Rebecca (Part 1)

her husband committed cold murder. She's like, but he hated her. He killed her because he hated her. Who I was. I was hooked in that moment because I'm like, Oh, she's going to take us on a ride, because she's going to try to explain away or try to reason all these very very real red flags. Welcome back to Popcorn Book Club. I am Danis Schwartz, joined as always by Karamadanqua, Jennifer Wright and Melissa Hunter and Tian tram Hi everyone. I am so so excited that we're talking

about the book Rebecca. I had never read it and I feel like once maybe in my childhood, I had started the prologue and I got like two pages in and I was like, man and put it down. And once you sort of get over the hump of like the first like pages, this book really takes off. Tim. What was your experience. I I absolutely loved it, kind of the same though I was like at first, I was thinking to myself, I can't wait for this book

to pick up. Everyone's been talking about it. And then when it picks up, Oh baby, it picks up, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. All the characters are really fleshed out and funny, funny, and the narrator is I don't know about you all, but it's hilarious to me, so so funny to me. Um. So I'm like super excited to watch all the adaptations too, because I like, really hope that they stay true to some of the quirks and are like personality traits of everyone. Because I really

really loved it. Uh, Jennifer, you had read this book before and you were you were vouching for it for us. What is your experience with Rebecca? It was really interesting because I read this when I was a teenager, and it was around the same time I was reading books like Janier and was wearing plights, and this really fits into that Gothic romance category. And I feel like I had a very different experience with it now as an adult then um, when I felt when I was a teenager,

I definitely had a lot more simply for Rebecca. Now as an adult, I still think the second Mrs de Winter, who has no name, is incredibly funny and likable. Um, I think I had a different perspective on her loyalty to Maxim than I do when I was a sixteen year old girl. So we can get into that as discuss it, I will say she is a ride or die. Yeah, Karama, you as you made before we start recording, you mentioned that you did not finish this book. Not you care

to elaborate. Well, first of all, I would just like to start by saying I know that I'm going to start getting a reputation as the person that doesn't finish the book, but I actually so. I was very worry about reading it. I was like, this feels boring. I don't want to read this, and then everybody was like it picks up in and I was like Okay, I

will read it. And I got more than that far and I just felt like it never picked up for me, and like, I got almost two hundred pages in before I was like, how much time am I going to invest in something that is genuinely difficult for me to enjoy?

And I kind of wanted to have a discussion at least at some point during this conversation about when it's okay to sort of abandon a book, because I was like, Oh, I really really put in the effort, and I've gotten to the point where people are like, this is where it really starts. And I do think that there are good things about it. I don't think that it is an irredeemable book, and I just I also have my

own biases. I don't like romantic Gothic literature. I don't I didn't like Wuthering Heights, I never read gene Air. I was just like, no, this style is not for me. And so I found that revulsion and like sort of pushing against it again. Reading this book, I was like, oh God, I really don't enjoy anything about this. But I'm really excited to watch it as a film because I think that the core plot elements really will lend

themselves to an exciting, thrilling viewing experience. I will say I want to go on record as saying I think if you're not enjoying a book, you can always abandon it. They're like, if you give a book a fair chance, life is too short. There's no there's so many good books in the world. It's I feel like it's kind of like watching the first three episodes of a TV show and if it doesn't really like everyone has a limit of like how far you commit to a TV show?

Why not for a book to you know? So, Melissa, what was your response to Rebecca? Oh? God, I loved it. I mean I had I did have the same experience in the beginning where I felt it was very slow. I was reading like I couldn't read it at night because I kept on falling asleep within a page. Um And it reminded me of high school where I was like, I have to read this book. But then. But but I do think on the flip side of have being so happy we are doing this podcast is like normal

Melissa would just have given up at that point. But because we are doing this podcast, and I my main motivation is not being publicly shamed. Um, I I'm a very I'm very good student in that way, like I love deadlines to other people. I pushed through and I think it was around like like right after she went to Manderley when I was just like when Mrs Danvers came in and everything that I was just like, oh, there's something going on and I don't quite know what

it is. And then just like the building tension was so much for me, and I just loved the hero so much and was so like in on this ride with her that I loved it. And so no, no, no, no, no, okay, yeah, sorry the narrator, No, that would have been interesting. No judgment has been fun. We just would have talked about it. Jen. The listeners can't see your face, but I can't. There was judgment there. Yeah. I love him every you know.

