The House of Eliott

House Of Eliott #1

by Jean Marsh

Brand new book in plastic!

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Historical, Adult Fiction, British Literature

304 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1994

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Jean Lyndsey Torren Marsh was an English actress and writer. She co-created and starred in the ITV series Upstairs, Downstairs (1971–1975), for which she won the 1975 Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for her performance as Rose Buck. She reprised the role in the BBC's revival of the series (2010–2012).
Marsh co-created the television series The House of Eliott in 1991. Her film appearances include Cleopatra (1963), Frenzy (1972), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), The Changeling (1980), Return to Oz (1985), Willow (1988), Fatherland (1994) and Monarch (2000). She is also known for three roles in Doctor Who: as Joan of England in The Crusade; Sara Kingdom, a companion of the First Doctor; and a villain opposite the Seventh Doctor. She was briefly married to Jon Pertwee, who played the Third Doctor in the series, from 1955 to 1960.

Reviews

[Baba · Rating 3 out of 5]

Based on the TV show, Marsh's wonderful tale of the fall and rise of the House Of Eliott, that was such a hit BBC drama. Two sisters fight to assert themselves after being left near penniless in their family home, after their father's death, and as they begin to assert themselves they begin to find out a lot more about men and the reality of their father's life. 6 out of 12

[Tea Jovanović · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sećate se serije rađene po ovoj knjizi? :)

[Ellie Spencer (catching up from hiatus) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rounded down from about 3.5 stars ⭐️ this was a lighthearted and easy read, with a plot twist I didn’t expect. However, it didn’t make me feel any major emotions, and there wasn’t enough description of the setting for me to feel completely immersed in the world. I haven’t seen the series that this book is based on, but this has definitely made me want to give it a try. At times things felt a little disjointed, and I found the chapters too long for my liking. But, it was a nice easy ready after finishing a lengthy dickens book!

[Steph · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a 1920s dive into two sisters finding their way and building a fashion empire it is quite interesting and I really enjoyed the women they were strong and independent in their own ways I didn't know that this was based off of a TV show but all in all this was a really good read

[Kirstie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really nice easy enter read and I kept imagining the tv programme. The characters were very well picked for the show now that I've read the book I can see how hey worked well

[Marsha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book! It was a really enjoyable summer read. I loved the BBC series aired years ago. Kind of a Dickinson story about women thrown into poverty in London who make good. It's hard not to like the story!

[Hermien · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the tv series especially because of the beautiful clothes. The book was enjoyable but lacked depth and substance.

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Picked this up in a book sale. I used to really enjoy the tv series. The book was a true comfort read.

[BellaGBear · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very entertaining. As a fellow improvisation crafty person, these ladies gave me inspiration!

[Beverley · Rating 3 out of 5]

THE HOUSE OF ELLIOTT by Jean Marsh

This is a book that was based on a UK television program, which was televised during the early 1990's. I remember it being on, but do not really remember watching it very often.

The book was published in 2011, according to Amazon. It was a library lend and so of course as things must be, i had to take it back. However it was originally published in 1994 or 6 (sorry).

The book is based around the lives of two sisters, Evangeline and Beatrice Elliott and is set in London during the 1920's. Their father, who was a medical doctor and therefore should have been well-off, dies suddenly leaving them not only penniless, but also with lots of unanswered questions.

In 1920 England women were more or less still seen as the property of men, to kept and looked after and if you were the father of daughters the best you could hope for was marriage to someone who would give your daughters financial security and maybe love as well. However it is just after the first world war, where sadly many young men had lost their lives leaving many women without the possibility of marriage, let along a 'good match'. Women of a certain class were not educated for work, in fact most of the time they were barely even educated. But life was changing.

Evangeline at the age of 30 was seen to be too old for marriage and she was supposed to accept what life had or had not given her, but Beatrice was 20 and there was still hope of a marriage for her. However while they waited for Mr... to sweep them off their feet they had to learn to fend for themselves and they did!

First using the material salvaged from their father's clothes they began to design and sew clothes first for themselves and then for women of a certain class. This was seen as acceptable employment for a woman, but what the world didn't expect was how popular their fashion ideas would become and that out of humble beginning bloomed 'The House of Elliott.'

