Why did he have to be so charming in some ways and so insufferable in others? She was sure she had hurt far more than just his pride. Would it always be so hard?
I admired and enjoyed this alternative imagining of Elizabeth and Darcy’s romance very much. Very. What if Elizabeth took the more practical approach of her friend Charlotte and accepted Darcy’s proposal at Hunsford?
She had been proposed to by a stranger. A very rich, very handsome stranger who was very much in love with her. She could not possibly accept him—but, suddenly, she could not possibly refuse him either, not now. This was, she knew clearly, a chance unlike any other she would ever receive. She could not turn him down for the satisfaction of it. She had to think.
You will need fear nothing as my wife, neither poverty nor loneliness, dishonor, or disloyalty, unkindness, neglect . . . you will be the most cherished wife in all of England.”
Who could resist such a declaration? She’s only human. After a week of soul-searching, she accepts Darcy. Not only for the good she can do her family, especially Jane, but because she starts to see Darcy in a new light. She thought he despised her. She was so wrong. How else has she misjudged him? Before she can truly come to love Darcy as he ardently wishes, he has to change. And changing the habits and attitudes of a lifetime is by necessity slow going. But I never found it tedious. It really felt like this is how it would have gone. In the original, Elizabeth’s words in summarily rejecting Darcy’s proposal shake him to the core, and he starts to change. Just as ”the letter” starts Elizabeth on her path. In this book, it is a much different process. How Elizabeth finally gets through to him is a great scene.
As for Darcy, he had been completely unable to speak. Elizabeth’s words had cut through him like knives, shaming him deeply, and shame was not an emotion he was accustomed to experiencing…Was it possible that he, who had studied throughout his life to improve his mind and character, had overlooked such an essential flaw?…He had not understood her then, but he did now. His refusal to talk was an active unkindness, a deliberate slight on the value of those he had thought beneath him. He had not thought their feelings even worth the effort of a few polite remarks and a smile or two. He certainly had not been willing to consider lowering his own dignity to promote theirs. Nor . . . his brows furrowed deeply in pain . . . nor to promote Elizabeth’s happiness either.
This book includes many high points of Austen’s novel. Particularly delicious is this version of Lady Catherine De Burgh and Elizabeth’s confrontation in the garden. And in this one, we have Darcy’s reaction to his aunt’s unmitigated gall and ill manners “which rather threw anything anyone in the Bennet family had ever done in the shade” when he walks into the middle of the fray. All of the characters remain true to Austen’s creations. And the more time we spend with Mr. Bennet and Lydia the more contemptible they are revealed to be. I liked how Lizzie started seeing her father more clearly and lost a lot of her respect for him. At one point, she even intervenes and protects her mother from Mr. Bennet’s mockery. There is even a dramatic rescue of Lydia and an exciting confrontation with Wickham as well, but in entirely different circumstances than the original.
I also found the dialogue, vocabulary, and narrative very authentic to Jane Austen’s style. The book is too long and repetitive but it rarely got tiresome. I admit that I found Elizabeth’s change from confusion to liking, to loving Darcy way too gradual to be believable or sympathetic. But Ormiston’s treatment of Darcy, I thought, was brilliant. His admiration, love, and passion for Elizabeth remain steadfast throughout. In this, he proves, again and again, the ardent words of his proposal in Austen’s work. Even when Elizabeth’s fearful secret is revealed to him: that not only did she not love him, but how much she actively and publicly disliked him, he doesn’t blame Elizabeth but himself. Elizabeth has to accept the fact that her actions and manners were not above reproach either and have caused great pain.
This is easily the best reimagining of or sequel to Pride and Prejudice, I have ever read. I hate to call it Fan Fiction, although it is, because it doesn’t do it justice. When I looked for more of Lara Ormiston’s books, I was so disappointed to learn she hasn’t written anything else.
And the society itself sounded like a band of misfits with negligible expertise and no head for business: a country doctor, an old maid, a schoolmarm, a bachelor farmer, a fey auctioneer, a conflict-averse solicitor, a scullery maid, and one Hollywood movie star.
I really really like this one. I started it on Audible read by Richard Armitage and finished it on Kindle. As many have pointed out, it has a lot in common with a book that really spoke to me, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. England recovering from the devastation of WWII…an outsider welcomed into a small community of the like-minded… gentle romances…bookish conversations. It also reminded me of the work of the 20th-century English novelist, D. E. Stevenson. And this one has a Hollywood Movie Star and Jane Austen!
