Quantcast

Suddenly Mrs. Darcy by Jenetta James

Source: JAFF Get-Together Book Swap
Paperback, 168 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Suddenly Mrs. Darcy by Jenetta James re-imagines the Netherfield Ball in which Mr. Darcy is accused of compromising Elizabeth Bennet and forced marriage takes place.How will Elizabeth cope in a forced marriage to a virtual stranger, someone she’s only sparred with verbally while tending her sick sister? What other changes will happen as a result. I really loved the plot and changes in this story to Austen’s original, but at the beginning I was put off by the exposition of the plot before the ball. I think this story could have started with minimal exposition and continued from the ball. This is told from Elizabeth Bennet’s point of view, which limits the narration and keeps readers in the dark about things Elizabeth doesn’t know or experience, which really helped build the tension in the latter part of the story.

Here Mrs. Darcy is striving to prove herself worthy and to please her husband, whom she doesn’t really know, because the situation is so new and she doesn’t want to harm their potential happiness, even if their marriage doesn’t start off well. She must learn to find her way back to her forthright self in this novel, which could be hard for some readers to bear, but given the forced marriage to a man she barely knows and certainly doesn’t understand, it makes sense that she would be more timid than she would have been as a single woman. However, I do think her better nature would have come out sooner, if in more mild ways to ensure her husband was aware of her feelings. I did love her blowout with Darcy; it was well executed.

Suddenly Mrs. Darcy by Jenetta James is a variation that makes for a quick read in the summer afternoon; I was pleased to finally read a book cover to cover in a weekend, especially since the pandemic has upended my normal reading. I really enjoyed some of the changes James made in this story, with a new marriage for Mr. Collins and a meaner/more spiteful Lady Catherine. I also loved seeing the sisterly relationship between Elizabeth and Georgiana grow. Overall a good read.

RATING: Tercet

Logan and Luna Find the Magic Tree by Cristina Hanif, illustrated by Murray Stenton

Source: Author
Paperback, 34 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Logan and Luna Find the Magic Tree by Cristina Hanif, illustrated by Murray Stenton, is a delightful exploration of imagination for children, and it reminds adults that there is a time to slow down and spend time with their kids. As I did a preliminary edit of Cristina’s manuscript, I’m just going to give you what my daughter thought about the book and what I observed when she was reading it out loud for her homework, rather than my normal review format.

My daughter really carefully looked at each, vivid illustration. She was engaged with the characters and the story. As she read, she did stumble a bit over more challenging words like “original” and “differentiate,” but for the most part, she kept reading. One point she looked up at me and said the illustrations did not look like the family they are modeled on, except for the boys. She also thought the story was a bit long, but I chalked that up to her having to read before dinner and before we headed out for her evening music class. She told me that her favorite part was the gnomes, the library, and the adventure in the woods.

RATING from my daughter: Quatrain

Silver Girl by Leslie Pietrzyk (audio)

Source: Instagram giveaway win
Audiobook; 10+ hours
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Silver Girl by Leslie Pietrzyk, narrated by Cassandra Morris, is a startling and uncomfortable novel about female friendship between an unnamed narrator from a small Iowa town and a poor family and a rich girl, Jess, in college in Chicago.What would it be like to escape a suffocating small town where nothing happens and where the only things that happen are dark and unsatisfying? Can you escape the past?

The narrative is disjointed and jumps in time – back-and-forth – as she strives to make sense of what happened. There is so much desire here — a need to belong, a need to be more, get more, and see more — and in many ways that desire takes over all rational thought and leads the narrator astray on more than one occasion. She’s a hard character to like, and in some ways you won’t. She’s striving to fill deep holes within herself, and her holes go deeper than any canyon the shallow, rich girl she rooms with could imagine.

Set during the 80s and the Tylenol poisonings in Chicago, the narrator shifts from the uncertainty in her own life to the investigations, mirroring her paranoia about someone finding out that she does not belong at this upper crust college. For all her talk about herself and her family, she fails to realize that even her roommate’s family is as screwed up as hers. As she strives to hide her true self and her home life from her roommate, she spends a lot of time judging Jess and those she encounters at school.