He just reminds me of my fiance. I want. I want a boy who will bring me to his house and then never talk to me like a dog. Yeah, baby, like three things on a platter, foods. I'm just like, I had a lot of problem with the food waste. Yeah, so much food. She never and she was too insecured at I also very much related she there's so much going around. Yeah, I feel like I think, Danny, you're

saying too. Like I just related so hard to her, like I was hurt eighteen of like just having these imagined conversations of what people are saying, with the horrible things people are saying about me and like these I just called it, like Rebecca the room Nation cycle because it just felt like she was just this constant, circular, like reaffirming of these beliefs that she was so distracted by that she didn't notice that her she finally realized, like her sticking point is he never loved her. Oh

my god, he never loved her. Yeah, it's like the best, the best news ever that he killed her. It's that's the writer is so funny. She does not care at all that her husband committed She's like, but he hated her. He killed her because he hated her. It was very obvious to me that he killed her, Like I clocked that very early on, and I'm like, wait, okay, so you don't realize that this dude straight marked his ex wife, Like you don't know that lady, Like I before they left,

what was the kipping point for you? Because I absolutely did not know that. I remember that time I read it. It came as a real shocked No I knew, and I never read this book. I didn't know anything about the movie. I didn't know it existed until Jenn suggested we read it. So I was reading it and I was I remember I was like, on page seventy five or something, I was like, Oh, this motherfucker killed his wife. I don't remember the exact moment. I think it was, um.

I think it was when Beatrice first came about. I feel like she kind of knew. She didn't know for sure, but she was like, oh, well, I hope you guys are happy, and I was like, oh, okay, with everything else that's been leading up to this, and the way that it was talking about Robecca and the way he's like, I wish you wish you could bottle your memories and I wish that I never had to think of them again.

And I'm like, oh, she murdered her. Yeah, and he tutor twice every year, he uncontrollably exactly, So I he was about the Beatrice visit where I was like, oh, okay, he killed her. And I think for me also realizing that early on it didn't make the book interesting to read because I'm think it's taking so long to get to the murder. I will say what I found very relatable is that as someone who uh does not know how to ask for things or or advocate for myself,

it was very relatable. As we were mentioning with like the food waste the second Mrs de Winter clocks like there is a ton of food waste in this house, and it takes the full arc of the book for her to be able to be like, fucking reuse the same food, you assholes. But me, I'm like, I do not ask for anything, like I have like a manager, and I'm always like, can I ask her to I don't want to send this thing to her. I don't want to bother her. And my friends had to be like,

she works for you. I loved when she hid the cupid that she broke in the and and she had to like be like I did it, and I was afraid, Like that just felt so like just being a person who doesn't feel like they belong in the place that they literally are calling home, it feels so And I'm like, Grama, I definitely thought from the beginning that he killed his wife, like when they first like the Mysterious Widow. And also

it's a Hitchcock movie, so it's like, okay, there's murder involved. However, I felt like the way it was written, you just get so sucked into her point of view that like end this vision of Rebecca and the jealousy of Rebecca and everyone loving Rebecca. That like, to me, it like pulled me into a different narrative of hers that by the time he actually said it, it wasn't shocking to

me that he killed her. It was shocking to me that he did not love her, because that felt like to me, what I thought was, oh, there was like they loved each other, but they had these big fights, you know, accident And the first twist, Yeah, the first twist to me was how when Mrs dan Verse describes how Rebecca loved no one and I was like, whoa, okay, so she's like an interesting cold bitch, Like that's fun

and and that was a throw to me. And then and then that yeah, that it was like how could he do this to to Mr de Winter Like, yes, maybe he killed her, but he also like loved her and regretted it. I'm not saying that makes him a good person, but that that's the narrative that I had. And I think that I also kind of clocked early

that he probably murdered her. It was and I think it was when they were on that drive and he like stopped on that like cliff and was fucking weird, and I was like, oh he he did something like just knowing, yeah, yes, something was wrong, something's wrong? Did he push a bit off the cliff? Like what's going on here? Only because we've all talked about it in like, you know, I've I've seen the trailer for the Netflix adaptation,

