Miss Bates: Emma Revisited

by Catherine Cliff

A daring re-imagining of an Austen classic from the unflinching viewpoint of the misunderstood Miss Bates.

Henrietta Bates, the iconic bore of Austen's Emma, is the opposite of handsome, clever, and rich Emma: she is plain, ill-educated, and impoverished. An unmarried woman of quite a different order from that novel's proudly single heroine, she is an object of scorn and pity, whose survival depends upon the generosity of her neighbors which she barters for with an unrelenting shower of banal and grateful chatter.

But what if the woman we see in Emma were actually deliberately assuming a role, donning a mask, as a means of managing an untenable situation? What if there was a world of difference between her inward and outward voice? What would the Woodhouses’s Highbury look like from her perspective?

Miss Bates by Catherine Cliff imagines answers to these questions as it chronicles Henrietta Bates's unexpected and, at times, violent life, navigating a world with no ready-made opportunities, where the stakes are of the highest order. In a debut that is by turns comedic, tragic, startling, and altogether brilliant, Miss Bates turns Austen’s poignant and ridiculous side character into a feminist force who understands innately the life she has been dealt and how to slyly play it to her advantage.

This is no marriage plot; it is a spinster plot. Or maybe, the spinster’s plot.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Jane Austen, Historical, Audiobook, Retellings, British Literature

336 pages, Hardcover

First published July 7, 2026

Reviews

[Sophia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Those familiar with Jane Austen’s Emma might raise their brows at the idea of a garrulous woman like Miss Bates telling the story of Emma. However, I assure you, ladies and gents, debut author, Catherine Cliff writes a Miss Bates who will have you sucked in and needing to know this darker tale through her eyes.

Beginning when ‘Henrie’ Bates is a little girl, Miss Bates: Emma Revisited introduces the Bates family, the village of Highbury, and those who shall eventually be the key players in the story. The Bates family suffers an early tragedy for which some never really recover and its is the beginning of what shapes the young girl who is precocious and thinks differently from others around her. She’s differently-abled and this leaves her at a disadvantage. Later, her financial and social circumstances which we are more familiar with play a role.

Catherine Cliff writes a Miss Bates who is pitiable from the outside, but doesn’t invite one’s pity. She’s actually strong and cunning in her own way. Shocking, at times and a person it does not due to under-estimate (looking at you Miss Emma Woodhouse).

Speaking of Emma, those familiar with Austen’s story will see a much darker Emma and a different version of Mr. Knightley. Frank is an exaggerated version, but not by much. Jane Fairfax is the sweet, mysterious damsel who Henrie will sacrifice greatly to see happy.

The book explains that it is not a romance and it isn’t. This is a dark, character-driven historical fiction that readers will find themselves cheering on an under-dog character with a bit of larceny in her.

I rec'd a print copy from Pegasus Books and Great Reads Book Promo to read in exchange for an honest review.

My full review will post at The Quill Ink 8.6.26.

[Isabella Bersani · Rating 5 out of 5]

We need more books like this. The “older single woman” character is always in the shadows of books. Now it’s time for her to take center stage in a big way. All those habits and stereotypical ways of being take on new meaning. This book has everything- humor, creep, plot. Will transform your perspective on both Miss Bates and similar dynamics in the real world. Very much enjoyed and also - perfect length of book that flies by.

[Abigail Bok · Rating 3 out of 5]

Why do so many books these days feel as if they were written in boldface type and italics? I suppose it is at least in part the fault of literary agents and editors, who find such works easier to pitch and market than subtler fare.

In Emma, the heroine reflects at one point that “a very narrow income has a tendency to contract the mind, and sour the temper. Those who barely live, and who live perforce in a very small, and generally very inferior, society, may well be illiberal and cross.” The author of this book, Catherine Cliff, has certainly taken that notion and run with it.

Cliff has taken the quiet, sad little story of Miss Henrietta Bates’s life, which hovers around the margins of Jane Austen’s Emma, and pumped it full of drama. Her Miss Bates (Henrie, as she calls herself), is a welter of passions (mostly rage) hiding behind the pretense of the grateful little chatterbox in Austen’s story. She finds beauty in killing chickens, she is attracted to witches, and she likes to imagine those she dislikes dying hideous deaths (and sometimes they do). Even Miss Bates’s love—for Jane Fairfax, and for a new character—is conducted at Category 5 intensity.

