I'm a total Jane Austen nerd. You can read my rundown of all of her novels here. And yes, I do like Austen retellings or Austen-inspired works.
One such work is the subject of this week's review.
This book is actually a parallel book to the first in a series, Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict. The story follows Jane Mansfield, who's spent years longing to escape the rigidity of life in nineteenth-century England. But waking up as Courtney Stone in Los Angeles in the twenty-first-century is probably not exactly what she had in mind.
Yet, this is exactly what happens.
Now Jane must adapt to a world not her own, a body not her own, a face not her own. Some things are good, like running water, or shampoo, or television! And Courtney seems to own every single Jane Austen book... even ones not yet released in Jane's own time. But other things - bars on windows, noise, bills, phones and the Internet, and the job Jane cannot comprehend - those things are not so good.
And what's the deal with handsome Wes, Courtney's friend who reminds Jane so much of the man back home who broke her heart? But above all, here and now people are allowed to flirt, to kiss, even to have sex without marital implications, and Jane has a difficult time matching this current reality with what she knows of relationships. She fumbles her way through her days with only the help of a mysterious familiar woman. But here, where there does not seem to be real rules, she is out of place.
“Most of us walk through our daily lives as if we were asleep.
We regard not what is before our eyes. We see not how we
construct fantasies of our own and others' intentions without
having the smallest knowledge of what we, or they, are truly
about. We are all imaginists, storytellers if you will, and the
pity is that none of us recognizes his sorry state.”
So, this is a perfectly fine book. I like the premise, the escapism, and all the Austen elements. I enjoy the theme of adapting to another time and the role and struggle of a modern woman. It did get a bit preachy about accepting and not judging; I like these messages, but the heavy-handed deliverance felt a bit more like a YA novel for a bit, which would have been fine in, you know, a YA novel.
I think the issue with this book is that it was a fun story, that then tried to become something else or make some loftier points; it just tried too hard, and in so doing, it lost its momentum and the actual message itself. Remember: show don't tell! If the points were more subtle, if the story and characters' actions and thoughts delivered the messages, that would be far more effective I think.
All in all though, I still enjoyed this book, and ran through most of it pretty quickly. It's a great, fun, light summer read (for the most part), and if you enjoy Austen-inspired escapism, and looking at our modern world through different eyes, then you'll probably enjoy this book.
Are you an Austen fan? What about retellings or Austen-inspired works? How about time traveller books?
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