You will meet a number of interesting characters throughout this book, such as Penny, who lost her finance in the war and now dresses like a man and does charitable deeds and is often seen driving a car!! What next? Also her brother, Jack and an architect by the name of Hugo. There are others!

I settled myself down for a nice period read and i wasn't disappointed - but, about page 220 out of 270 there was this quite unnecessary sex scene, which i glanced at and then passed over to be faced with another one a few pages on. This spoilt the end of the story for me somewhat as i was on my guard for any more. I know people had sex back then and out of marriage just has much as they do today, but it was almost like someone had said to Jean Marsh you really need to add this - she didn't, the book was perfect just as it was.

This book gets ***

NB I score books like this; 1 * - it was so bad i didn't get started, 2** it was so boring i didn't finish it, 3*** it was ok, i read it, i wouldn't necessarily expect others to read it, 4**** it was good, i wouldn't keep or probably read it again, but it was good, 5***** it was so amazing i want everyone in the world to read it.

[Joyce · Rating 2 out of 5]

De achtergrond is erg interessant en ligt in mijn straatje, maar het verhaal sprong zo van de hak op de tak en het boek staat vol fouten, waardoor het me uiteindelijk toch niet kon grijpen. Jammer!

[Juliana Graham · Rating 3 out of 5]

I used to absolutely adore the House of Eliott when it was on TV when I was a teenager so this book was a nice trip down memory lane. It was very similar to what I remember watching and documents the establishment of the House of Eliott from its earliest days. Evangeline and Beatrice are the strong, independent sisters who go it alone following the death of their father at a time when this was far more unusual for a woman than it is today.

The book was very standalone and I think if you hadn't watched the TV series you might feel as if you were left hanging a bit - but because I knew the story well I don't feel like I missed out. I have another book in this series to read so it will be interesting to see what areas of the series (if any) that one covers.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 3 out of 5]

A straightforward, unpretentious novelization of the classic 1990s BBC serial. It concentrates on breezy pace and emotion, rather than greater depth & background of the characters & their life stories. But even with the longing for something more in-depth, this hits the spot for a feel-good piece of historical fiction.

[Sheila · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dr. Eliott has died and Beatrice and Emmaline discover all they have is part ownership of their home and a lot of his beautiful clothes. He gave them very little money while they were growing up and Beatrice had to work in his office. She is now 30 and considered a spinster. It is just after WWI has ended in England. Their older cousin Arthur is now guardian to Beatrice and will be for another five years until she turns 25. Both women are beautiful.
Arthur refuses to give them any more than a pittance for an allowance. He and his mother, their Aunt Lydia want them to sell the house or to take in lodgers to earn a living but the two sisters have other ideas. They decide to use some of their father’s clothes to make new outfits for themselves. Soon, other women want clothing similar to theirs. They decide to donate much of their father’s clothing though and meet a young woman, Penelope who refers Beatrice to her brother, Jack for a job. He is a portrait photographer and needs someone to act as his receptionist. After a rocky start, Beatrice is hired.
It’s an enjoyable story about how the two young women work hard and become successful with their own dressmaking/design business.

[Rob Smith, Jr. · Rating 2 out of 5]

I first ran the series and then read the book. I might've not done the same if in the reverse. The mini-series (With aid of Eileen Atkins) was far better. Even with the unfortunate sudden death of the series due to fire, the televised ending is more satisfying than Marsh's open ended last sentence in the book.

Marsh is heavy handed through out this book about her embracing the view of the bolsheviks than the efforts to start a fashion house. The book should've been entitled 'The Bolsheviks of Eliott'. I guess she felt more comfortable couching characters in a background her family lived than the politics she espouses.

I wouldn't have a problem if the story was all about lovers of Lenin. This book just does a poor job of handling politics and the fashion business. I believe Marsh was trying to contrast the two, but fails miserably as she never writes beyond the frilly "Worker Rights" doctrine.

Otherwise, the book is too much a soap opera. Hopping from instance to instance with no clear vision of an end, that never comes.

Bottom line: I don't recommend this book. 3 out of ten points.