To drive this whirlwind, every character from the original novel has to morph into some kind of monster—most especially Emma Woodhouse herself. Cliff also has to change the storyline of the original, making every event more dire and distorting every personality. It is a common failing of Austenesque fiction to exaggerate the characters, but this book takes that tendency just about as far as it can go. Nobody can be allowed to be happy, nobody can be normal. The shades are dark, darker, and black.

The book is pretty well written, though in a modern style I tend to find jarring, and with certain odd errors (why, oh why, can no contemporary writer master the difference between “lay” and “lie”? and why spell “pus” as if it were a cat’s nickname?). Cliff showed a good understanding of the manners of the age but none at all of the symptoms of consumption, notably the constant hunger cravings of a mid-stage consumptive.

But the main thing I missed was nuance. Perhaps this was intended as black comedy—Dark Jane—but I missed compassion and the relief of lighter moments. I was excited by the prospect of having the poignant Miss Bates placed at the center of a story, but see little need for turning her into Kali the Destroyer.

[BethFishReads · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let me start out by saying I love new takes on Jane Austen's novels, and I'm usually fairly forgiving.

Unfortunately, MISS BATES didn't work for me. I had no issue with Cliff's interpretation of the character Emma. Here, Emma is inherently mean and bossy from childhood and is a spoiled brat. That's not my take on Emma, but I could live with the premise.

My problems came with Cliff's changes in the plot of the novel EMMA for no apparent reason. Okay, maybe there were reasons that were made clear later in her novel (MISS BATES); I wouldn't know because I stopped at page 170. Here are just a couple of things that made no sense to me: Why did Emma and Isabella have different mothers? Why did Mr. Weston buy Randalls soon after his wife died instead of twenty years later? I spotted a few other similar issues and expected that there would be more to come. I realize these deviations from EMMA (the novel) may be considered small things, but they began to gnaw at me.

I enjoyed Cliff's portrayal of Miss Bates's childhood, and the contrast between Miss Bates's inner and outer lives was really fun. In addition, I had no problem with the writing style or the general premise of the book up to page 170. (I haven't yet read spoilers to see what happens in the rest of the book.)

Lots of people really liked the novel, so if you're curious, give it a go. You might have a better time of it than I did.

Thanks to Pegasus for the review copy.

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

The audiobook is fantastically narrated.

Miss Bates gets her time. The “character flaws” are given such a heartbreaking and believable foundation. Cliff ties up all the loose ends left with Emma. I have to say that I enjoyed the answers to many of the questions left open with Jane Austin’s work. From now on, I will listen to both of these novels together.

[Emily Kidd · Rating 5 out of 5]

For anyone not a purely Jane Austen aficionado, a reminder that Miss Bates is the talkative spinster lady who Emma makes fun of at the picnic and is then chastised by Mr. Knightly (before becoming engaged to him).

This retelling of Emma tackles what it was like to be a spinster in the Austen-era, from Miss Bates’ childhood to her much later years. It also is a great look into how people in poverty are not valued by Society, how character traits are formed, and how every human is capable of unspeakable performances, both sly and overt.

That being said, this book is excellent. And even though {SPOILER} Emma is “killed,” in the end, it makes complete sense, makes a reader like me doubt the genius of Austen even more, and offers an enlightening view of charity, domesticity, and femininity.

I’ve read shocking Austen retellings, from a cheating Mrs. Collin’s to a vampire priest, but a life-end to Emma only sounds unimaginable until you’ve read Miss Bates—and that would be, therefore, the reason it’s worthy of your reading attention.

[Laura Hayes · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was awful. I really disliked it. Why didn’t this author choose her own characters and tell her terrible story. The fact that she stole the characters from the beautifully witty Emma by Austen and then changed the characters completely is awful. If you like Emma do not read this because you will be terribly disappointed with what she does to the characters.