Silver Girl by Leslie Pietrzyk is a complex story about social class, female friendship, and feels like Plath’s Bell Jar with a main character spiraling out of control emotionally.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

Leslie Pietrzyk is the author of the novel Silver Girl, released in February 2018 by Unnamed Press, and called “profound, mesmerizing, and disturbing” in a Publishers Weekly starred review. Her collection of unconventionally linked short stories, This Angel on My Chest, won the 2015 Drue Heinz Literature Prize and was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press. Kirkus Reviews named it one of the 16 best story collections of the year, Her previous novels are Pears on a Willow Tree and A Year and a Day. Short fiction and essays have appeared/are forthcoming in Southern Review, Ploughshares, Gettysburg Review, Hudson Review, The Sun, Shenandoah, Arts & Letters, River Styx, Iowa Review, Washingtonian, The Collagist, Cincinnati Review, TriQuarterly, New England Review, Salon, Washingtonian, and the Washington Post Magazine. She has received fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Pietrzyk is a member of the core fiction faculty at the Converse low-residency MFA program and often teaches in the MA Program in Writing at Johns Hopkins University. Raised in Iowa, she now lives in Alexandria, Virginia. Visit her website.

Kin Types by Luanne Castle

Source: gift
Paperback, 30 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Kin Types by Luanne Castle, which is touring with Poetic Book Tours, is more than poetry. It is a breathing history of ancestors and how their lives impact the present long after they have left the earth. The poet opens the collection with “Advice from My Forebears,” in which readers are greeted with much the same advice they probably heard from grandparents and others about not spending what you do not have, etc. And much of this is advice about risks we may encounter in life and it sets the tone for the collection. It demonstrates how the past can inform the present and even guide it toward better decisions, but it also calls to the rebels within us who want to go against even good advice.

Castle’s narrative poems leave the reader with a sense of the past, and through detailed accounts, she places us where she wants us to bear witness to the hard lives of these ancestors. Many of these people are immigrants leaving their homes for a better life, or at least what they believe will be a better life. But not all that befalls these men and women is good, and not all of it is bad.

From "New Life, New Music" (pg. 15)

The boy in knee pants didn't notice
the many wrinkles
or if he did they created that comfortable
space between his own raw starch
and her eyes and smile that were only his.

Like us, there are dreams held close by these ancestors. They may have a sense of loss that these dreams were not achieved or even lost, but they never let that stop them from living their lives. In “What Lies Inside,” Castle asks how well we really know our closest family members and speaks to the secrets we hold unto ourselves, as a self that we protect from the outside hardships of our lives. It is one of my favorite poems in the collection, with this haunting line: “If I don’t have this one space, where can I go to protect this self/kept inside only by my thin twitching skin?”

Kin Types by Luanne Castle is haunting and deeply emotional, allowing readers to wander off and discover their own ancestral stories. Perhaps they too will re-create the past and see how it mirrors the present or has shaped who they are.

RATING: Cinquain

About the Poet:

Winner of the 2015 New Mexico-Arizona Book Award, Doll God, Luanne Castle‘s first collection of poetry, was published by Aldrich Press. Luanne’s poetry and prose have appeared in Grist, Copper Nickel, River Teeth, Glass Poetry Press, Barnstorm Journal, Six Hens, Lunch Ticket, The Review Review, and many other journals. Published by Finishing Line Press, Kin Types was a semi-finalist in the Concrete Wolf chapbook contest.

Luanne has been a Fellow at the Center for Ideas and Society at the University of California, Riverside. She studied English and creative writing at the University of California, Riverside (Ph.D.); Western Michigan University (MFA); and the Stanford University writing certificate program. Her scholarly work has been published in academic journals, and she contributed to Twice-Told Children’s Tales: The Influence of Childhood Reading on Writers for Adults, edited by Betty Greenway. For fifteen years, she taught college English. She divides her time between California and Arizona, where she shares land with a herd of javelina. Visit her website.

Stranger Than Life 1970-2013 Cartoons and Comics by M.K. Brown

Source: Gift
Paperback, 248 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Stranger Than Life 1970-2013 Cartoons and Comics by M.K. Brown begins with an introduction checklist of what makes a good cartoonist from Bill Griffith and a note from M.K. Brown. She says that there must be a spirit of “drawing without fear,” and when looking through this coffee table must-have, you can see fear plays no role in her cartoons or comics. Beginning in the 1970s, we see how Brown’s drawings (black-and-white, mostly) began and there is a bit of truth in these: that table you keep tripping over (Tripping Table) to the “Egg Solid Sandwich.” The ordinary people in her cartoons bring to life the squabbles of married couples, even those just starting out. From “housepeople” to people at work, it is clear that she has a keen sense of humor.