[Sara · Rating 2 out of 5]

The concept of this novel was promising. After I'd finished a lengthy book I just wanted a light and enjoyable read over the Christmas period.
With regards to the plot about two headstrong sisters paving their careers and launching their own business without the restraints of their father sounded like a good read. I really felt that the writing was disjointed and lacked any sort of substance or description. Paragraphs were very short, topics flitted from one to another and chapters were unnecessarily lengthy.
I did finish The House of Elliot in less than a week but admittedly I was disappointed in the writing style and lack of pizzazz.
I also found the sex scenes quite insipid and I am by no means a prude; I just found it hard to digest why Eveangeline was the only character to have her sex life documented. Understandably she was the beautiful and vivacious character but none of it really made any sense to me. The book at times was pretty confusing and it was hard to make a real connection with any of the characters.

[Kathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the BBC series when it was on years ago, and I love Jean Marsh for creating such strong, independent, creative women. Evangeline and Beatrice are left destitute when their father dies, and at the mercy of their cousin Arthur, who has charge of what little money and property they have. They decide to support themselves with dressmaking, and their skill and instinct for business lead to the opening of a couture house. Unfortunately, the book covers only the first season, and it appears that this is the only one that made it into print, which means that the real success of the House of Eliott is left out. Still, I appreciated the opportunity that the written word always provides to get to know the characters more intimately, and explore their motivations.

[Bev · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two sisters, Beatrice and Evangeline. Dad dies, and they are left destitute. They also realize that father dearest wasn't all he made out he was. His fortune had been philandered, and they are the worse off for it. Not to mention a predatory cousin who wants to claim his right to be their guardian, and marry one of them, and a revolting aunt, who is no help whatsoever, and flitters and flounces in and out of their lives, making things generally worse.

Beatrice, the elder, knows they need jobs. Evangeline just wants to dance - and she possibly could. Until she lands in some hot water and can’t anymore.

But fortunately these sisters have a sense of style that is soon noticed by all.

Read my full review here.

[Dorothy · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is SO much wrong with this novel. Head-hopping; lack of description (except the clothes); dizzying jumps between scenes (sometimes without even a line of white space to indicate a lapse of time or change of location); cardboard characterization; uneven pacing.

In more experienced hands, this would have been a longer book where the era of the twenties was recreated as vividly as the Eliot sisters' creations. As it is, if I hadn't watched the series I would've had little sense of what the people or the setting looked like.

It didn't really matter, because I wasn't reading it for literary merit. I read it, purely and simply, as a way of reliving the TV series, which I loved. On that level, I enjoyed it.

[Kim Russell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I watched every episode of The House of Eliott back in the nineties – I loved it – and did not know that a book had been based on the television series, written by Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins, who I remember from Upstairs, Downstairs, another series I enjoyed. When my stepmother-in-law gave me a hardback copy, I knew it would make an easy, cosy bedtime read, and I was sad when I finished it last night. The style of writing wasn’t particularly wonderful, but I overlooked that just to spend some time with some of my favourite characters.

[Kateřina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Já mam prostě slabost pro meziválečný romány a ještě ke všemu z anglickýho prostředí. Navíc když je to celý takový pozitivně laděný.
Jen bych tomu možná vytkla, že je to psaný lehce jako scénář k seriálu, postavy tam nikdo moc nepředstavil, neuvedl, jako bychom je snad měli vidět, když se poprvý objeví v příběhu. Což samozřejmě začalo dávat smysl, když jsem zjistila, že je to román napsanej podle seriálu.

[Lily Mifsud · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book about female empowerment in London after the first World War. I love reading stories about women who push themselves the opposite way in which society is expecting them to and make a business for themselves.

[Danielle Barnes · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wanted to love this but honestly found it so badly written, and it felt like there were so many loose ends at the end. There were pages I had to read multiple times to work out what on Earth was going on.

[Maria Thermann · Rating 2 out of 5]

I adored the BBC's 1990s TV series The House of Eliott, co-created by actresses Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins. The hugely successful series ended abruptly after three years, when the BBC, displaying their usual arrogance with regard to their treatment of writers and audiences alike, decided to cancel the fourth series. Infuriatingly, we never found out, what happened to Beatrice and Evangeline Eliott, after the successful launch of their high-fashion emporium and never got to see the outcome of the important steps they were going to take to untangle their complicated love lives.

