Book Review: The Man in the Stone Cottage
- N.J. Mastro
- Mar 14
- 8 min read
The Man in the Stone Cottage by Stephanie Cowell is a novel of the Brontë sisters. I imagine myself reading it again one day. Not only does curling up with this book feel like having been handed a steaming cup of tea (by a warm fire in a vintage cottage on a chilly English moor), the story also invites readers to speculate whether Emily Brontë had a secret relationship with a mystery man. Emily was famously reclusive.
Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Brontë need no introduction. Most readers are familiar with them. Their appeal has been timeless since taking the literary landscape by storm in the middle of the nineteenth century, first in England, then around the world.
In the 1840s, when the sisters first published their work, the public’s attitude toward women writers was harsh. People called them mere “scribblers.” Because of society’s bias against female writers, most women wrote under a male pseudonym, first to attract a publisher, then to gain respect and credibility. The Brontë sisters followed suit, emerging on the writing scene as Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell.
The Man in the Stone Cottage takes place mostly in Yorkshire, England, at Haworth, the childhood and forever home of Charlotte, Emily, and Anne. Never more than one disaster away from the poorhouse, they look for ways to earn money. Their father, the Reverend Patrick Brontë, a gruff country pastor, is going blind, and their brother, Branwell, a brilliantly creative man, is a hopeless opium addict. With none of the sisters having any prospect of making a good match, they know they must be the ones to save themselves.
Turning to their pens, they write articles, plays, and short stories. Charlotte sends out a novel, but to no avail. They also send to publishers a joint collection of poetry they’ve written. When no one will publish them, they take matters into their own hands and scrape together their savings and self-publish the collection. Their book of poems is a flop.
As Charlotte begins working on a second novel, and unbeknownst to her, Emily and Anne take to writing novels of their own, Cowell’s novel zeroes in on Emily, who meets Jonathan MacConnell, a shepherd on the moors. Emily forms an attachment to McConnell, first out of curiosity, then out of passion.
She keeps him a secret from her sisters, however, which isn’t a surprise. In real life, Emily was aloof, a solitary, intensely private woman. She loved animals and fiercely devoted herself to her family, as did all three sisters.
“If I could I would always work in silence and obscurity, and let my efforts be known by their results.” —Emily Brontë
The title of Cowell’s novel suggests the story is mostly about Emily, and it is. But while readers enjoy Emily’s secret meetings with the mysterious shepherd, a man no one seems to know about or has seen but her, Charlotte reflects on the past as she tries to put together a viable future for herself, her sisters, her ailing father, and their increasingly erratic brother. As the oldest sister, she bears the special burden of feeling responsible for them. But Charlotte hoards her own secret. While studying the year prior in Brussels, she fell in love with a married professor at the boarding school where she was studying. She knows she must bury the raw feelings left by unrequited love, but as anyone who has experienced this kind of heartache knows, the heart is the last to let go.
I don’t like to reveal spoilers in my reviews, so I won’t say more. I want you to read the book and enjoy it as much as I did. I will say this, however. As familiar as the Brontë sisters are, we never learn less. Stephanie Cowell offers a new way to think about them. Her writing is, as always, sublime. She captures the moors as if she has lived there her entire life. Cowell’s research also shines. The things we know about the Brontës—the tensions between the sisters, the dysfunctions that threatened to destroy them singly and as a close-knit family unit, how hard they had to fight to live boldly—all show up in rich context, driving readers toward a deeper understanding of the sisters’ lives and the challenges they overcame. Even if you know the Brontës well, reading this book will feel like visiting old friends—the prolific Charlotte, the enigmatic Emily, and the courageous Anne, whose themes of social justice are as critical today as the were then.
So Who Were the Brontë Sisters?
Daughters of a country pastor, the Brontë sisters lost their mother and two older sisters at an early age. With an elderly aunt filling in as a surrogate mother, they lived an almost stilted childhood at their father’s parsonage in Haworth, a tiny village in West Yorkshire, England. They had one brother, Branwell, whom they doted on. The four of them were close as children and were immensely creative, inventing a fantasy world of their own. They were writing stories and poems as soon as they learned to read and could dip a pen into an inkwell without spilling it.
“There are great books in this world and great worlds in books.” —Anne Brontë
The Brontës were not any poorer than the other families living in Haworth, but they were working class and thus expected to find jobs, even the girls, to help make ends meet. Due to the exceptional education they had received at home and to some degree at boarding school, all three would at one time or another work as teachers or governesses. Even Branwell worked as a private tutor. Somehow, they always ended up returning home to Haworth, and it was here their writing flourished.