I love that Brown also provides some insight into what she was thinking when she created certain cartoons or comics, like listening to the Bee Gees or providing water to a thirsty grasshopper rescued from the drapes inside the house on a summer day. Even her inspirations are whimsical and funny. Imagine taking a grasshopper outside and giving it water when it fails to stand up on a succulent leaf. It takes a great deal of observation skills deduce the needs of a grasshopper, as it does to create witty cartoons about science and technology, particularly when a lot of the new stuff is hard to understand. Some of my favorites stem from those interminable waits on customer service lines.

Brown even takes some of the oldest gags and makes them sharp, like “you remind me of my mother” or those obvious questions you hear at cocktail hours, like “what do you do for a living?” Stranger Than Life 1970-2013 Cartoons and Comics by M.K. Brown has a bit of everything in it for those looking for well told, humorous stories of romance to those who just love a good pun. Highly recommended for a good laugh.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

M.K. Brown grew up in Darien, Connecticut and New Brunswick, Canada. Her cartoons have been in all sorts of publications, above- and under-ground. She is naturally a bit selfish, maybe a little self-conscious, and self-centered, yet has an enlightened self-interest and a healthy curiosity about any new technology which happens to coincide with her trajectory at the time. She lives in northern California and her cartoons are about that process.

New Authors Reading Challenge 2017

Modern Persuasion by Sara Marks

Source: Giveaway Win
Kindle, 220 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Modern Persuasion by Sara Marks is a novel in which Emma Shaw passes up the love of Frederick Wentworth and his marriage proposal at college graduation in favor of returning to New York City for a career in publishing. During their time apart, they have both built solid careers — hers in publishing and his in Hollywood.

“Rationality won over love.”

Eight years later, her reputation as the “queen of book tours” proceeds her and Frederick Wentworth has little choice but to let her take the lead when his own editor goes down in a scuffle.  The multi-city book tour across the country should be the perfect opportunity for two professionals to get over their losses eight years ago and declare a truce, but even as the sparks start again, each has reason to push them aside and embrace anger and depression instead.  Will Emma and Freddie ever learn to move beyond the hurt of the past and rekindle their love?

Marks’ re-imagining of Jane Austen’s Persuasion is outrageous in some places given the characters she develops.  Their backgrounds in Hollywood make some of them eccentric, while others with their basis in Austen’s novel were modified to meet the modern setting.  The scenes at PubCon (which is pretty close to what some Book Expo America stints have been like) were pretty hectic, but very close to the truth.

Although the scuffle taking Freddie’s editor out of the picture seemed a bit much, a device was needed to throw him and Emma together.  Readers will note that there is quite a bit of telling rather than showing through description and dialogue, which puts the reader at a distance for a good portion of the book.  Modern Persuasion by Sara Marks ends up being a delightful read about overcoming grief of more than one kind, rekindling lasting affection and love, and chasing dreams that are bigger than you expect.

RATING: Tercet

About the Author:

Sara Marks is an author, knitter, Wikipedian, and librarian from Massachusetts. Born in Boston, her family move to Miami, Florida when she was 3. There she spent the next 14 years of her life. She attended Florida State University for 3 years, but graduated with an A.A from Miami Dade College and a B.A. from Florida International University before moving back to Boston for graduate school. She hasn’t left Massachusetts since (except to visit people and places in the world). Now, over fifteen years later and over 10 years of participating in National Novel Writing Month, she is releasing her first novel, Modern Persuasion, with Illuminated Myth Publishing. Sara works with local writing group Mill Pages, which creates an annual anthology of short stories, poems, and art work. She is a member of the Society of Independent Publishers and Authors (SIPA), a group supporting writers in the Merrimack Valley.When she isn’t writing, Sara is an academic librarian at University of Massachusetts Lowell. She has a masters degree in library science and another in Communications. She is an active Wikipedian who has been editing Wikipedia for over 10 years. She spent 6 years as a member of Toastmasters International where she twice earned the status of Distinguished Toastmaster, the highest status members can achieve. She is one of the local organizers for National Novel Writing Month. She is an avid knitter who designs and publishes her own patterns. She love unicorns, Paris, and the color purple.