[Ehrrin · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5, rounding up

[Ella Crabtree · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book stands on its own but is a particular treat if you’ve read Emma. Here you see Miss Bates fully humanized and can’t help but root for her with your whole being. Wonderful writing, super gripping, and the epilogue was perfection 🤌

[Desirae · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have always had a soft spot for Miss Bates. In Emma, she is one of those characters who seems almost impossible to forget despite the fact that she is constantly being talked over, talked about, or simply tolerated. She is ridiculous, yes, but there has always been something about her that fascinated me. What happens to the women who exist at the edges of Austen's world? What happens when the money disappears, the marriage never comes, and the family that once protected you gradually becomes another source of vulnerability? Catherine Cliff takes that little question and absolutely runs with it in Miss Bates: Emma Revisited, turning one of Austen's most comic peripheral figures into a woman with a life, a history, secrets, anger, intelligence, and an astonishing capacity for survival.

And I absolutely loved it.

This is not a sweet, cozy retelling of Emma. In fact, calling it an Emma retelling almost feels inadequate because Cliff takes Austen's Highbury and turns it inside out. The broad outlines of the familiar world are still there, but everything feels stranger, darker, and considerably more dangerous. The novel follows Henrietta “Henrie” Bates from childhood through the events we recognize from Emma and beyond, allowing us to understand how she became the woman Austen's readers know: the endlessly chattering, apparently foolish, financially dependent Miss Bates.

Except she isn't foolish at all.

That is probably my favorite thing about this book. Cliff takes the chatter that we have always associated with Miss Bates and gives it another meaning. Her endless talking becomes a kind of camouflage. It is a performance, a survival mechanism, something that allows her to hide the considerably sharper mind underneath. While everyone around her assumes that she is harmless because she is poor, unmarried, socially awkward, and perpetually grateful, Henrie is watching. She notices things. She remembers things. She understands exactly how little power she actually possesses.

And that is where the novel becomes so fascinating.

The Bates family's decline is particularly devastating. Cliff does a wonderful job of showing what genteel poverty actually means for a woman like Henrietta. There is nothing romantic about being an impoverished unmarried woman in this world. Charity is not freedom. Being invited somewhere is not belonging. Gratitude becomes a currency, and dependence can become humiliating very quickly. Henrie's increasingly reduced circumstances make her desperation completely understandable, but Cliff never turns her into a saint. If anything, the novel is much more interested in what happens when a woman has been denied every socially acceptable avenue for agency.

Sometimes that agency becomes very strange indeed.

Henrie is one of those wonderfully bewildering characters who continually surprises me. I loved how morally slippery she becomes. She can be funny, compassionate, observant, calculating, resentful, loving, and frightening, sometimes within the same chapter. There are moments when I wanted to embrace her and moments when I thought, Henrie, what on earth are you doing? But that uncertainty is precisely what made her so compelling. She is not a secret perfect woman waiting for everyone to realize they underestimated her. She is a woman shaped by deprivation, humiliation, grief, and necessity.

And then there is Emma.

Oh, I loved what Cliff does with Emma.

This is a much darker Emma Woodhouse than the one we know from Austen, and I found that delicious. Austen's Emma is spoiled, meddlesome, privileged, and frequently wrong, but there is an underlying warmth to her that makes her journey toward self-awareness so satisfying. Here, Cliff pushes the darker elements of Emma's personality much further. She becomes a more unsettling presence, particularly because we are seeing her through Henrie's eyes. Emma is no longer simply the clever young woman playing with the lives of those around her. She is someone with enormous social and economic power who has very little understanding of what it means not to have that power.

The contrast between these two women is fascinating.

Emma can afford to be careless.

Henrie cannot.

That difference sits underneath practically everything in the novel.

I was also particularly taken with what Cliff does with Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill. In Austen's novel, they are enormously important to the plot, but they are still somewhat secondary to Emma's story. Here, they become much more central, and I loved seeing them expanded into complicated, consequential figures. Jane in particular gains a fascinating depth, and her relationship to Henrie becomes one of the emotional anchors of the novel. Frank, meanwhile, is given considerably more room to be charming, manipulative, unpredictable, and morally complicated. Watching these characters move from background players to central figures completely changed the shape of the story for me.

