A Pride and Prejudice Novella Variation On her way to Kent, Elizabeth Bennet unexpectedly meets Fitzwilliam Darcy in London. Having spent time reflecting on her interactions with Darcy after the dissolute habits of George Wickham are discovered, she has come to realize her first impressions were wrong. Love secretly blossoms between the two when they meet again in Kent. By the end of their time … their time together, it has grown from the first blooms of love into ardent admiration, and they are determined to marry. However, not everyone is pleased and trouble follows our dear couple threatening to tear them apart.
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Short and quick, like a karate chop to the throat: 3.5-stars
Short and quick simply meant the author didn’t take a lot of time in fleshing out the storyline. Scenes were brisk; you’re in and then you’re out. You had to look at the timeline and make sure continuity was not lost and that focus was maintained on ODC.
First, we had to settle the problem with Wickham and his lies. While Elizabeth and her sisters were in Meryton they witnessed an outrageous scene that sealed the fate of Wickham. When his proclivities were exposed to the whole town, it was shocking as well as hilarious. It didn’t end well for him or several of the other officers within the militia.
The clearing of the trash, so to speak, allowed Elizabeth to do some soul-searching regarding Darcy, his actions, her quickness to believe Wickham over Darcy, her regard for Darcy, and that perhaps Darcy had feelings for her after all. It was a difficult time for our girls as Jane was also feeling the sting of Bingley’s departure.
Like canon, Jane took her broken heart to London where she stayed with the Gardiners. Later Elizabeth, along with Sir William Lucas and Maria, traveled to London on their way to Rosings Park to visit Charlotte. We differ from canon here when the Gardiners took their party to the theater and they ran into Bingley, Hurst, and Darcy. After combining the two parties in the Darcy box, Jane asked Bingley about his intended. When he realized that Caroline had written to Jane indicating he was intended for Miss Darcy, he was furious. When Caroline joined the group, she was startled to find Jane back in Charles’ path and Elizabeth back in Darcy’s sights. She was not best pleased that her plans, of being Darcy’s wife and Mistress of Pemberley, were again in jeopardy.
In this story, Charles put his foot down with his sister and even Mr. Hurst was impressed to remove his wife from her sister’s influence. Charles manned up and did a good job of clipping Caroline’s wings.
Before the night was over, Darcy asked Elizabeth for permission to court her; she accepted. He then informed her that he would be visiting his Aunt in Kent in a few weeks and they made arrangements to meet when he arrived. He went to Longbourn and asked Mr. Bennet’s permission to court Elizabeth and even to propose to her if the occasion presented itself. He warned Mr. Bennet about his Aunt and what might happen when she found out he was not going to marry her daughter.
Again, quick scenes brought about conclusions more quickly than normal and all the angst and tension were diminished. Why the rush? Why not flesh out the scene a bit more and let it happen naturally, not rush or strain the drama?
As predicted, Lady Catherine acted badly and believe me, she acted badly. When Darcy told her he was going to marry Elizabeth, she jumped on Darcy with both feet and would not listen to reason. Elizabeth had as much trouble when Collins overheard her talking to Charlotte about her engagement. By then, Darcy was approaching the parsonage and nearly came to blows when Collins called Elizabeth all manner of horrid names. Darcy threatened to call him out if he continued to insult his intended.
Lady Catherine stormed Matlock House and demanded her brother, the Earl, do something with Darcy. It did not go well for her. The Earl set her down as no one has before, it was hilarious.
We were given a glimpse of a side of Lady Catherine that I’ve not seen before. We heard her thoughts regarding her relationship with Sir Lewis de Bourgh, the ramifications of his will and her feelings regarding her future at Rosings. We saw how her disappointments and fears had made her into what she was. An honest and forthright meeting with Anne turned into a very touching and revealing conversation.
The conclusion was cute; however, we didn’t have an epilogue… drat.
Minimal errors, chapter 2 had the spelling theater while in chapter 7 had theatre.