New Authors Reading Challenge 2017

Footprints in the Forest by Jeannette Katzir

Source: giveaway win from Diary of an Eccentric
ebook, 247 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Footprints in the Forest by Jeannette Katzir, which I received from a giveaway and is an advanced reading copy, tells the tale of Chana Pershowski a young girl not yet fifteen who’s family is forced into a ghetto in Poland during WWII. Her brother Isaac loses his new wife and child, and that becomes a catalyst for the life they eventually live among the partisans. Fleeing Poland has to be the hardest decision Chana is forced to make, though she really doesn’t make it. As a young girl, she has little choice but to follow the orders of her mother and follow her brother into the wintry forest.

Her brother vows to protect her, as does his childhood friend Saul, who Chana views as strong. She’s had a crush on him for a long time, but he sees her as a little sister, and nothing in the forest is certain when the Nazis are looking for you. Running under cover of night and breaking camp when the Russian partisans decide to whether or not everyone is present makes life unpredictable at best. Being sent on missions when you don’t know how to shoot or make bombs can be deadly, even when you have protectors around you.

“I worked with gunpowder and straw, and was amazed to find how fearless I felt.  In a strange way, putting together a bomb reminded me of making sugar cookies with Mama.”

Katzir takes the reader on a journey through the forests with Chana the partisan and in the United States after the war with Chana the young woman finding her way in a world she still fears. Paranoia left over from the war threatens to keep her from happiness, and readers will wonder how far her PTSD will hinder her. Along the way, she learns to trust some of the partisans even against her mother’s ingrained advice, and she even learns to love.  But the war is far from done with her, and she needs to prepare herself for the ultimate sacrifice.  Chana is equal parts strong and weak, child-like and mature, and it is her makeup that leaves her at the mercy of others on a few occasions, especially when she makes rash decisions.

Three things bothered me to prevent a 5-star review: one that she wore a red coat in the snow-white forests when more than likely it would have made her a target, the resolution at the end seemed too rushed, and I’m hoping that many of the typos and grammatical and story line errors I saw were corrected in the final book.

Footprints in the Forest by Jeannette Katzir provides readers with a well-rounded look at what life in the forest during WWII looks and felt like for a young girl who hasn’t had time to find herself, let alone dream of how she wants her life to be in the future.  It also doesn’t gloss over partisan life and how women were perceived in those freedom fighting bands.

RATING: Quatrain

 

 

 

 

New Authors Reading Challenge 2017

The Indomitable Miss Elizabeth by Jennifer Joy (audio)

Source: Giveaway Win
Audible, 8+ hrs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

The Indomitable Miss Elizabeth by Jennifer Joy, narrated by Nancy Peterson, is the second of Meryton Mysteries and while you could read it alone, it would be best to read The Honorable Mr. Darcy first.  Darcy and Elizabeth may have successfully helped solve the murder of Lt. Wickham and come to a tenuous understanding in the previous novel.  However, despite their continued miscommunications and misunderstandings, they are again forced to face forces beyond their control.

In the latest mystery, a secret held by the ladies of the town leads to the ultimate tragedy, devastating the Bennet family.  Adding to their pain, Lady Catherine makes an appearance in Meryton, and she has quite a bit to say about Darcy’s duty to her daughter and Miss Bennet’s place.  In a war of words, she makes bodily threats to one of the Bennets, but Darcy cannot merely dismiss his aunt’s concerns given the state of his cousin Anne’s health.

As the magistrate, who has a tumultuous past with Lady Catherine,  investigates, so do Darcy, his brother, and Elizabeth.  Amidst the sadness and fear, however, the Bennet family has something to look forward to, a wedding for one of the youngest Bennets.  Joy has crafted a twisted mystery that will leave readers guessing for the better part of the novel, but she doesn’t skimp on the romance and tension of those uncertain in the feelings of the other.