and like we know that it's a thriller. We know that like something mysterious, like spooky, and there's some sort of like we know this woman is dead. So at that time, when she's in the car to the cliff and she even like I love the way she talks about it, she's like so forgiving when he's acting like

a fucking weirdo. That like I was, I was hooked in that moment because I'm like, Oh, she's going to take us on a ride, because she's going to try to explain away or try to reason all these sort of like very very real red flags that any of us would hope I would hope that like we would

be like, oh, that's not a good sign. I will also say she was very blind, like I think I was with you, Melissa, where I fully would have believed like, oh it was if something was weird with the accident, but like, oh it was a tragic accident of a

flight of passion gone gone wrong, of like whatever. But I think like the book also establishes really well his position and um wealth and age and status, and like she has nothing, Like her choices are literally marry him or travel as a basically a servant with this insufferable American woman. So it's like he is like the prince charming narrative, like that was her only choice. She began the book being trained to be a companion. I would not she ends the book as a companion to an

older man who is not took down that. The plot of this is what if there are the pitches? What if there is a sequel to Cinderella where the marriage absolutely sucked, because because it does feel like the whisked away happily ever after, like she was in poverty and this rich, handsome man comes and takes her to this date and then it turns out she feels awful all the time, and then the husband is a murderer. I thought, enough of that murder daddy. Let's take a quick break.

So we're back with Popcorn Book Club for My Heart Radio. I find it so interesting that you all really related to the narrator, because I did not at all. And I found her deeply annoying a lot of the time, And I sorry, Dana, I was like, how are we friends? Sometimes I also find you deeply annoying, but I love you anyway. I keep reading the book that is you. Um, You're welcome, But for me, it was like, why aren't you saying things? Why aren't you asking for things? Be

more assertive? What's your fucking problem? I understand that it is the early twentieth century, However, you have way more agency than you are allowing yourself. I mean, even at the beginning. And I'm also that person at a restaurant that will one hundred percent send something act and I'm not going to be a bit about it, but if it's not what I ordered, I'm going to tell somebody, Hey, I'm so sorry. I don't eat nuts. I'm not allergic. I just don't eat them, but I don't eat nuts.

I specifically asked for this not to have nuts. Could you bring you back a version that doesn't have nuts? Thank you so much? Like you are uncommonly self assured. I don't feel that though I don't insecure a lot of the time. But I find that like when she got that cold ham in the beginning and she's just like, oh, well, I guess it's just a reflection of how the staff here sees me is lower and lesser, and I'm like, bitch asked for warm ham. I don't understand what you're doing. Karama.

I have to say, as someone who has known you years, you are an incredibly self assured person. I remember the first time I met you, and like freshman it might have been freshman week or whatever my parents were at college, and you like extended your hand and you're like, hi, I'm Karama Aqua, so nice to meet you, Mr and Mrs Schwartz, and like the most self assured way that. I was absolutely floored. I was like, oh my god, she's so confident. Though you should be common we I didn't.

I didn't necessarily relate to her, but I just I loved her. Growth like she had if we if she started out being assertive, she wouldn't have ended up with Daddy Maxim Like like we needed her to be kind of like diminutive and like kind of like a you know, in this sub dumb relationship that is being established, we needed her to be kind of like questioning everything so that at the end she can finally be like, I

want a new menu. Like for her, that is such a huge moment of asserting herself, which I thought it was hilarious, Like I just I thought she was funny, Like there's something very funny and charming about her little victories being so small, but for her being key Yeah, and I mean yeah, I did relate to her. I'm not I don't think I'm like her now by any means.

