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This book surprised me - as a regular reader of Victorian literature (Trollope & Dickens), I wasn't quite expecting the transition in focus from the physical world of money and social expectations to the interior, mystical world of self-determination.
Some sections are marvelously written, and his dialogue is terrific, though the mystical mysteries of love grew a little convoluted for me. Trollope told this tale many times over: girl torn between the poor boy that she really likes, and the rich boy she should marry for advancement. But the emphasis on the social implications of her choice were personalized in a different way. Forster focuses on her internal dilemma, her "lying to herself," not what it could mean to her family's standing. Intriguing shift of emphasis from the nineteenth to the twentieth-century perspective.
I guess that's my roundabout way of saying that I liked the writing, but it did get a bit navel-gazing for me. In the end, without any real pressure from her family and friends and society to marry the rich guy (they almost shrugged it off when she finally broke it off with him), it felt like it didn't matter all that much to me either.
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