Mr. Knightley, too, feels different in this world, as does practically everyone else. Cliff is not simply filling in the blanks of Emma; she is reinterpreting the entire ecosystem of Highbury. The wealthy characters become more difficult to romanticize when viewed from the perspective of someone who depends upon their goodwill.

And that is really what makes this book work so well for me.

It is about perspective.

Austen gave us the privileged view of Highbury. Cliff gives us the view from the margins.

The result is sometimes funny, sometimes grotesque, sometimes heartbreaking, and occasionally downright shocking. There is a darkness here that I wasn't expecting, but I adored it. The strange turns, the secrets, the violence, the shifting loyalties — all of it makes Highbury feel like a place where everyone has something they are hiding. Cliff manages to preserve enough of Austen's wit and social observation while introducing something much more unsettling underneath.

And the ending?

I loved it.

I genuinely loved the ending, particularly because it feels like the logical culmination of everything Cliff has been building around Henrietta's lack of power and her determination to survive. I don't want to spoil it, but it is one of those endings that made me sit back and think about the entire book differently. It is audacious, strange, and completely in keeping with the version of Miss Bates that Cliff has created.

Miss Bates: Emma Revisited is ultimately a book about what happens to women when society decides they are insignificant. It asks what we miss when we laugh at someone instead of listening to them. It asks what a woman might become when the world has given her very few respectable choices.

And I absolutely loved that Catherine Cliff chose Miss Bates to answer those questions.

I have long loved this character, but after reading this, I don't think I will ever be able to see her quite the same way again. Cliff has taken the woman Austen placed at the very edge of the room and brought her directly into the center of the story. She has made her funny and frightening, vulnerable and cunning, ridiculous and deeply human.

There are so many amazing things happening in this novel. It is strange. It is dark. It is bewildering. It is wildly imaginative.

And I loved it.

[Amanda P · Rating 2 out of 5]

Look, I am not an Austen purist by any stretch. But there are limits, and there is a line between “this is an interesting idea” and “this is something I enjoyed reading.” I was super excited to pick this one up. From the promo material, I expected a dark comedy perspective-flip. What I got instead was comic, yes, but *very* dark and shockingly violent.

Don’t get me wrong - it’s certainly well-written from a craft perspective, and Cliff has a razor-sharp pen and wit. But I’m not entirely sure who the audience is for an Austen retelling that effectively asks “what if just about every Emma character is some shade of sociopath?”, vividly outlines its anti-heroine’s violent ideas amidst her social isolation, and swings between darkly comic and just plain brutally dark. I appreciate what the author was trying to do, but this feels less like a reconsideration and more like a totally different story using the Emma characters as shorthand.

[Kirsten · Rating 5 out of 5]

So good. Laughter, tears, and a few moments of honest shock. :)

A transformative work, in the true sense of the word. This rewrites Emma in my head in some pretty major ways.

[Kiki · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

[David Dunlap · Rating 3 out of 5]

Henrietta Bates, the garrulous and barely tolerated spinster from Jane Austen’s Emma has her story elaborated in this impressive novel. Raised as the unloved daughter of a drunken parson-father and a distracted mother, Henrie (as she calls herself) develops her talkative persona, partly as a defense mechanism, partly as a method of countering the invisibility such marginalized women had forced upon them. Her life has its challenges – poverty, the death of a much-beloved younger brother, the departure of a younger sister to whom she is completely devoted, her being left as the sole caregiver for her increasingly infirm mother, the haughtiness and disregard of local society bigwigs – but she soldiers on. Henrie is fascinated by witches and develops some witchery of her own. And this is where, for this reader, the novel slides a bit off the rails. Miss Bates is well-fleshed out, in terms of her loneliness and how she learns to deal with it. But some of her actions strike one as being totally out of tone with Jane Austen’s character. Emma Woodhouse Knightley is particularly dark – and becomes Henrie’s special nemesis. – In the end, the excellent and the off-putting do not quite gel to make an entirely pleasing result. YMMV, of course.

