![]() I thought this was a reasonably good book, but not one of Kearsley's best. It's not terrible, but I would've liked a little more detail on how everything worked out. (view spoiler) There's also a lot of smoking by one of the main characters, which doesn't read so well for me in a 90's era romantic novel. At least for me, that didn't work as well as the various other methods Kearsley has used in other books. There's usually a paranormal element tying the two time periods together, and here it's **possibly a spoiler if you're particularly sensitive about these things, though it's disclosed pretty early in the book** (view spoiler). In Mariana Kearsley uses her patented dual-timeline approach, with one plotline set in our modern times and the other in a historical period (usually the late 1600's/early 1700's, which really seems to draw Kearsley). ![]() Meanwhile, back in the present, a descendant of Richard's family is also very interested in Julia. Mariana also meets the local lord, Richard de Mornay, who is violently hated by her uncle, but Richard is clearly very interested in Mariana. Mariana is forced to leave London when her mother's death from the plague leaves her as an orphan, and she moves into Greywethers with her self-righteous, abusive uncle, his downtrodden wife, their baby, and the wife's younger sister, who becomes Mariana's friend and confidante. And immediately starts experiencing these odd events where she's reliving events in the life of Mariana, a young woman who lived in 1665, the plague year in England. When it goes up for sale years later, she snaps it up. The main character, 29 year old Julia Beckett, has been inexplicably and powerfully drawn to a historic home, called Greywethers, in an English village since she first saw it as a child. Kearsley's definitely grown as an author since then. This is one of those and, while I really liked parts of it, in other ways it shows its age (written about 30 years ago). I've read most of Susanna Kearsley's recent books, but I've bought a lot of her older ones on Kindle sales over the years that I still need to read. ![]() I've read most of Susanna Kearsley's recent books, but I've bought a lot of her older ones on Kindle sales over the years that I still need 3.5 stars. So if you're a fan of P&P fanfic (and not picky about character makeovers or historical accuracy), you … could do worse?. It was weirdly fun seeing various famous lines from P&P pop up in the narrative, except they often came out of the mouths of different characters. The writing style is okay, if rather uneven, and the book had a few funny and interesting scenes. On the plus side, Mrs Bennet got a character upgrade from the original. (I know, it's hard to believe Mr Collins' character could be worse, but Mary Smythe found a way.) It's necessary to make the plot here work, but I could never really get on board with this one. This was a particularly odd version because Mr Bennet and Mr Collins have SERIOUSLY different characters than they do in the original, to their detriment. I've read my share of JAFF (usually to my regret). So he immediately takes steps to squelch their romance. Plus, Mr Bennet has his own plans for Elizabeth's future. Mr Bennet doesn't even know who Darcy is, other than a rich guy who is - thinks Mr Bennet - certainly untrustworthy with his favorite daughter's affections. That is, until Elizabeth's father catches wind of her romance. Their initial meetings lead to some tension between them, but without Elizabeth's family in the way, the two of them come to an understanding much quicker and with far less drama. In this variant of the Pride and Prejudice story, Elizabeth meets up with Darcy much earlier, when she's staying with her aunt and uncle Gardiner up in the area of Pemberley for several weeks one summer. One of my GR friends *waves to Shifra* loves JAFF and gave this one 5 stars, and I was all, hey, it's on Kindle Unlimited so why not? One of my GR friends *waves to Shifra* love So I felt like I was slumming, in a literary kind of way, when reading this JAFF (Jane Austen fanfiction). So I felt like I was slumming, in a literary kind of way, when reading this JAFF (Jane Austen fanfiction).
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