In School for Brides, Patrice Kindl returns to Lesser Hoo on the coast of Yorkshire, the setting for her Keeping the Castle, where finding a husband of suitable title and wealth remains a preoccupation for young women of a marriageable age.
The events here shift away from the narrator of the previous book, Althea, to the eight students (ages 12-19) of Winthrop Hopkins Female Academy. The pickings in this remote part of the world are slim (though Miss Asquith seems willing to settle for the school's "very handsome" footman) until an accident causes the esteemed Mr. Arbuthnot to break his leg on the grounds and remain at the school to recuperate. Luckily, his misfortune metamorphoses into the ladies' good fortune, as their recuperating guest attracts other eligible bachelors as visitors to the patient. The female members of this rather large cast begin to differentiate themselves from the get-go, as they reveal their ages and rank. The youngest, Miss Victor, is prone to crying. Miss Evans is the oldest, but Miss Crump is of the highest rank (the daughter of a viscount). Miss Asquith's father owns a distillery and must overcome the fact that her family is "intimately associated with gin," and Miss Franklin exhibits a propensity for science.
Readers catch onto the motives of the male visitors before the young women do; some have noble intentions, others do not. Working within the parameters of Jane Austen's era, Kindl exposes the frustrations of smart, curious women stuck in society's rigid structure while also playing up their wit. Another feather in the cap for Kindl. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness