Fans of nineteenth-century novels should flock to Mary Cholmondeley's Red Pottage. This novel takes an unflinching look at the social conventions and strictures that dictated so many women's life trajectories in the era -- often with less-than-ideal outcomes for everyone involved.

It was Saturday and a half-holiday; it was that one day of all the year when the seasons change places when winter is visibly worsted and summer with warmth and relaxation bathing and tennis and motor trips in the moonlight becomes again a reality.