Winding through the story of the diverse group of society members are shades of some of the plots and characters from Jane Austen’s novels. Particularly Persuasion, Emma, and a cad straight out of Sense and Sensibility. Or is it Mansfield Park? Or Pride and Prejudice? Or Northanger Abbey?) The novel is character-driven, but the characters would probably not be all that interesting to many people. But I felt like I was drawn in and a part of their small world. I cared about them and their sufferings, secrets, and fates. I was invested in their mission to save Jane Austen’s house and the library, which was full of secret priceless treasures revealed thanks to a scholarly teenage housemaid. I was anxious and concerned because their chances of success looked pretty slim at times. Then we are given hope in a surprise twist I did not see coming.
Like many, I struggled to understand “the vote” of the society regarding how to advise one of their members. But I think it had something to do with this perspective from Mimi, the Hollywood star.
“…we are lucky if we get to live in places where so many people care—the trick is understanding why they care. Here, what I love, is that you care because you have a history together. You have known each other’s parents and grandparents…In Hollywood, it’s quite the opposite. Everyone comes there to start new and makes up a history—…Anyway, in a town where no one even knows your real name, let alone where you come from, what is tethering you to anything? What is there to keep you on the ground?
But I still didn’t like it, agree with it, or really fully understand it.
It won’t be a surprise to anyone familiar with Jane Austen that in this book, so closely aligned with that great author, it all works out in the end. And I will add that the epilogue was everything an epilogue should be. Even though this is a fictional treatment of a real Society, the Knight Family, their home, and Chawton, it was loosely tethered enough to reality that I learned a lot. And I agree with Adeline about Emma. **4 1/2 stars**
It was not my intention to review the much-criticized new adaptation of Jane Austen’s Persuasion. But such has been the vitriol and bitterness of some of the reviews, that I can’t resist. Because I didn’t hate it. I was confused by it and confounded by some of the decisions that were made particularly concerning Anne’s character, but there was much that I enjoyed. And I certainly didn’t think everyone involved should be “thrown in prison”.
It follows the plot pretty closely. All of the characters are substantially the same people as in the book and the very faithful films. Except for Anne. Anne is not the same character at all. The mumblings and murmurings started with the miscasting of the gorgeous Dakota Johnson as the mousy beaten-down Anne. And the trailer really got people going. Since Anne Elliott is one of Austen’s most beloved characters, the sneak peak did not sit well with many. Particularly the hyper-vigilant “Janeites”. Because of all the hate, I approached this movie with an open tolerant mind and sat down to be entertained. One aspect of the movie that has incurred much criticism is Anne continually breaking the fourth wall. She makes sarcastic and witty comments to the viewer about the behavior of her family members. Her observations are dead on. “My Father. He’s never met a reflective surface he didn’t like. Vanity is the beginning and end of his character. Also the middle.” She gives the viewers sly glances when one of her fellow characters does or says something particularly absurd. It was clearly an attempt to interject Austen’s own voice into the narrative and simultaneously enliven Anne.
As Sir Walter Elliot, Richard E. Grant could not have been better. In fact, all of the actors except one were good to excellent. But things started to get weird almost immediately. Instead of keeping Anne’s outspoken and barbed observations between herself and the audience, she calls out her relatives directly to their faces. Anne is shown to be publicly full of verve and spirit. If they had kept this facet of her personality a secret between Anne and us, her confidants, they could have kept much of the integrity of her character. They missed an opportunity to show how Anne’s true feelings and opinions are at odds with the way she is forced to navigate her world. She acts out and in the process makes her character eccentric and at times, incomprehensible. There are many examples but most jarring was Anne spouting off out of the blue and unprovoked during a dinner party to all and sundry that she herself was the first choice of Charles, her sister Mary’s husband. Needless to say, she brings the merry party to a standstill. However true, even the most socially inept meanest mean girl wouldn’t do that! It was almost Tourettes-like. I can’t think of why this was done, as well as the many many other examples of weird behavior Anne displays such as the octopus speech and drinking way too much wine right from the bottle. The director replaced Anne Eliot with Bridget Jones. Remember Bridget’s response at the dinner table full of couples that all singletons having scales? And as Bridget Jones, Dakota Johnson was charming and funny. She just wasn’t Anne Eliot in a work that is supposed to be all about the character regaining her bloom and spirit long suppressed by sorrow and regret. There is nothing to prevent This Anne from going after her heart’s desire right from the get-go.