All three sisters would publish at least one novel. Charlotte is the one who convinced them to publish their work. As in The Man in the Stone Cottage, in real life, when no one would publish their poems, they did so themselves, at substantial cost, and with almost no return. But the book of poems established their male pseudonyms: Currer Bell (Charlotte), Ellis Bell (Emily), and Acton Bell (Anne), names and identities they would hang on to for as long as possible.
Their breakthrough came in October 1847 when, as Currer Bell, Charlotte published Jane Eyre to stunning literary acclaim. Emily’s Wuthering Heights followed in December under the name of Ellis Bell, also to acclaim but of a different sort. Even though gothic stories were all the rage at the time, the darkness of Cathy’s and Heathcliff’s characters disturbed readers, along with the tale’s harsh violence. (If you’ve seen the recent movie of Wuthering Heights, you know it does not represent the novel.)
Anne also published Agnes Grey in December as Acton Bell. Agnes Grey came out as part of Emily’s Wuthering Heights in what their publisher packaged as a three-volume set, with Wuthering Heights presented in two volumes. At the time, publishers released titles in multiple volumes to reduce printing expenses and force readers to buy more books. Oh, the publishing business...
Only Jane Eyre soared as a new release. Besides being aghast at Wuthering Heights, the public labeled Agnes Grey as coarse and dull. Though it’s worth noting, some conservatives called Jane an "ungodly" woman and thought her character entirely too bold. But they were in the minority, and there were avid readers for all three novels.
What set the Brontë sisters’ novels apart? Their styles were unprecedented. The Brontë sisters expressed intense, genuine emotion. Even male readers found their writing exquisite. The only question was, how could men write with such emotion? The public assumed Currer, Ellis, and Acton were men. Surely no man could write with such profound sentiment, such ardent feeling!
Years would pass before the public knew who the Bells were, except their publisher, George Smith of London, whom Charlotte and Anne told in 1849 when literary circles were buzzing with speculation over the gender, especially that of Currer Bell.
The Brontë sisters’ secret would trickle out gradually, over time, with Charlotte controlling when and how. When the truth was finally known, her sisters were dead. Sadly, Branwell died in 1848 at age 31, just as his sisters were gaining a foothold in the publishing world. He would never know they had published their novels. Emily passed away shortly thereafter at age 30, and Anne in 1849 when just 29 years old. All died from the same dreaded disease: tuberculosis.
“Better to try all things and find all empty, than to try nothing and leave your life as a blank.” —Charlotte Brontë
Patrick Brontë would outlive all his children. In 1854 Charlotte married Arthur Bell Nicholls, her father’s curate. The couple lived at Haworth. She became pregnant almost immediately but died in childbirth in 1855.
Between the three sisters, they penned seven novels: Emily - Wuthering Heights (1847); Anne - Agnes Grey (1847) and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848); and Charlotte - Jane Eyre (1847), Shirley (1849), Villette (1853), and The Professor (1857, the first novel she had ever written, published after her death).
One has to admire their talent and persistence. The limitations society placed on them and their entire sex were monumental, yet the Brontë sisters prevailed in a way I’m sure even they would have had difficulty imagining in the 1840s.
What fascinated me the most as I reaquainted myself with their lives is how much they reminded me of Mary Wollstonecraft, the protagonist in my novel, Solitary Walker. Like Wollstonecraft, aspects of the Brontë sisters’ real lives show up in their fiction in daring ways, which makes their writing feel original, full of truth.
Arguably it is their open display of real life that makes their novels resonate with modern readers. Their books remain among the most widely read classics written by women, such as on this list of the top 100 classics to read on Goodreads, where they rank 1 (Jane Eyre), 4 (Wuthering Heights), and 10 (The Tenant of Wildfell Hall). The Brontë sisters’ struggles and that of their fictional characters were like that of contemporary women, giving their stories a treasured timelessness.
If you want to know more about the Brontë sisters, their lives, and their writing, I recommend checking out the Brontë Parsonage Museum’s website. I dream of going there one day. If you've had the chance to visit the museum in person, lucky you! I’d be interested in hearing about your experience.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t recommend my other favorites by Stephanie Cowell, who ranks top among my favorite historical fiction authors:
Claude and Camille is biographical fiction about Claude Monet and his wife Camille. Absolutely splendid!
The Boy in the Rain is an unforgettable novel about a young gay man in Edwardian England in 1903 and the love affair he shares with a man haunted by his past.
I hope you’ve enjoyed my review of The Man in the Stone Cottage. Of you’d like to receive my next review of a novel about an audacious woman from the past, be sure to follow me on Substack, where I’ve recently moved my once monthly book reviews in Herstory Revisited and my once monthly personal newsletter.
Thanks for reading. I’m glad you’re here.
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N.J. Mastro is the author of Solitary Walker: A Novel of Mary Wollstonecraft.