[Alenka of Bohemia · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have some mixed feelings after reading. Emma is my favourite Jane Austen novel, but I am not as fanatically attached to it as I am to, say, Jane Eyre, where I nitpick ad nauseam. Miss Bates does a good job filling the clothes of somewhat silly and innocent Miss Bates with a woman who has her own identity and history, which form her actions. The parts where she is valiantly struggling against every affliction life gives her and tries and tries to squeeze at least a tiny bit of satisfaction from all those rotten lemons fate has thrown at her I loved, and I felt were done with a very sensitive, moving touch. The part where the greatest loss occurs made me genuinely feel her desperation and I was ready for some better things to come. Unfortunately, certain parts of the book dragged a lot, the character of Emma is not really seen from another perspective, but rather completely assassinated, and the ending felt like something from a cheap thriller, which also turns the main protagonist into someone I could no longer support.

[Olive Fellows (abookolive)]

Between this book and Ladies in Waiting: Jane Austen's Unsung Characters, the humble Miss Bates is the birthday!! I've heard that this book imagines that her chatty, agreeable nature was a survival strategy. Could be interesting. 🤔

Click here to hear more about this book and my other anticipated releases of the upcoming quarter over on my Booktube channel, abookolive!

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

What is your favorite flower? One of my favorites is the peony. Mine just finished blooming for the year, or have they? I still see a few buds left out there.

Happy Release Week and #bookbirthday for Miss Bates: Emma Revisited by Catherine Cliff. I just finished this book today and am posting my review today a well.

Henrietta “Henrie” Bates is known from the book Emma by Jane Austen as a very boring elderly and poor spinster. What was her life before this that brought her to a spot in life to be looked down upon by Emma? This book tells the story of her life from her early childhood until after the events of Emma.

My thoughts on this novel:
• This novel did a great job of really delving into what life would be like for a woman of limited means during the late 18th century and early 19th century. It was disheartening to see how Henrie was reduced as she grew older as her means kept decreasing. When your father does not save money to leave to his female heirs, they are left in dire straits.

• It really made me think about what life would be like for such women in that time period and thankful for the rights we have today. This is the life that Jane Austen lived and feared. Luckily, she was never reduced as much as Henrie, but it could have happened if things had turned out differently. This is what Mrs. Bennet feared for her daughters in Pride and Prejudice.

• I liked how Henrie was a sharp person who was well aware of everything that was happening around her. She put on a mask of happiness and silly prattle in order to survive in her world. She needed extreme gratitude to help people to remember her as their gifts were often the only food she had.

• Her love for Jane and having to give her up to ensure that she could have a better life was heartbreaking.

• This is a well written literary novel and a good character story.

• This is a dark take on the story of Emma and best for those that really hate the character of Emma. While it was dark and I like Emma, I couldn’t put the book down and wanted to see what would happen next.

• The very last couple of pages were the perfect ending for this book.

Favorite Quote:
“But we, we undistinguished and unmarried women – we are like imaginary beings to the rest of the world. We only have substance when we are before them. What is it to forget someone imaginary? - there can be no consequence. While to use it is the difference between living and dying. The humiliation!”

Overall, Miss Bates: Emma Revisited by Catherine Cliff is an intriguing and literary character study of Miss Bates and the plight of a poor single woman trying to make it in the past.

Book Source: Thank-you to @catherinecliffwrites @pegasus_books @greatreadsbookpromofor a review copy of the novel as part of the Great Reads Promo Book Tour.

This review was first posted on my blog at: https://lauragerold.blogspot.com/2026...

[Paula W · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to Pegasus Books, Catherine Cliff (author), and Edelweiss for the digital review copy of Miss Bates: Emma Revisited. Their generosity did not influence my review.

I love a good retelling. Reimagining fantasy and fairy tales by giving an origin story to the villain is one of my favorite tropes. However, when it comes to historical retellings based in the real world, I want the ugly things said out loud. There is no need for another glossy biography of America's founding fathers unless the text tackles the uncomfortable truths of slavery and colonization. The same standard applies to historical fiction. A retelling of Jane Austen's Emma, my favorite of her novels, is only compelling if the perspective shifts to the outside looking in. The landscape looks vastly different from the margins, but it is ultimately more truthful.