But I when I was eighteen, I sure and going to college, I sure didn't know how to talk to anybody, and I like sometimes would think I would, but then I would sit and stew about all the stupid things I said in my first acting class all night. You know, I think this was it's really in. It feels like a really perfect portrait of someone who was deeply insecure and hasn't come into herself. Um, and someone who suffers

from anxiety. Uh, like just not knowing what to wear to the fancy dress ball and like, girl, I've been there so many times. It's like, how far do I commit to this Halloween party? Do I really go all in? Of course Max doesn't dress up, that's so typical of for him, but she perfect Yeah, my god, an impeccable tuxedo. You navigate this mine field alone? Um yeah. Anyway, I just feel like, to me, I thought she was very funny and I wanted her to speak up and that's

why I did feel so satisfying in the end. Um My. Also, big note was I really want a flower room? Yes? I think we can all agree upon that everyone deserves a flower and in the morning room. I want a morning and library and a flower room to put all my flowers in. I mean I walked away from there being like, should I have tea time? When when they go to London, they're like, oh it's five oh seven, we should wait for their tea time to be over. I'm like, like on the dot these Brits. I Um.

The thing that I wanted to point out a little bit towards what you're saying is like, there is a very what's the asymmetrical relationship between Max and the second Mrs de Winter that I think, um, the narrator dozen very subtle ways, which is what reminded me of Phantom Thread because the relationship is uneven. But again in the book, she is a teenager or twenty two? Is she? I think she's twenty two? They never and specifically say no, no. That's why I was like, what's she a teenager? What

she was talking out? Lad? I know she was not older? I think, okay, so nineteen. I think she said she was nineteen. Yeah, so she's nineteen. He's in his forties. He is of the landed gentry, and she is an orphan nobody. So it's like all these factors combined put her in a very vulnerable position to not speak up

in situations where she absolutely should speak up. Well, but she has the beginning that she's going she's going to Lady House and she's going to entertain people, and people will come down from London to see her, and um, I don't think she realizes until she gets there that she's not in a position in life where the going that that is an insurd fantasy, like imagining I'm going to build a house on the moon. She just doesn't know the details of how to manifest that, even if

she has the external trappings. Yeah, and it's clear that, like Maxim, didn't know how to do that either, Rebecca make that house. Rebecca was born with a huge amount of confidence, uh, seemingly giving free reign by Danny, who raised her and um turned Manderly into this terrific show palace with beautiful gardens and amazing parties and interesting people. And all she asked for in return was the freedom

to funk around. They had a very clear arrangement, I will give you the most beautiful house in the world, let me funk people in London. Yeah. Yeah, my first cousin. Okay, really interesting to me because I I had always read this assuming that Daphne saw herself as the second Mrs the Winter, because all I knew about the author was that she was very shy and she ended up buying the estate that I think is called Mandabilly that inspired man, So good for her. That's all I knew about her

until I started reading more about her. She was a bisexual who had lesbian affairs, and also she fought her first cousin so and wrote about it in her memoirs. So I did not realize the extent to which the author maybe saw herself in Rebecca when certainly when I first read this book. Just to be clear, though, Rebecca definitely had some sort of sexual experience with Mrs Danver's right. Oh yeah, oh yeah, that's that's what I thought to think.

So I think Mrs has raised her her mom. Yeah, I thought she was the mother, like the mother died early and she raised her. That's mother daughter thing. Yeah. But also like I think, especially when we watched the version, the sexual element there, but felt like maybe if they didn't sleep together, then Danny Danvers wanted to for sure

wanted to. Yes, yeah, yeah, I also just love like it makes the whole thing makes me really want to meet Rebecca because she is such a charming person but also clearly a sociopath, Like like the way she's described like she's able to reflect back whatever someone is is she is telling them and is able to like figure out what people want and give it to them and

has no feeling for anyone. I'm like, oh, there's just like this is like a textbook sociopath, and I just think it's so like it doesn't make her, it doesn't make her villain. It just makes her so interesting to me, Like she's just like a very successful sociopath. Okay, I don't know that that's necessarily for them, because we're getting

that whole perspective from maxim shot No, from Danny. Perspective is maybe partly she was only ever able to love me because I was in love with her and we were in love, and she hated all the rest of you, and that's what was happening, which is like behavior. Yet I think that the book does make it clear, at least how I read it, that Rebecca was this fascinating, beautiful,

brilliant sociopath. Like Also, the way that like details about how she would like talk to people and then talk about them behind their back was very like that Regina George of like, oh my god, I love your skirt and it was my mom's in the eighties. It's not as far as about defintely like popular mean girl like for sure for and I and I questioned taste and

