Juliet Bell’s The Other Wife reimagines the classic Jane Eyre in the Australian outback. The story of Betty, Rochester’s first wife, and Jane Eyre are told in alternating sections.

This is a pretty racy version, which felt simultaneously like smutty Bronte fanfiction and a thoughtful commentary on female sexuality. In this version, Jane and Helen are a bit more than friends. I think the original novel could have been read that way, if you wanted, although my original reading was about two friends clinging to each other in a cruel system.  In The Other Wife, Jane’s sexuality is squashed by the nuns, before her heart is squashed when Helen dies. (It’s not a spoiler if the story’s over a century old!)

Meanwhile, there’s A Lot going on with Betty, female sexuality and mental stability.  A woman with an interest in sex can’t possibly the quiet, modest, upperclass wife Rochester wants! Of course he’d want to upgrade to the quiet (squashed) Jane, and we all loved Mr Rochester as teenagers, so of course she’d fall for him, too.

The isolation of the moors in the original translated well to the isolation of the outback. I don’t think the mad woman in the attic works quite as well today, although Rochester and Richard tried to explain the loss of face that would come from divorce.

I loved this book, right until the last scene. The way it wrapped up felt fake.  I thought that Betty and Jane would eventually become friends, and it was clear that they both cared about Adele, but the instant alliance and escape didn’t ring true for me. Also, the escape seemed weirdly impractical – do they have any cash? Or a map? And what about Jane’s unfinished teaching qualification? And Betty’s evil step-fam? I would have loved a postscript kind of ending explaining all that.