The Age of Innocence

by Edith Wharton

eBook, 334 pages

English language

Published March 24, 2012 by Barnes & Noble Classics.

ISBN:: 978-1-4114-3374-8

Winner of the 1921 Pulitzer Prize, The Age of Innocence is Edith Wharton’s masterful portrait of desire and betrayal during the sumptuous Golden Age of Old New York, a time when society people “dreaded scandal more than disease.”

This is Newland Archer’s world as he prepares to marry the beautiful but conventional May Welland. But when the mysterious Countess Ellen Olenska returns to New York after a disastrous marriage, Archer falls deeply in love with her. Torn between duty and passion, Archer struggles to make a decision that will either courageously define his life—or mercilessly destroy it.

54 editions

Leth reviewed The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

Very OK and good for snoozing

No rating

I had some expectations for this, given how much I remember liking "The House of Mirth." While I won't go so far as to say this was a miss, I felt a bit too distant from the upper crust situation to appreciate it fully. The romance of it rarely struck me and every character except Ellen Olenska felt too manipulative to root for. Although, I will say that refusing to see her again because she felt more real in his head was a huge mood...

I listened to the LibriVox recording by Brenda Dayne.