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What Members Thought
Read Harder - a "retelling" - this is Pride & Prejudice from the downstairs perspective.
P&P is one of my very favorite books and this retelling lived up to it. Now I need to re-read P&P with this backstory; I wonder what I'll think?! Loved Emma Fielding's narration, too. ...more
P&P is one of my very favorite books and this retelling lived up to it. Now I need to re-read P&P with this backstory; I wonder what I'll think?! Loved Emma Fielding's narration, too. ...more
I’m a fan of writers who tackle a famous work of literature from a new vantage point (for example, Gregory McGuire in Wicked or Jean Rhys in Wide Sargasso Sea) and do it in such a way that the end result fundamentally changes the way you view the original. Longbourn worked for me in that respect because by giving the servants in the background of Pride and Prejudice back stories and names, Jo Baker makes me see the gaps in Jane Austen’s narrative (and I say that as someone who really loves Jane
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I finished Longbourn yesterday and spent part of the day mourning its end. I tend to think that's a signifier of a good book: that I'm sad to see it end. I'd heard about this book and its fresh take on Pride and Prejudice, so I was pleased to receive it for Christmas. I found it to be just the holiday read I needed: it was a quiet book that invited me to linger with it, not rush through the pages. (Unlike my thirteen year old, who loves Pride and Prejudice and read this book in less than 24 hour
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This isn't a re-telling of P&P so much as a story told against the backdrop of Jane Austen's book. It's beautifully written, a tale all its own that still manages to put Elizabeth Bennet's, and indeed all the Bennet's, "hardships" soundly into perspective.
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I enjoyed Elizabeth Bennett not being so perfect. The life of the Longbourn servants was just as entertaining. The book does start off slow but hang in there the pace picks up.
Loved the setting. A bit slow for my taste, but I am impressed with the author's reimagining of life below stairs in the world of Pride and Prejudice.
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I didn't get into this at first, but I ended up enjoying it overall.
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Pretty good spin between Pride and Prejudice and Downton Abbey.
Very well done "downstairs" view of Pride & Prejudice, with surprisingly few glimpses of Mr. Darcy. The servant characters are fully drawn in their own right, and there are twists and intrigues and details of ordinary life (sweeping the floor with damp tea leaves--who knew?) that feel true, even when they rock the canon a bit.
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Oct 30, 2013
Melissa
marked it as to-read
Mar 29, 2014
Caitlin H
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Oct 09, 2014
Grace
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Dec 01, 2014
Leeann
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Feb 01, 2015
Anne
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Jan 09, 2016
Jen Horan
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Mar 30, 2016
Tiffany
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Aug 18, 2017
Alison
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Jan 09, 2018
Kate
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Jan 17, 2018
Julia
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Dec 27, 2018
Cas
marked it as to-read