There was little to no chemistry between Anne and Captain Wentworth, who looked decidedly grungy throughout the production. I didn’t care for him. Henry Golding’s shady and scheming William Eliot actually falls in love with the common and unattractive Mrs. Clay and marries her at the end. Just weird and nonsensical. Back to the good. The cinematography was beautiful and the scenery and fashions were both lovely. I actually liked the contemporary pop-culture parlance (“playlist,” “fashion forward,” “you’re a 10,” “we’re exes”, “I’m an empath,” etc.) I thought it was fresh, whimsical, and definitely brave. I was drawn in as I always am by Jane Austen’s regency world however askew this one was. In fact, I rather enjoyed the off-center vibe.
I was able to tolerate the strange choices by the writer and director while I was looking at it. It was only later upon reflection that my feelings started to sour. I hated that they could have made Anne a modern kick-ass heroine, while still maintaining the integrity of one of Jane Austen’s most interesting creations and her truly moving character arc. I hear that Netflix is (or was) planning to bring more of Austen’s novels to the screen. If they decide to go ahead with this despite the fact that “everyone” hates this one, I will be very curious and interested.
Much of the appeal of Pride, Prejudice and Other Flavors was the clever and insightful interweaving of the characters, themes, and plotlines of the Jane Austen classic with Sonali Dev’s own take on the novel. Between this one and the original Emma the integration is spotty at best. There are major plot lines and characters in both novels that find no parallels in the other. I won’t go into a long list here, but Esha’s strange supernatural malady and her miraculous recovery and romance are one. There was enough material and backstory there for it to be its own book. It was just shoehorned into this one and it was a distraction. It had no place in a homage to Emma and didn’t make the most of Esha’s story either. But the one that really hurt my enjoyment was how the Raj family are so ugly to Naina, the Knightly character. Especially Nisha, the sister of the Emma character, Vange, and Vange’s mother. I didn’t read the middle two in the quartet, so there may be justification, but since we see everything from Naina’s eyes and with our knowledge of her struggles, it was very bothersome.
Naina has been damaged by the lifelong cruelty of her abusive father. This has affected her ability to be open and vulnerable to love. She has dedicated the last 10 years of her life to rescuing the poverty-stricken women of Nepal and she has finally secured funding from zillionaire Jiggy Mehta. Enter Vansh Raj, whose chance run-in with a person he knows that he learns is surprisingly homeless spurs him to save not only his acquaintance but all of San Francisco’s indigent. While coming from a good place, this quixotic notion has jeopardized Naina’s funding. Instead of getting his own money, he latches on to Naina’s source. Because there is more in it for him to be associated with a real Raj instead of an ex-Raj, Jiggy Mehta cools towards Naina’s project. It’s really terrible. I was enraged over this.
Vansh Raj has a passing resemblance to Emma in that he is a do-gooder who wants to make things better for those who are less fortunate than him. Actually, there are quite a few interesting parallels. But Naina has very little in common with Mr. Knightly. Both Emma and Vansh are misguided, but in very different ways. Emma almost ruins the life of Harriet with her interference. Vansh, causes Hari, the homeless computer whiz he targets, an isolated episode of pain and suffering by not listening to the good advice of Naina (Knightly). But his interference ultimately saves Hari puts him on a path to health and prosperity. Sonali Dev’s parallels between Harriet and Hari are well done. (as well done as some of the connections in the first of the Raj series) but really, that’s about it as far as The Emma Project being a modern take on Emma. Perhaps there is a parallel between Naina’s mother and Emma’s father? But it’s is a stretch. A huge stretch. Naina is 12 years older than Vansh and has been a supportive presence in his life since he was a baby. So that hearkens back to Emma, I guess.
Dev makes Vansh the kind of guy who spends hours a day on his grooming and body sculpting because he likes to look good. Even though he is already too handsome to be true. We are treated a couple of times to a description of his long tangled eyelashes. And more than a couple to his cut and flexing muscles, which he likes to show off by wearing clothes two sizes too small. I mean yuck. It’s different if a great body is the by-product of manual labor or sports. But his vanity turned me off.
