H.--: The Story of Heathcliff's Journey Back to Wuthering Heights

Embroidering the classics is a venerable literary tradition that sometimes goes awry. Here, however, Haire-Sargeant, a professor of 19th-century literature at the University of Massachusetts, conjures the dark, brooding air of Wuthering Heights with striking authenticity. This refreshingly well-spun fantasy re-creates Heathcliff's three lost years, between the time he fled Yorkshire to seek his fortune to his return to claim Catherine Earnshaw. The events of this time are related in a long-lost letter to Cathy, delivered on the day of her marriage to Edgar Linton, which meddling housekeeper Nelly Dean had kept from her mistress. Haire-Sargeant's inventive story takes liberties with more than Wuthering Heights ; she also invokes Jane Eyre and Pygmalion . amed characters--wild, tempestuous Cathy, who pouts and postures in this version; steely, mousy governess Jane Eyre; a more jovial Mr. Rochester, recast as Heathcliff's savior Mr. Are; and even Charlotte and Emily Bronte themselves pop in and out of the novel, making it seem at times like an overwrought drawing-room comedy. The romance novelist's urge for a happy ending threatens to overwhelm Bronte's original intentions, but a wry final twist prevails. Some Bronte devotees may be appalled at Haire-Sargeant's temerity, but most readers will enjoy this nicely executed tale. (July)