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    The Rebel Wife
    The Rebel Wife
    The Rebel Wife
    Audiobook9 hours

    The Rebel Wife

    Written by Taylor M. Polites

    Narrated by Johanna Parker

    3/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    In this dazzling debut, Taylor M. Polites crafts a Southern gothic novel that mines classic literary archetypes while shaping them in new ways. Set in Reconstruction-era Alabama, The Rebel Wife opens with Augusta Branson losing her husband to a terrible blood fever. Now she and her son must fend for themselves in a community being destroyed by violence. When the inheritance she expected suddenly disappears, Augusta starts hunting for answers, but she'll have to find them fast-before the deadly fever claims the life of everyone in town, including her son.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRecorded Books, Inc.
    Release dateFeb 7, 2012
    ISBN9781464008269
    The Rebel Wife
    Author

    Taylor M. Polites

    Taylor M. Polites received an MFA in Creative Writing from Wilkes University, where he was awarded the 2009 Norris Church Mailer Fellowship. He lives in Providence, Rhode Island.

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    Reviews for The Rebel Wife

    3/5

    47 ratings10 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Fascinating first person account of a widow after the Civil War living in northern Alabama. I found myself wanting to shake her, but ended up fist pumping her final act in the book. Rarely do I actually feel proud for a fictional character, but Polites made me do it. His intense study of all things reconstruction and southern for this time period are very apparent and extremely well done. Sometimes I find it difficult to read historical fiction or male writers writing female voices, but had no problems with either one with this book.
    • 1/5
      No.Don't read it.Don't do it.You will never get those hours back.I love historical fiction, especially set in the Civil War era. And when I saw this book compared to Gone With the Wind, I was sold. Except this book is nothing like GWtW, save for a few minor similarities like time frame. I loathed pretty much every character in this book; they were all so cardboard. I especially hated the narrator, which never bodes well. It took a heroic effort to finish this book, and I rather wish I hadn't!
    • 5/5
      It’s no surprise that this is a work of southern historical fiction, set during the Reconstruction, about ten years after the end of the Civil War. What was surprising was that the entire book was a first person POV from the eyes of Augusta Branson, the titular Rebel Wife.That angle worked well because Gus, as she’s called, went through the novel ‘waking up’ to the actual circumstances of her life and surrounding community. She was a product of her time and, having some sense of disenfranchisement due to her gender and her dead-husband’s politics (Republican); and an above-average familiarity with racial tolerance (also due to her husband) she is able to increasingly sympathize and ally with former slaves as they struggle against the resurging southern land owners. Taylor’s first-person POV is very strong; he has a real ability to project the inner voice of his character. The book never reads like it has any particular agenda, even though issues of race and class morality prove to be the lifeblood of the entire society under consideration.Gus ‘wakes up’ in both a literal and figurative sense – giving up her reliance on laudanum and on the illusions of her life woven by the men around her. All the characters are complicated – not least of all her husband whose backstory is revealed as the novel unfolds. She didn’t truly know him until after his death. A modern feminist might complain at Gus’ passivity – she spends most of the novel waiting and reacting to circumstances rather than acting – but I think this fits her character (although I was almost frustrated with her!) and she does start taking charge at the end. I think this restraint is actually a strong point of Polites’ writing: he lets the story unfold in a very leisurely, natural way. If you have trouble getting into the story, stick it out. There are plot twists – very interesting plot twists coming late in the book and filling back into the earlier events very cleverly. The book came most alive at the end (when Gus was most aware of things.)
    • 2/5
      The Rebel Wife was ok. I enjoyed the setting, which Polites described so well, and I loved the post Civil War era in which the story took place, but I just didn't like reading the story in present tense/first person. Blah! Now, that's not to say that Taylor Polites did not write a likeable, readable book. I did like the story but I just found it to be drawn out at times and found myself becoming impatient with Augustus(Gus), the main character. She seemed to ramble on and on and some things were repetitive. The title is kind of misleading, too. Gus may have done a few things that a woman would not have done but I would hardly consider her a "REBEL WIFE". Maybe a woman doing what she HAD TO DO is a little more like it.

      Post Civil War Era. Reconstruction Era. Augustus Branson is a Southern beauty, married to a wealthy Yankee. The slaves are now free but hatred and racial tensions are at a boiling point. Gus, as Augustus is nicknamed, finds herself widowed after her husband dies from a mysterious death. Gus shows no emotion at his passing because she believes that she has been freed from a marriage she never wanted and was pushed into. A son was born of this ten year union. Henry. Unfortunately, Gus is visited by her elderly cousin, who is also the executor of her late husband's will, and is told that after the business and personal debts are paid, that Gus and Henry will be left with very little. How can that be? There was once so much money. Where is the money from the mill that is still operating?

