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Content snapshot
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Violence
Barely any
A sledding accident with devastating consequences; no graphic violence
Language
None
No profanity; period language
Sexual Content
Barely any
Romantic longing and attachment; nothing explicit
Substance Use
None
No substance use
Emotional Intensity
A lot
One of American literature's bleakest endings; the psychological horror of the outcome lingers long after reading
What this book is about
Ethan Frome is a farmer in the bleak Massachusetts village of Starkfield, trapped by his sickly, demanding wife Zeena. When Zeena's young cousin Mattie Silver comes to help with the housework, Ethan falls in love with her. When Zeena sends Mattie away, Ethan and Mattie decide to die together in a suicide sled ride. What happens is worse. Wharton's spare novella—some twenty thousand words—is among the most perfectly constructed tragedies in American literature, its irony as cold as the New England winters it describes.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
A bleakly ironic ending that has disturbed readers for a century
Themes of entrapment and hopelessness
Reader Verification
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