for the inevitable to happen, which it did at a very languid pace. I guess that's what du Maurier did too, but somehow she made it live. ( )

Short review here, some spoilers:
http://acupofcoffeeandagoodbook.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/mrs-de-winyer-by-susan-hi... ( )