      Amid a quickly spreading and deadly illness that is claiming lives, Gus must learn how to operate her household with no income, deal with a household of freed workers who expect to be paid, decide if she and her family should flee to safety, and most importantly, learn who is to be trusted and which of those are to be feared.
    • 2/5
      This book occupied the morning of a snow day; at 282 pages, a quick read. The story was not terribly deep, either. So much of the text was spent describing how oppressive the heat was, or how dark the night was, I found myself starting to skim paragraphs as soon as the topic entered a sentence. (How many different was can you describe the heat and humidity, and how many times do I need to be told how everyone was damp with perspiration? I get it; tell me something else, please!) I agree with some of the other reviewers who felt Augusta (Gus) had an unaccountable change of feeling toward her servants, seemingly all due to a single troubling revelation concerning the inception of her marriage and the emotion of one final flashback — although there were plenty of other revelations and flashbacks that preceded this particular one, none of which seemed to have altered any of her sensibilities. It just didn't ring true to me.

      The story is told entirely form Augusta's point of view, but this choice, along with the author's style, means many of the other characters came off as one-dimensional stereotypes. Then there were others (such as Emily) who blazed in with no attempt to conceal or disguise their hatred and ill-will, but neither was there any attempt on the part of Polites to ground their enmity with any justification. It was mentioned once or twice that Gus was socially ostracized from the "southern nobility" by her marriage (Southern-belle-weds-Southern-man-turned-scalawag), and that her husband was apparently well-off financially where as the old, established families struggled, but none of that seemed to explain the vitriolic outbursts of Emily and Jennie. And the implied romantic inclinations at the end seemed completely unfounded in light of Augusta's attitudes throughout the first 200 pages of the book. The last 60-some pages cover the space of approximately 36 hours, but in this span we are to believe the main character completely changes her attitudes toward almost every other character (including her deceased husband) and develops the backbone and gumption she seems to have lacked up to this point? All her threats and obstacles have gone away? A little too neat and tidy, and an overall unsatisfying story.
    • 3/5
      A rather interesting novel, The Rebel Wife, takes into account the beginning of Civil Rights as they occurred or didn't occur after the Civil War. Obviously, Lincoln freeing the slaves did not guarantee that they were free. Through the character of Augusta (Gus) we learn that women were not free either. They were governed by husbands, brothers and others. This novel tells a story that is typical of events that happened throughout the south after the Civil War.I found the story interesting in historic value. As a novel the story was pretty average but it served as a vehicle to present the true feeling of antebellum.Definitely a must read for historical fiction fans in particular Civil War and post war material.
    • 4/5
      A richly atmospheric novel set in the post-Civil War South. The newly widowed Augusta Branson struggles with the legacies of the former South, from the recently emancipated trying to build a new life to those attempting to uphold the old ways of life. Augusta walks a narrow line between these two groups, and while at the beginning of the novel, she seems to be a typical helpless, and somewhat frustrating, Southern lady, by the novel's conclusion, Augusta takes a stand and fights back for what she has come to believe in. A great piece of historical fiction.
    • 3/5
      I think the cover blurbs over-sell this. It did not seem very special and genre-changing to me. The characters were not well drawn and the plot was thin. There were stereotypes a-plenty. It was an ok read with a predictable ending.
    • 4/5
      The Rebel Wife is set in a small town in northern Alabama ten years after the end of the Civil War. Augusta, a southern belle from a slaveholding family in the prewar days, has just lost her husband Eli, a man she was forced into marrying in the days after the end of the war. Eli has done well since the end of the war, leading the Freedman's Bank and helping freed slaves. This activity has made him few friends in the local white community, where the Knights of the White Cross are becoming active. Augusta's cousin, Judge, steps in to help her manage Eli's estate, but it soon becomes clear that Judge may not have her true interests at heart.I really enjoyed this Gothic depiction of a life and town in turmoil 10 years after the end of the Civil War. Augusta is an unconventional southern heroine for this time period--she's neither a plucky Scarlett or a helpless damsel--and she really develops as a character over the course of the novel. She strikes me as a character who wants to survive, which makes her interesting to follow. No one in the Rebel Wife is quite who they seem, and I felt like this shiftiness gave the novel a feel that was pretty accurate for this area of uncertainty.I would recommend this novel to fans of historical fiction and gothic literature. It's definitely an interesting one, and I felt like the plot twists and quality of writing really kept me engaged.
    • 4/5
      This book is very interesting and unique. It takes place in 1875 in the Deep South. The Civil War is over, but emotional upheaval continues boiling in the south over civil rights. I was reminded of The Help as I read how Gus related to the servants. She loves Emma, who raised her, but now she's feeling jealous of her son's love for Emma. But this book evokes more parallels with Gone with the Wind, which I haven't read, and the beautiful southern belle.I thoroughly enjoyed the author's dive into the character of Augusta and everyone around her. Augusta is a wonderfully strong woman. She is careful to not upset the balance of life around her - at first, anyway - while reserving her opinion to herself. The time period comes to life, right down to the feel of the heat in summer and how black-dyed cloth runs in sweat. Her husband's death was very untimely and Gus doesn't have a clue. She's is a rebel, alright, in more ways than one.I don't want to spoil any of this story. It is a joy to read. The details are rich and the characters are deep. You must unravel the dangerous mystery of the money bag while avoiding the fever and political unrest for yourself.