In Miss Bates: Emma Revisited, the familiar world of poofy dresses, tailored suits, and witty country manor strolls is stripped back to expose the poorly hemmed petticoats underneath. The novel centers on Henrie (Miss Bates), the aunt of pretty little Jane Fairfax. While Austen's original text frames her as a talkative bore and the butt of Emma’s mean-spirited jokes, Cliff grants her a backstory and some really great inner dialogue. The comic relief of the original work becomes the character study of a survivor. Henrie is not a brainless chatterbox; she possesses one of the sharpest minds in Highbury, hidden behind a mask that society forced her to wear. She learned a lesson in childhood that she never forgot: every gift from the wealthy and every act of community charity come at the non-negotiable cost of performative gratitude.

The stakes are terrifyingly high. Failing to deliver an appropriate thank-you to the gentry's liking could directly impact the food on her table or the roof over her head. To ensure the wealthy witness her gratitude, Henrie performs it as loudly and as long as possible—transforming her iconic, relentless chatter into a brilliant survival tactic. While those at the bottom of the social ladder are usually forced to perform for the comfort of others, the smartest characters are strategic. Henrie intentionally uses her "harmless bore" persona to mask a burning, simmering rage that she cannot safely express. This is not a breezy romance with a happily-ever-after. It is a decades-long study of a woman previously seen only through the side-eyes of the wealthy. Look at her straight on, and the truth changes entirely. I loved this and will be telling everyone! 4 stars.

[Regency_Fan_ Michelle RegencyFanMichelleAndMore · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you to Pegasus Books for providing a complimentary copy. I was under no obligation to leave a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

As a longtime admirer of Jane Austen, I was immediately intrigued by the premise of Miss Bates. Giving one of Emma‘s most overlooked characters her own voice seemed like a fascinating concept, and I was eager to discover what untold story might exist behind Austen’s famously talkative spinster.

Instead, I found a novel that completely reimagines both Miss Bates and the world of Emma.

This is not a traditional Austen retelling. Rather than expanding on the character Jane Austen created, Henrietta Bates becomes a narrator consumed by resentment, envy, violent fantasies, and increasingly disturbing thoughts. Throughout the novel, familiar scenes from Emma are revisited through this perspective, fundamentally changing their meaning.

The story explores poverty, dependence, grief, and social inequality, but it also contains recurring graphic violent ideation, disturbing imagery, and a pervasive sense of bitterness that remains present throughout the novel. Instead of finding moments of hope or emotional relief, I found the darkness continued to build as the story progressed.

The greatest challenge for me was the portrayal of Emma. Austen certainly wrote Emma as flawed, privileged, and capable of causing genuine hurt, but she also gave her humility, repentance, and meaningful personal growth. This novel presents Emma in an entirely different light, portraying her as manipulative, cruel, vain, and an unloving mother. As someone who treasures Austen’s original work, I found this reinterpretation increasingly difficult to reconcile with the character I know from Emma.

I also struggled with the novel’s repeated graphic descriptions of violence and Henrietta’s persistent fantasies of harming others. These thoughts became such a defining part of her character that I found it difficult to connect with or sympathize with her.

Readers looking for a psychologically dark literary novel may have a very different experience than I did. However, if you’re picking up Miss Bates hoping for the wit, compassion, humor, and moral heart that characterize Jane Austen’s Emma, I think it’s important to know that this novel travels in a very different direction.

[Niniane · Rating 4 out of 5]

People associate Jane Austen with romance, balls and garden parties, turning what was initially meant as a satire of society into something harmless.

'Miss Bates' takes a step further and shows you the uglier side of this world. It is a world were women's options are limited: wife, spinster or governess. These people didn't work, they spent their time visiting each other and gossiping. They didn't do anything productive. Thus, being a woman without resources is an extremely difficult position, one that opens the gate to mockery and exclusion. And being a wife isn't a guarantee for happiness either. Henrie is no longer relegated to a comic relief. One sees all the suffering her position entails, what it truly means to be ridiculed and dependent on self-centered people.