coolness because Favel sounds like a piece of ship. Oh yeah, I fully imagine Favella's Ernie Hammer, like I am very surprised because she was in the upcoming person because I just don't imagine was like this beefcake an alcoholic because he was his first custom and he was like I was imagining, Oh no, girls have sweet shops and cinemas would be like very excited by his presence. Oh I didn't look a sweet shop. I would be excited by

the presence. I think. I think the way they described his drinking and his like sweaty and that he's like getting puff be because of all the drinking and smoking. I just imagine that kind of very classic British character actor who's just like a little bit blustery all the time and it's just so angry about everything, tra turgity and just like now, like I think I got those two people. I have to say before you get your answer, Karama. Mine was like very greasy puffy. Colin Paris was like greasy,

like greasy but hot. Okay. I think it should be Stanley Tucci because I think he can do all of those things. I think he would be do you guys watch The Lovely Bones because he was great in The

Lovely Bones. He can play yucky people, but also he's still very physically attractive, Like I fell in love with Stanley Tucci when I was eleven and I watched The Midsummer Night's Dream and he was playing Puck and was like, oh, Robin good fellow indeed, but but see, I feel like his Stanley Tucci's attractiveness is in that he looks so classy and you want him in like a button down making you a drink where it's like Jack. I imagine his attractiveness is that he's like kind of seedy and

like handrow you a cigarette could do that, you know. Yeah, he before he goes on set, let him get a little hot and like, yeah, I'm for real, for real. So like I think they can do literally anything. I didn't understand Armie Hammers casting for me because he and Lily James are the same age and I think makes it. And so they're both in their mid thirty which is which is weird because Hollywood loves casting a very young woman against a forty year old man, like that's their

favorite thing to do. And they had it like it was like your guys, yum, yum, here's it's tea time. He didn't eaties version for Charles Dance Winter and I think it's really good casting. Um, he's on yeah, yeah, he just seems really steely and unfeeling, So I don't I just looked up Jack Fabel who plays him in the New One, and his name is Sam Riley. I don't know who he is, but I actually think he

he's right, he's the right blend of everything. He's younger than he's like a young she's a little he looks he's like a young good looking guy that looks a little like his bangs are sweaty, you know, perfect slutty bangs. I would like sweaty, sweaty, not slutty. Would like to find a version of Rebecca or Stanley too. She plays every role. Okay, I would absolutely I would contribute to that fund, thank you. I would say my ideal cast

is like for Maxim is like a Daniel Craig. Oh, damn, Daniel Craig now or removed, But Daniel Craig now he's like fifty. You know, he's like a little I don't know that he's Do people think he's hot, Yes, they do, and it's very odd to me. I think he's kind of weird looking. Yeah, I do too. I don't find him unattractive, but I am not attracted to him. I'm like, Okay, your face has all the things in the places, but like your face is just a face to me. It's

a fine face. It's a face. What Christian bail. Oh, he can be weird, but I think he's hotter again. I feel like it needs to look. I also think that their marriage is unconsummated up until the night before. I don't think it is because she says like he has a mother on the simon, Yeah, but does that

does that mean that? Look, I think they're set scene right before she thinks he's about to go away to prison, when he's told her all about what happened to Rebecca confessed the murder, and they talked about how we held each other as we never held each other before, like plenty to each other in the night, and it feels like that's the first time consummate. I think we can agree that they never had good sex up until that point. I mean, she's pretty sure she's not pregnant. Whenever people after,

might you be pregnant, She's like, no, that's impossible. I have a unnamed narrator pitch for the star for the actress is Jessica Burdon. She was at the end of the fucking world. She's like, she looks super young, but she's like eight and and she and she has something that's like she's very pretty, of course, but she just looks like she could look very plain if they wanted

it to. Because I feel like that's that was her insecurity the whole time of how like classic and stunning Rebecca was and then she couldn't like get her makeup right ever and felt invisible anyway. And she's also very good, is very completely beautiful. Yeah, she's thirty five. She like looks like a stunning woman. The narrator is obsessed with being I do love the fact that we're like, this woman's too old, which I mean she is for the character she is. I just think it's funny that that's

the conversation character. But I think I think it's like because her naivete is like so fundamental to the character. But yes, we are. I will I will always argue for women to be older in movies. Then like it's like, oh, this this a woman who used to be an Ingnue two years ago. Now that she's thirty four, is like the mother of two eighteen year olds, like that's always what happened, and it's like very disappointing. They have to get really into vacing that. Just her instagram is just