The Indomitable Miss Elizabeth by Jennifer Joy, narrated by Nancy Peterson, shows Elizabeth at her strongest, even in her most darkest hour.  and it is through this dark time Darcy learns how to support her without taking control.  He grows into more than just an honorable society gentleman; he becomes a man that any lady would want by her side when tragedy strikes.

**I cannot wait for the next book in this mystery series.**

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

When Jennifer isn’t busy dreaming up new adventures for her favorite characters, she is teaching English, reading, perfecting her doughnut recipe, or going to the park with her family. She currently lives in Ecuador with her husband and 2 beautiful kids. All of them are fluent in Spanglish. Visit her Website.

The Honorable Mr. Darcy by Jennifer Joy (audio)

Source: Giveaway Win
Audible, 8+ hrs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

The Honorable Mr. Darcy by Jennifer Joy, narrated by Nancy Peterson, begins with a whodunit — who killed Lt. George Wickham?  Was it Mr. Darcy? A man he owed money to, or something far more sinister?

Pride & Prejudice is beloved by many, and many more have written spinoffs or re-imaginings or continuations of Austen’s work.  Joy’s version is part re-imagining and part mystery, with Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet playing amateur detectives to uncover the truth, especially when they both know that Mr. Darcy did not do it.

Joy’s characters stick to their conventional roles in society for the most part, with a bit of leeway, but what’s most interesting is how Elizabeth uses her position in Meryton and as a woman to learn more about those she suspects are involved in the murder of Lt. Wickham.  Mr. Darcy finds that his role as detective is suddenly hampered when he’s arrested for the crime.  As the two work together to solve the crime, prejudices are washed away and pride is worn down.

Nancy Peterson is a wonderful narrator of both men and women in this tale, and it is clear that she has a love for Austen’s work as well.  The Honorable Mr. Darcy by Jennifer Joy, narrated by Nancy Peterson, is a wonderful addition to this Austenesque world, and readers will be hard pressed to see how Darcy can remain honorable and protect the honor of Elizabeth Bennet at the same time.  Joy has crafted a whodunit that will keep readers guessing until the very end, and there are even more secrets to be hand than just the unveiling of the real killer.

RATING: Cinquain

About the Author:

When Jennifer isn’t busy dreaming up new adventures for her favorite characters, she is teaching English, reading, perfecting her doughnut recipe, or going to the park with her family. She currently lives in Ecuador with her husband and 2 beautiful kids. All of them are fluent in Spanglish.  Visit her Website.

New Authors Challenge

New York City Haiku illustrated by James Gulliver Hancock

Source: Library of Clean Reads
Hardcover, 128 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

New York City Haiku illustrated by James Gulliver Hancock is a compilation of haiku from readers that were solicited by The New York Times in 2014 during National Poetry Month.  Haiku were guided by the terms “island,” “strangers,” “solitude,” “commuting,” “6 a.m.,” and “kindness.”  Respondents wrote poems on the subjects of living, commuting, working, and enjoying New York City.  This is just 150 of the more than 2,800 submissions and, no, not all of the haiku are from only residents of New York City.  Some come from as far away as Ireland.

(I will caution that I, too, submitted haiku to the Times, but none of mine appear in this collection)

As we leave for work
Youngsters head home from parties.
Eras intersect. — Amparo Pikarsky, Edison, N.J.

These haiku are by turns serious and humorous about life in the city from a sketch artist on the subway willing sleeping commuters to remain sleeping to people jammed together and yet alone on the train.

Hidden among the
sleepwalking, caffeine zombies.
A morning person. — Aimee Estrada, Hyde Park, N.Y.

These writers clearly know the city and all of its nuances, as well as the rote behavior of commuters. It’s wonderful to visit the city in haiku form and see it from a variety of perspectives, including those who have a sense of humor about it all.

Dollar pizza joint
An oasis in New York’s
Harsh desert of cost. — Dennis Francis, Manhattan, N.Y.

New York City Haiku illustrated by James Gulliver Hancock provides a wide view of the city and commuting. Some seem to express personal experience, while others are more social in commentary. Each haiku displays a sense of humor and love for the Big Apple. Such a fun collection of poems, which would be easy to dip in and out of on a commute into the city or sitting in a good chair.