Another disappointment was the lack of satisfactory resolution to two important plot threads. The author meticulously details throughout the book Dr. Kohli, Naina’s father’s, evilness and cruelty, and Jiggy Meyta’s self-serving maliciousness. Not to mention their toxic sexism. I couldn’t wait for them to get the justice they deserved. Alas. It all happens off stage. We find out that Naina’s mom found the strength to leave her husband of 40 years in the epilogue. And the final straw after years of abuse was nonsensical. And Naina told Jiggy to take his money and shove it. We are just told that she did, but we are not there for the kill. Yes, I wanted retribution to rain down upon them and I wanted a front-row seat, but nope. And I guess Jimmy, the guy who cheated and wronged Hari never did get his just deserts at all. And speaking of retribution, Naina deserved a groveling apology from the Raj family. Instead, we get “I was a Bitch” and a “Yeah you were.” But Naina is not even in the room.
At times the sentence structure and word choice were awkward and confusing. I won’t quote specifically (although I can) because to be fair it is an uncorrected proof. But I noticed the same thing with her first book as well. And that was not an uncorrected proof. Ms Dev is a wonderful writer but needs a more vigilant editor.
Despite my problems, the book kept my interest. The romance was good even though it bore no resemblance to the romance of the real Knightly and Emma. And I gotta say there was a very hot sex scene that managed to be funny at the same time. I didn’t want it to end, and that is saying something for me. Thank you for that. The exploration and growth of the characters were well done. Vansh really grew on me, despite the things I didn’t like about him. I loved the way he and Naina learned to work together and became a united front against Jiggy. I was happy Naina’s project was saved. I liked the narrative voice. But there were too many promises unfulfilled and too many disappointments.
Thank-You to Net Galley and Avon and Harper Books for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.
HRH’s take on it was this advice to his children: “This is our home. This country is yours. Take everything you need. Give everything you have. From the beginning of time, humans have migrated. We’ve claimed land and let it claim us. Don’t ever fulfill anybody else’s definition of your relationship with your country. How many generations ago their forefathers got here may be how some people stake their claim, but I stake mine with how much I give. How wholly I love. This place called to me, I’m here, it’s mine. And now, it’s yours.”
I’m a soft touch for novels that are re-imaginings of or sequels to Jane Austen‘s works in film or on the page. I have a soft spot for even ones that are not all that good. This is one of the best ones. Sonali Dev did a masterful job of using P and P as an inspiration for similar themes while making it wholly her own. The looseness of the adaptation worked very well. A reader who enjoys contemporary romance or women’s fiction would enjoy this even if they haven’t read Pride and Prejudice. There are many characters in Dev’s novel that are not in the original and many characters and situations Austen’s classic that are not in Dev’s novel. Yet while they diverge in interesting ways, they also mirror each other in the essentials. There is the prideful, arrogant, but socially inept aristocrat (Trisha), the formidable love interest from a suspect background (DJ), victimized loved ones past and present, the evil opportunist, The cold and powerful head determined to “protect” the family from scandal, and the sweet and good sister. But they are deliciously shuffled up. A few scenarios are faithfully and delightfully reset in today’s times. One of the highlights of Austen’s work and this one as well is when Trisha (Darcy) pours out her heart to DJ (Elizabeth) and is rejected. …
“I have absolutely no interest in you, Dr. Raje,” meeting the wild pleas in her eyes…it hadn’t struck her for one instant that he might not lap up her proposition or whatever this was. “This might baffle you, but despite not being a physician, I do have some pride. Although most certainly not enough to withstand the kind of beating you’re capable of dealing to it. The kind of beating you’ve repeatedly dealt it from the first time we’ve met. You’re right, I value honesty, so I’ll tell you that I make it a practice not to find women who insult me at every opportunity attractive.” …she looked entirely devastated. Had no one ever denied her anything?
One thing I really liked about it was how the black hero in the book was portrayed. Too often, lately, it seems like authors are using diverse ethnic characters to make a political statement but they are ethnic in looks alone. In one book I read recently, we’re told that the swoony successful love interest looks like Barack Obama, but other than that, he might as well be a white guy. Maybe I’m being too harsh, but it’s like the author wanted points for having a diverse cast of characters but didn’t want to make her mostly white readership too uncomfortable. Kind of like the Hallmark channel checking the boxes. Oh well, baby steps. In this one, Trisha, although “brown” has always had power and privilege. Unlike DJ who knows very well what is probably going to happen if a white cop sees him breaking into his own luxury car.