I'm all about cooking for my family. Now. Yeah, when you turned thirty, you have to be mommy. Now, Okay, let's take a brief moment here for an ad break. Okay, we're back with Popcorn book Club. I wanted to go

back to the question of sex. I I do think that they had sex over their honeymoon, and he's like, I think they had the classic vacation they had like the vacation sex, like the the like and the vacation love story that when you like get back to your regular life, everything is not as what it seemed like. Everything is like you were in bliss in your vacation in Monte Carlo and Italy and then and then they never had sex a Mandy, and that's what's they don't have.

They don't have to surprise that they shared a bedroom, Like I know they had different beds, but I and the first part of the book, I just imagined her to have her own corridors because it felt she felt so isolated to me, didn't they though I thought it was like a sweet I thought it was I think it well, but I thought it was like in doubt, nay, like their attached. Maybe they were like, Oh, we love each other so much that we're gonna bunk convention and

sleep together every night. M wow. Being in the sounds exhausting images. Also, all the may it seemed to be having a lot of fun, Like every time she was looking at the maids and they were all like having fun gossiping, and like I was like, this sounds like a better time. Oh yeah, every time she sees a middle class Oh yeah, when have a picnic with people who were vacationing there, she like goes and sees a

family at the beach. That's just like a normal mom with her children and dad, and they're like having an afternoon. I just wanted to talk a little bit about like the pieces that I loved were like basically when it was all the falling action after the ball and the constant reveals, and I feel like what I loved about the reveals, even if you saw the murder coming, was it like it every time re contextualized everything that you've read, especially like Mrs Danvers point point of view over and

over again. I feel like she's the most interesting character in the book to me. Um, just like with ends with her fucking burning Manderley Down is amazing, but amazing, you know, just from Mrs Danverse, that really terrifying scene where she explains that you should be dead and tries to convince the narrator to kill herself. Yeah, she almost

does it because classic scorn. You just convinced people from just joking, please don't these are not none of these And the tricking of the narrator to where that outfit was so fucking cruel. But then you realize. At first I was like, that was so cruel to do to her, and then I realized, oh, she's doing it to him, like she's doing it to her, but really it's to him.

And then you realize, like, oh, because he killed her and she knows that like she does, and she can't do anything about it, and and so it's just like this unraveling and then the body being found and it just and and then I mean, I loved the reveal that was the one I did not see with the doctor. I thought it was going to be that she was pregnant,

and I think a moment. That's because one and then I think they think that you're saying it, and then they're like, and that will see all Maxim's fate because that's a motive. And I just love that. And every turn he gets off and I felt myself, even though it's awful, but I felt myself rooting for him to get off because I was just on this ride with the narrator. But then at the end, when Manderley burns down, I was like, fuck, yes, like it was just such

I I don't know. I love that point. I do think that the book like that period where you're we're all like rooting for Maxim to get away away. Okay, we're not, but the institution of the book is positioning with the anticipation and the fear of Maxi, this man who actually did murder his wife, whether he had a reason or not. You're still not allowed to murder your wife, even if she taunts you, sorry that she taunted you.

Just not shoot someone. You cannot take a joke. You literally cannot take a joke with somebody that you have complete power over. So, like I said, the whole book is structured like I found a very funny way that is very true of like the way that the system looks out for rich white men. Like the policeman knows he did it, but he's on his side. And even when Jack is like, no, he did it and you actually did it, He's like, okay, ha ha, we'll hear

you out because we have to. But everyone involved is like really hoping we don't have enough evidence that we have to deal with this because we want Maxim you give charity. No one wants to hold him responsible for his actions. They're all actively resisting but look good in Maxim's life. Everything makes Maxim an interesting Person's Mandardly. It's what he uses as the big to get the second