Henrie was a fascinating character. She is a strategist and a manipulator, using her harmless chatterbox persona as a façade. Her devotion to her niece was heartbreaking. She goes through many trials, but she never gives up. Her murderous impulses made her even more pleasant to follow! This was the story of a meticulously planned and executed revenge.

I loved that this was truly a spinster's story. No romantic plot. It follows an older woman that isn't considered attractive by society's standards.

I have mixed feelings regarding Emma's treatment in the last chapter. I'm not fond of bringing down a female character to elevate another. Sure, given who Emma marries you may as well question wether this a happy ending or not. Even though Henrie isn't a reliable narrator, I would have liked Emma's maternal regret to be explored with more subtlety. Also, Emma's death scene dragged on and on and felt needlessly cruel. Thought it feels logic given that this is the culmination of years of suffering and humiliation. Jane Austen could also be quite mean-spirited, especially since Miss Bates was frequently made the brunt of jokes in the original novel, so you know, YMMV.

If you're looking for a bold retelling, check this one!

[Mindy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you Partner @greatreadspromo for the ebook #gifted copy. I borrowed the audio from Libby.

I was very intrigued by the deception of this book and its title. At first I was picturing the older movie version of Emma, since that is what I remember most about this classic story. But I enjoyed the perspective of Hette and the glimpse of her life growing up. This book has similar elements of those moments and told by Hette Bates.

I felt sad for Hette many times while listening. So many tragic events in her life. But they explained why she would do the things she did I was surprised many times by the thoughts that she expressed about people and what Hette did and didn’t do in certain circumstances. By the end of the book, I was surprised and not surprised by certain events and the outcome of characters and the ending was honestly very fitting.

The writing is very well done and the author adds in bits of humor and some disturbing moments with the thoughts and action of Hette but I also couldn’t help cheering for her. All she wanted was to take care of those she loved.

The audio narrator’s performance was excellent. Pearl Hewitt delivers each character so well, especially Henry. I enjoyed her range of tones.

[Patsy Jensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Catherine Cliff pulls off something genuinely clever with her debut: she takes Emma's most overlooked, most pitied character--the endlessly chattering, perpetually awkward Miss Bates--and gives her a full, complicated inner life. The premise is irresistible and so well done. What if all that cheerful rambling wasn't foolishness, but armor?

The novel follows Henrietta "Henrie" Bates from a comfortable childhood as the vicar's daughter through her family's slide into poverty after her father's death, showing exactly how a clever, watchful woman learns to survive in a world with almost no options for her. Cliff's prose has real bite--hilarious in some scenes and genuinely painful in others--and she captures a Regency-era England where social standing could evaporate overnight, especially for women.

What makes it work is the gap between Henrie's outward performance (all that grateful chatter Austen's readers found so tedious) and her sharp, sometimes furious interior voice. It reframes a familiar character without betraying her--this still feels like the Miss Bates from Highbury, just seen from the inside for the first time.

A smart, moving companion piece for Austen fans, and anyone who has ever wondered what was really going on behind Miss Bates's endless talk.

[Summer Reading · Rating 2 out of 5]

What do I even say? According to this telling, Miss Bates is a hate-filled, vindictive murderess. Emma is not only spoiled and selfish; she is evil and cruel and never experiences the character growth of the original novel. The "perfect happiness" of her marriage to Mr. Knightley is a falsehood. Mr. Knightley himself is not the man of kindness and morals we see in the original, either. Frank is an unforgivable womanizer who neglects poor Jane, and the only person who ends the story even a little bit happy is Miss Bates herself, though she hardly deserves it.

The only truly good people in this novel are Mrs. Goddard and young Albert. And though Miss Bates is always kind to Albert, he certainly deserves a better role model than a woman who hates everyone but him.

As to the writing of this story, it is well-written, and the characterization, though unpleasant, is strong. There is nothing wrong with the craft of this story, I only object to the vilification of some of my favorite characters.

[Isabelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Surprising, dark, funny, and full of interesting plot twists! I read 90% of the book in five consecutive hours. I loved the vivid descriptions of food that changed dramatically from beginning to end. I also appreciated the realistic depictions of things like nearsightedness, infant mortality, sexual violence, and mice in this period.