RATING: Quatrain

New Authors Reading Challenge 2017

Essential Readings & Study Guide by K.V. Dominic

Source: Anna at Diary of an Eccentric
Paperback, 284 pgs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Essential Readings & Study Guide: Poems about Social Justice, Women’s Rights, and the Environment by K.V. Dominic is a compilation of Dominic’s published poetry to date. It includes three books of previously published poetry and some unpublished poetry in one collection, as well as discussion questions at the end of each poem for those who want to go deeper into the meaning of the text. In “Helen and her World,” we’re introduced to a child whose light shines bright, but she cannot see the light herself. “She is the light of the class,/light of the family,/light of the village,/but alas the light never sees itself” Her blindness does little to impede the hope that she exudes to those around her. And like in “A Nightmare,” Dominic juxtaposes light and dark, as a lavish wedding feast is held while girls outside are fighting with dogs over trash to eat and sustain themselves.

Dominic’s poems use simple language and imagery pulled from the news or events around him to draw larger connections with others. Rather than divide by declaring someone or something other, he strives to bring together people around common causes, such as ending poverty.

Hunger’s Call (pg. 122)

A startling news with
photos from Zimbabwe!
Carcass of a wild elephant
consumed in ninety minutes!
Not by countless vultures
but by avid, famished
men and women and children.
Even the skeleton was axed
to support sinking life with soup.
Impact of globalization,
liberalization and privatization?
Or effect of hyperinflation
and economic mismanagement?
Billions are spent
by developed nations
on arms and ammunitions.
Isn’t poverty the greatest enemy?
Why not fight against it
and wipe out destitution,
pointing guns, rifles and missiles
at the chest of the poor?

While plain-spoken, Dominic also employs sarcasm to get his point across. From class struggles and poverty to global warming and globalization, Dominic seeks a greater balance, a world in which we care for the world that sustains us without succumbing to the greed of materialism and capitalism. But it doesn’t stop with how humans treat one another and instead continues to evolve this notion of balance and care to all living beings. Essential Readings & Study Guide: Poems about Social Justice, Women’s Rights, and the Environment by K.V. Dominic is a comprehensive collection of poems that speak to our maternal instincts and our desire for belonging and balance in the modern world.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Poet:

Internationally acclaimed poet Prof. K. V. Dominic (Kerala, India) is the author of three major volumes of poetry about the natural world as well as social and political commentary: Winged Reason, Multicultural Symphony, and Write, Son, Write.

Save

Save

Impertinent Strangers by P.O. Dixon (audio)

Source: the author
Audiobook, 5+ hrs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Impertinent Strangers by P.O. Dixon, narrated by Pearl Hewitt, revises the time line of Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice quite a bit. Elizabeth Bennet is visiting Charlotte Collins at Hunsford Parsonage when she meets Mr. Darcy, and both view the other’s behavior as impertinent. Through quick assessments, Darcy and Miss Bennet have decided the other is not worthy of notice, and Elizabeth takes particular dislike to being told to warn her family against Mr. Wickham, whom she still holds in high esteem even though he abandoned her in pursuit of Mary King. Despite overhearing Darcy speak of her as merely “tolerable”, Elizabeth vows to be civil to him. Over the course of time, both begin to admire the other, but how can they bridge the gap that their earlier perceptions have wrought?

Hewitt is a fantastic narrator for this type of fiction. She does an excellent job voicing different characters so that they do not get confused by the reader, and her accent is spot on. Dixon’s story is surprising in how the original timeline is played with, which made the story enjoyable. However, the only drawback here is that the story seems rushed at the end and the description of the romance between Darcy and Elizabeth could have been fleshed out more with body language cues, etc., particularly in mixed and restricted company.

However, these do not detract from the overall story in which Darcy and Elizabeth must come together, learn to see past their own per-conceived notions, and dare to dream for a marriage that society would deem inappropriate at best. Impertinent Strangers by P.O. Dixon, narrated by Pearl Hewitt, is lovely and unique, especially as Darcy and Elizabeth find themselves able to get to know one another in unusual circumstances — on long walks from Rosing to Hunsford and in the east library at Rosings.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Author:

P.O. Dixon has authored several Jane Austen “Pride and Prejudice” adaptations, all written with one overriding purpose in mind—falling in love with Darcy and Elizabeth. Sometimes provocative, but always entertaining, her stories have been read, commented on, and thoroughly enjoyed by thousands of readers worldwide.