Missus de Winter to marry him. That he talks about, like how you'll love Mandrely and she's seen it on a postcard and she like knows that everybody thinks as a status cabulous, that's all Rebecca. Rebecca me that house um, and I think maybe it is cly. The fact that I'm not reading this book when I'm sixteen anymore, and the fact that I am an adult now and we had to do renovations and I had to on a very very small level fix up my house the way

Rebecca did. Yeah, Danny should burn that place to the ground. That place was Rebecca. She did the work. That's why I made her husband a remotely interesting person. I will say that matters history. Before Rebecca showed up, I think it was shit, and the Maxim makes that clear of like this place is dur the garbage. Rebecca maybe spend money on it. I never considered that before their furniture, like they had nice furniture, but it was all in storage.

And Rebecca, yeah, she brought around like the Renaissance of Manderl like it did have a storied history. It was just fallen into disrepair. So I feel like he could have let it continue to fester, but she brought it back and revived it. And that is what does him more interesting as opposed to just posting on family legacy. It does. It's not about the winter. I think it's

a perfect in that way. It's the perfect consequence for his actions in so it's just like, well, now they're just two boring people living in a mediocre hotel with each other's company. And to be clear, I was not rooting for Maxim to get away with killing his wife. I think it was just it's the ride that you're taken on in those scenes where it's like you want the tension to be released, and at every point they

don't let it. Like you think when he comes back from the court, he's going to be like I was convicted, and then he's not, and then Favel comes over and then that doesn't work, and then you go to the doctor and then that. So it's just like this this sense of dread that I felt in that back third of the book that didn't allow me to put it down, and that the like in that back half of all the descriptions of like the Knowing looks like so much

of that last half is just like what's her? Um Mrs the second Mrs de Winter talking about Frank looking at her maximum looking at her, not making eye contect, making like he knows, Like I I love that ship. Yeah, that scene, it makes so much sense that Hitgecog was like, um, excuse me, I will take this one furtive yances. I guess I kind of was rooting for Maxim, like I

find in spite of myself. No no, But then because like they make Jack seemed like such a near duell and like you don't want him to have his victory. He's such a slime bag. Oh my god, he's lover he's dead because I'm sorry, Jennifer, he was blackmailing. He didn't like. No, I understand. Can both be bad and also against each other. That's true. I'm just alcoholic now.

And it's because he sat. The book clearly frames Jack as the antagonist in this scenario, and because we're in the second missistant Winter's Head, we are on Max's side. And then it takes like a pause. You have to read it and then pause and take a minute to step back and be Dana again and be like, oh, no, I mean he did he murdered his wife. Yeah, for me, so that I think the book, the book brings you on that ride in her voice and her perspective, and

she is on. She is Maxims ride or die. She finds out that he murdered someone and does not give it a moment of critical thought, which is such a credit to Daphne Right because I was reading, I was looking up some articles and people she in when it first came out, was surprised that people thought that this was a romantic novel, Like it's such a credit to her writing that she was able to make so many people kind of lust and also be excited about this

murder man. Murder man, daddy baby girl so excited about those two. Uh well, a lot of people in this group have like long term relationships. Um. I have always thought that if my husband came home and told me that he murdered someone, I would sigret how to get him up was the country like like, obviously I would escape. I would assume that whoever he murdered there was a good reason. And I wonder if the most people feel about their partners, and she knows him though you so well,

would ever do that. Maybe that's why I'm the only single person here. But if somebody I was dating came home to me and was like, Babe, I killed somebody. I swear to you it was completely justified. I would be like, okay, sweetheart, that's great. You go pack the suitcases, and as soon as they left the room, I would call nine one one immediately because I am not going so we could escape. But here, but here's the difference.

