"By comparing 'ideologies surrounding women and books' on both sides of the Atlantic, it offers new interpretations of canonical texts in a series of fascinating pairings of British and American texts. . . . The most original aspect of the book is its examination of the woman reader as she appeared in illustrations in popular novels and the way illustration functioned as a vehicle for illuminating issues of gender. "--Emma Liggins, coeditor of Feminist Readings of Victorian Popular Texts, Edge Hill College of Higher Education, Lancashire, U.K.
"Argues persuasively that female reading...