The book version only allows us to see what was covered by Series One. Sadly, the book is not that well written and I found it quite inferior to the well-scripted TV series. What irritated me the most was that Jean Marsh felt it necessary to add Jackie Collins-style sex scenes to show us what a passionate, and emotionally misguided, creature Evie Eliott really is.

It jars on eye and mind, and somehow derails the image Marsh tries to built up throughout the book for the younger of the two sisters. Here Evie is little more than a sexual play-thing for men. She was so much more in the TV series! Because the sex scenes are creepy, not sexy, we are left with a very negative impression of Evie, namely that she's a masochist, something the TV series certainly didn't convey.

On screen, we saw a young woman exploring her sexuality and sexual freedom, and while her choice of men was always disastrous, her "experimenting" was convincing and realistically portrayed; most young women go through the "must have that bad boy" phase when they're 20. One could relate to Evie on that score in the TV series, but not at all in the book, where Evie allows men to humiliate her both physically and psychologically at every turn. This doesn't ring true from a character who is earlier on portrayed as a quite spoiled and selfish person, somebody apt to please herself rather than think of others, despite her involvement with Miss Maddox's charity for the poor.

Another problem with the book version is that Jean Marsh is obviously so used to dealing with scripts and seeing action physically played out, she forgets to correctly tag her dialogue for readers. At times, one is really confused as to who has just said what to whom. She also tends to jump into the heads of her protagonists from one sentence to the next, like an omniscient god-like creature, something that began to grate on me quite early on in the book.

The other problem, for both the TV version and the book, is that both cousin Arthur and the girls' father are 2-dimensional villains. They have no redeeming features whatsoever, which makes them far less credible, especially in the fairly narrow social circles that the Eliotts would have enjoyed after WWI. It seems utterly incredible that a 30-year-old woman like Beatrice should never have had an inkling or heard a rumour about her father and cousin's involvement in illegal and very unsavoury dealings.

The sisters may have led a very sheltered life, but such things have a habit of getting back to family via unexpected sources, gossiping trades people, next door's servants, patients visiting Doctor Eliott's surgery. Although we are given a brief glimpse of this, when Bea remembers a young man she quite liked, but who broke off the blossoming relationship rather abruptly, the elder of the two Eliott sisters seems to have closed her eyes, ears and mind to what was going on under her very nose.

The plot: Two sisters, the 30-year-old Beatrice, and her 20-year-old sister Evangeline Eliott find themselves left penniless by their cruel father. He has led a double life, foolishly squandering his own money and his wife's, leaving their two daughters without the means to support themselves upon his unexpected death.

Over time, the sisters find out what a truly cruel man he was. Gradually, more and more is revealed of his villainy. At first, the sisters are at a loss of how to earn a living, but they are determined to keep their creepy cousin Arthur and their horrible aunt Lydia out of their lives, now that they have finally found a degree of freedom from male dominance.

Having tried being a dancer for hire and having been forced to take on the odious Crawleys as lodgers, the sisters eventually hit on the idea of starting their own fashion house. Both are talented designers, creating dazzling frocks for all occasions. Above all, they are not averse to hard work and taking risks.

It is rare to find anything on TV that depicts the lives of successful and inspirational women, so when I started watching The House of Eliott, I especially liked the fact that both Bea and Evie were such complex characters and had such turbulent relationships with those around them, men and women. Some of that is lost in this book, because Jean Marsh's writing skills are simply not up to the task. Having said that, it is an entertaining read and in the absence of a fourth series, it's a reminder of how good the TV show really was. Even if Jennifer Saunders and Dawn French thought they had to lampoon it.

[Sue Marsh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Easy read, very obviously written for television with very black and white characterisation

[Corinne · Rating 2 out of 5]

Could not get into the story and stopped reading after i was half way through.

[Janey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good story (which I kind of knew from the TV series ages ago) fairly well told and engaging. Not great writing style but overlooking that it was enjoyable.

[Helen P · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book !

[Jessica]

Easy read.

[Virginia Fletcher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easy reading. Light and predictable