“Are you laughing because you think you taught me some sort of lesson?” Because he had, he had pulled the world from beneath her feet…DJ had stood there helpless as a cop reached for his gun for no reason other than fear based in prejudice…Trisha didn’t want him to be standing there in that inequitable ocean, unable to do anything about it. She wanted to live in a world where the waves hit everyone the same way, where everyone could choose how they surfed them. Where the only thing that mattered was ability. And she had allowed herself to become oblivious to the fact that they did not live in that world.
I was not too impressed with the first book I read by Ms Dev. This one also slowed to a crawl in several places. It was repetitive (the constant rhapsodizing about food got old and kind of creepy in places, to me) There were a little too many tangents explored and too much detail which did little to advance the story. But even so, it kept my interest. Sometimes the sentence structure seemed a little off and sentence meaning was a little obscured at first. But this book was a really good novel and a superbly creative riff on Pride and Prejudice. I love books about interesting families and especially ones I have to do a family tree to keep everyone straight. 4 stars for the novel and 5 stars for the Pride and Prejudice connection.
I’m a sucker for anything based on Jane Austen if it is well done. And sometimes when it is not. This is evidenced by the fact that I’ve read all of these Mr. and Mrs. Darcy Mysteries, though this is the only one I have actually written anything on. It starts off pretty well; the characters seemed pretty true to the originals, though Kitty is given a more positive spin. It is an improvement over Pride and Prescience. I actually chuckled a few times. Sadly, it degenerates pretty quickly once the mystery kicks in. Unfortunately, it is another paranormal mystery and it is positively outlandish. It was nice to see the Dashwood women again. Lucy Ferrars nee Steele starts out true to form, but her ultimate fate is positively ludicrous and cringe-worthy. The resolution has some tragic aspects considering the fluffy way it starts out. I was considerably less patient with the rest in the series, just skipping through the mystery part. I remember looking forward to more of Georgiana as she was pretty intriguing, and also an appearance of Lady Catherine de Bourgh. Unfortunately, I do not remember anything about any of the other stories, which I guess is a review of the whole series in and of itself.
“Fred!” the nurse said, though they had never met. “How are we today?” Reading the nurse’s name tag, Mr. Bennet replied with fake enthusiasm, “Bernard! We’re mourning the death of manners and the rise of overly familiar discourse. How are you?”
Pastiches on Austen novels number into the hundreds in film and literature. They usually range from terrible to not too bad with a few real gems. This one is 4 stars. Would have been 5 but for a too drawn-out tacked-on ending. The book could have been 75 pages shorter. Eligible is a very clever, and funny homage to Pride and Prejudice set 2013. Elizabeth is a 38-year-old journalist, who along with her sister Jane, a mellow, sentimental, kind-hearted yoga instructor whose biological clock is ticking, goes home to her Cincinnati home to make sure her caustic, cynical, but lazy ivory tower father is cared for after his heart attack. God knows, the rest of their family would probably kill him with their incompetency and neglect. Lydia and Kitty still live at home though in their 20’s, supported by what’s left of their inherited money, which Mr. and the shopping-addicted Mrs. Bennet have frittered away over the years. Mr. Bennet’s medical bills have thrown the Bennets to the brink of bankruptcy. The 2 girls are idle, though beautiful and toned due their dedication to CrossFit. They are potty-mouthed and have no filters. Mary is an unpleasant recluse, and working on her 3rd master’s degree, with no thought to getting a real job and becoming self-supporting. The book parallels the original as well as it possibly could, although does get off track towards the end. Part of the pleasure of this book was anticipating what Curtis would do with characters and situations that you knew were coming. It mirrors the overall tone and diction of the original as well. When it went astray was when she diverged too far from the Austen story when the family went west to film their parts in the reality series. Lady Catharine de Bourgh has no relation to Darcy in this one but is a lauded 80-year-old feminist icon, Kathy, whom Elizabeth seeks to interview throughout much of the book. Her character is a surprise. Think Gloria Steinem. Georgy is a Stanford student: sheltered, shy, and anorexic. “Chip” Bingley is a doctor by profession, but seems to gravitate towards reality TV stardom (The Bachelor) as he is really a bit of a dim-bulb. He would rather try to parlay his fame into a medical TV talk show than actually be a doctor. His friend, Darcy, is an old-money renowned San Francisco surgeon in Cincinnati to head a new brain surgery facility. Elizabeth’s long-time toxic (married) boyfriend of 25 years is Jasper Witt, whose dirty secrets are ultimately exposed by his fellow Stanford schoolmate, Darcy. Everyone is there, plus some fresh new characters, but with a modern spin. They are so well-realized, and sometimes so out of the box and witty, that the book actually gives fresh insights into Austen’s original characters. Some plot and character threads proceed as expected, some take some unlooked-for twists and turns. By the end, Elizabeth sorts out her family’s financial problems and all of the sisters are happily pared off and standing on their own two feet, including Mary. Except she prefers bowling to romance.