I want to say, Jennifer, you and Daniel have known each other four years and have had an intimate, close relationship in which you are a partner and teammates in your life. You know Daniel, and you in your heart would know Daniel is a I could speak on behalf of me, is a very gentleman. And if he killed someone, there would be certain where it's like, I think that the book make it. But if the book makes very very clear that they don't. She doesn't know Max UM's

basically strange. That's sorry. And if if it was your long term partner, okay, and they came back and they were like, I murdered someone because they and because they didn't laugh at my joke, I would be like, okay, I have to I have to. Especially I think if it was a stranger, if I would be and I've known Jeremy, you know for a very long time, I'd be like, all right, but let's figure this out. But if he was like, so, you know my ex how she died that was because of me, I'd be like,

all right, I'm so sorry. You're going to jail looking up as you're saying you're going to turn them in. You need to make them figure on their side, And then I'm with you. I am, and the cops immediately like I don't work with the tops. And I was still called the top right, God, you're right, this man is murdered. He might murder again. I do want to say something, um. So we had all talked about sort at the beginning of the book, and I would just like to say that I think that it could have

benefited from another edit. Um. The beginning of chapter three was where I was like, oh, this book should have started here. Like, I didn't want it to start with them in the hotel on the lamb, not on the lamb, because nobody thinks that he did it, even though he did it. But um, I wanted it to start with the line I wonder what my life would be today

if Mrs van Hopper had not been a snob. I think that that's such an engaging begin I love the witness or it begins, first of all, because I think the only two moments of real clarity that this narrators has are in her dreams. That the first one is about dreaming about returning to Manderley, and the second one is in the last chapter where she dreams about Rebecca coming through her dreams and Rebecca just destroying everything. Um. And I think those are things that she can't think

about in her waking life, and that's really fascinating. And I think the next chapter means that we all know how this plays out, Like we're all just waiting to see how they go from having this beautiful home in Cornwall to living in city hotels. And she begins as a paid companion to an older, unpleasant person, and now she is a paid companion to an older unpleasant person again, and it's her husband. And I think part of what makes it such a mystery is how she gets back

to that place. I'm not a big fan at the end, at the beginning most of the time. That's that's I think that's a personal thing for me. Also hate very vivid descriptions of Flora, and that's like a lot of the first two chapters. I think we've talked about that before. I'm like, I don't want to hear about plants. I don't want to hear about there's a lot of flower talks. We gotta we got to know all about the as Ailiens, which are blood red at first but then afterward come

in blue. Yeah again, all her there. Yeah. I love that You're I love Jennifer, that you're giving You're You're the Danvers of this. I will say that that convicting her to wear the costume that Rebecca Laura to her last ball is a crazy, I mean, amazing prank move like it's so it's evil genius, Like it is so evil and and I just wanted. I was like shouting in my like the trap don't do? Why why do you trust me? I couldn't so so naive, but I

do look like I crom I agree. Sometimes I don't like knowing the ending at the beginning, like I really try to avoid spoilers and things, but I think that to me the way, like every now and then she would like drop in like, uh, you know, the first and last my first and last fancy dress ball. Uh, you know, just like little things of reminding you of the dread. I feel like this book was so much dread and I love that ship, and I think there's something.

If there wasn't that I would be like I don't care about the rhododendrons, like I don't because I know there's a body coming. I know there's gonna be a body human being. When I'm reading something where I and I think it's taking too long to get to the murder, like I recently was reading Heather Wells Mystery series and I think it's the fourth book. In it, you don't get to the body until like page fifty, and I

kept texting people. I was like, I'm reading the next Heather Wells book and there's no one dead yet, and I'm just like, I'm on page fifteen. Where is the dead body? Where it at? Give me the body? I want the death, give me the murder. And I'm like, it's a murder mystery, I want the murder. This is a very atmospheric novel. It's like it's everything is in subtle glances and the like arranging flowers and then like what time is t again? Like little social conventions. That's

our show for the week. Thank you so much for listening. I'm Danis Schwartz and you can find me on Twitter at Danish Schwartz with three z s. You can follow Jennifer Wright at jen Ashley Right, Karama down Qua is at Karama Drama, Melissa Hunter is at Melissa f t W and Tan Tran is smart enough to have and off Twitter, but she is on Insta at Hank Tina. Our executive producer is Christopher Hessiotis and we're produced and

edited by Mike John's Special thanks to David Wasserman. Next week, after we make sure to print up a bunch of give Me the Murder t shirts thank you for EMA, we will continue our conversation about Rebecca before we jump into the screen time portion of this book and do the nineteen forties Alfred Hitchcock adaptation and then the Army Hammer Lily James adaptation. Coming to Netflix. Popcorn book Club is a production of I Heart Radio.