The intersections with the events of Emma gave me a thrill like the one I experienced while reading Wicked. Catherine Cliff doesn't just fill in gaps in the story of Emma, she enfolds that story in a longer, wider range of events that absolutely stands on its own!

There was intricate ring composition that had me flipping back to the early chapters to check different passages. No side character was wasted and no pattern emerged that didn't serve a purpose. This book was a gripping and stimulating read from start to finish!

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, I’ll never be able to think of Emma the same way again! Miss Bates’ perspective creates the perfect twist to turn this story on its head, to show the realities of life for the less fortunate side characters, and to call out characters of privilege experienced by so few. Far from romanticizing the time period, the author metes out justice for Miss Bates, adding depth and complexity to and sympathy for the character. Miss Bates is the same tiresome, fawning, helpless spinster you know from Emma, but somehow, she is paradoxically strong, and even wise in her way. And, I’ll just say, you don’t want to mess with her. A heroine and antihero wrapped up in one, making a way for herself and protecting those she loves through her own cunning and sheer endurance, overlooked no more.

[Andrea · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is as if somebody decided to write a retelling of Jane Austen's Emma and make that retelling as bleak and depressing as possible. I get it that Miss Bates is poor and her life could be easily imagined as dismal in many ways, but must the tragedy be laid on with a knife at every possible opportunity? It's not even especially good as historical fiction; people were not saying "yoo-hoo" to get attention until the twentieth century, and the use of toddler wasn't until 1837. It's told in first person from Miss Bates' point of view, from childhood, up through, and past the events of Emma. I wish writers would make up their own historical characters and leave Jane Austen alone. I also wish I had stopped reading halfway through, I very nearly did. I would not read another by this author.

[Courtney Pityer · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone who really enjoys the story Emma this book was a treasure to read! Told from the point of view of Miss Bates who kind of gets a bad reputation for being a borish character we get an insight on what her life was actually like and the events that shaped her into the person she became. I have to admit I was very intrigued with how this story played out! We get an insight of what her childhood was like growing up and some events that lead to the life that she decided to have. We also get an insight on what went on with the characters after the events of the actual story. Overall I think that this book was a very interesting character study and if others are looking for the chance to discover new opportunities they should definitely read it!

[Janereads10 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Miss Bates finally gets to tell her own story. I was completely on her side.

Cliff put me entirely in Henrietta's head, her despair, her hopes, and her growing rage against Emma all jumped off the page. She was misunderstood in the original, but getting to know her as a sister, daughter, and aunt showed the size of her heart. What elevated this even further was how well Cliff wrote the poverty. It deepened Henrietta's character in a way that made the belittling she endured even harder to read. Not your average Jane Austen retelling. This was a full reimagining that gave Miss Bates exactly the spotlight she deserved. Jane Austen fans will love this one.

Thank you Pegasus Books for my gifted book copy. All opinions are my own.

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have to preface this review by saying, If you are an Emma Woodhouse superfan, she can do no wrong, is utterly perfect, etc. This isn't the book for you. and this is a very strong reimagining of the events before, during, and after Emma by Jane Austen, told through the lens of the novel's quirky, tiresome spinster, Miss Bates. This is a wickedly funny, sharp witted and character driven story that made me laugh out loud, move me with deep empathy, and feel utterly satisfied in turn. I adored every page I read and Catherine Cliff has hit the nail on the head of her character, and the other supporting characters, perfectly in her debut novel. I will be on the look out for any more novels released by her in the future!

[Marianuwu · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am shocked and unsettled, was unprepared and naive… Will be pensive and seeking comfort from the original material. The darkness was so unexpected but, incredibly enough, it made itself appear as though it had always been there. I constantly felt overwhelmed and fearful for my original and beloved characters, worrying about what might happen to them, forgetting they are not, have never existed. No danger in imagination or reinterpretation! And what fantastic writing and story-telling, truly. I remain aghast on behalf of my dear Emma, but I understand the basis that planted the seed of such an idea for a twist. And the complexity will keep me up at night until I can do a re-read of the original Emma and, for further comfort, watch the ‘96 film. What a read.