It ought to be so simple. The titled were wealthy, and the poor were poor. That is how it used to be, but now trade and title were blurring, a most confounding condition. Caroline sighed. She simply could not understand the way of the world.
In this better-than-average spin-off to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice Caroline Bingley retreats to her mother’s home to lick her wounds and strategize how to return to the Darcy/Pemberley circle without apologizing to Elizabeth Bennett. It was brave to take on Caroline Bingley rather than the usual siblings of Elizabeth and Darcy. It keeps her snobbish character intact while making her a little more relatable and her mean-girl actions foiling Jane’s romance with Charles Bingley a little more understandable. A.) She loves her mother. B.) Her family comes from middle-class roots. Her father made his fortune “in Trade” and she lives in fear of being looked down on and excluded because of that.
The writing was competent. Although, and this seems picky, the author seemed to really really like the word “smirk”. It was distracting. Caroline’s motivation for trying to make a noble marriage in order to still have access to Pemberley made no sense. Why Should Darcy and Elizabeth or her brother care about whom she married after being understandably cut from their society? Darcy had already demonstrated his democratic nature by marrying Elizabeth and his friendship with her own brother. Given the Author’s background and qualifications, I expected better.
I do give Jennifer Becton credit for exploring the unjust way women were treated and making the slow changes in society and the rise of the middle-class part important themes in her novel. It was entertaining. I did enjoy her relationships and interactions with Lavinia, the love interest, Rosemary, and her family. I was glad that she brought in Elizabeth, Darcy, Jane, and Charles in a believable way. But Ooh, that title.
“I confess I found it somewhat insipid when I last went….it was all so prosy – so bonnety – so whisty and teacuppy – you see, the adjectives for it do not even exist, and I must invent them.”
Jude Morgan is a skilled writer with a quirky, eccentric style. He changes tenses and points of view. He almost randomly inserts colons everywhere. He uses colons like he went to a colon firesale and bought every one. There is a witty turn of phrase, observation, or piece of cleverness on almost every page. We roll our eyes or smile with (or at) almost all of the characters. Sometimes we even laugh out loud at the frequently amusing dialogue and observations.
The plot is woven from the plotlines of most if not all of Jane Austen’s novels. It’s mostly Emma, but It is peopled with dozens of characters or combinations of such from her other books. Mapping out the intermingling plotlines and characters would make a fascinating spreadsheet. Sometimes a character starts out as one Austen character and ends as another. That’s a weakness, as it is not a character development so much as a whiplash-inducing about-face. Yet, there are no surprises in the book if you have read Jane Austen. It is liberally sprinkled with Austen allusions, isms, and inside jokes. It starts out very Austen but ends up very Georgette Heyer. I count that as a strength: (colon!) It’s fun, and Mr. Morgan knows his stuff. My only complaint is it ends rather abruptly. I wish he had ended the book by reverting back to Austen for a chapter to get all of the characters neatly disposed of, and a little glimpse into the future.
What could be better than Emma Thompson reading to you? I enjoyed this dramatization of Northanger Abbey with music, sound effects, and each character portrayed by a different actor. Emma Thompson as the narrator, Jane Austen, was perfect and very amusing. She conveyed so many subtleties of the story by her inflections. It is an abridged version, unfortunately, but it seems that the abridgment was very well done. I have seen all of the movie versions that I know of, but I still look forward to reading the unabridged version sometime soon.
I see that a couple of weeks ago Audible released The Jane Austen Collection, similarly narrated and played by top British actors, such as Claire Foy, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Billie Piper, and Florence Pugh. How Will I find the Time?
Rebekah's Readings and Watchings 