A Curious Statistical Anomaly

Mr. Darcy’s Little Sister by C. Allyn Pierson. Sourcebooks Landmark. ISBN: 978-1-4022-4038-6. 448 pages. Trade Paperback. List $14.99 (Amazon: $10.19 / Kindle: $9.99) Previously published in 2008 as And This Our Life.

Darcy and Elizabeth are married and settling into their life together. Georgianna is elated to finally have a sister to talk to and confide in. However, Georgianna’s coming out this season and she’s nervous, terrified, and feeling very insecure. Like any seventeen-year-old, she acts out by snapping at people – in other words not being as polite as possible — which has everyone concerned as she’s normally so compliant.

C. Allyn Pierson’s Georgianna is complex and multifaceted. Told from Georgianna’s point of view, Mr. Darcy’s Little Sister gives us a chance to actually get to know Georgianna who had so small a part in Pride and Prejudice. She’s shy, unsure of her judgment after her misstep with Wickham, sick of being treated as a child, yet afraid to stand up for herself. On the other hand, Georgianna is intelligent and often underestimated by those around her which leaves a lot of room for an author to build a story.

It is expected that young girls will be engaged by the end of their first season and if not then certainly by the end of the second. That’s a lot of pressure to put on a teenage girl. Many of the young men in society are always short of money and Georgianna has 30,000 pounds to bring to a marriage. She knows that she’ll need to be very aware that many of the young men who will court her will be only interested in her dowry. To identify those who care more for her than her money will be a skill she’ll have to learn to develop and quickly.

What only Georgianna knows is that she’s already decided who she wants to marry, she just needs him to see her as an adult and realize that now is the time to act. In the process of helping Georgianna, Elizabeth also is trained to be presented at court. She and Darcy hope that Elizabeth sharing the training will help Georgianna, and being presented at court might help Elizabeth’s standing with the ton since Lady Catherine has not been reticent in her opinion of Elizabeth.

There are also several side plots that are set in motion and people go off to adventures that are not detailed in this book; hopefully they’ll be covered in later works by Pierson. For example, Mr. Darcy is sent to France by the King to retrieve some embarrassing items and Col. Fitzwilliam is helping uncover a group that is selling arms to France. Each of these tales would make interesting reading.

Eventually, all the various threads come together in a satisfying conclusion that leaves us believing that this is the Georgianna that Miss Austen meant us to get to know. Mr. Darcy’s Little Sister is an excellent addition to the growing list of Pride and Prejudice follow-ons.

Darcy’s Voyage: A Tale of Uncharted Love on the Open Seas by Kara Louise. Sourcebooks Landmark. ISBN: 978-1-4022-4102-4. 512 pages. Trade Paperback. List: $14.99 (Amazon:  $10.19 / Kindle: $9.68). Previously published as Pemberly’s Promise in 2007).

Kara Louise has written a beautifully retold Pride and Prejudice beginning with Darcy and Elizabeth meeting when she was returning home to Longbourn by Post and Darcy, whose coach had a mechanical problem, was forced to take the Post to the first stop and there change to another carriage that was being sent from Pemberly.  Darcy of course immediately made a less than desirable impression when he nearly knocked her down as he raced to the carriage door.  He apologized and actually tried to make conversation — surprisingly they found literature a topic on which to converse and challenge each other and the two hour ride passed pleasantly.  They never learned each other’s name but remembered fondly the other person long after the event.

Fast forward two years and Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner and their children have traveled to America for Mr. Gardiner’s business.  They write and invite Elizabeth to join them in New York City to help with the children and enjoy the sights.  Elizabeth is excited to have the opportunity to travel and looks forward to the trip.  Mr. Darcy on the other hand doesn’t look forward to his trip to America where he’ll join Georgianna in New York City and bring her home from where she’s been visiting with Mrs. Annesley’s and her family.  Naturally, they are sailing on the same ship, Pemberly’s Promise (and I’m sure clever readers will realize just who owns the ship based solely on its name).

While Darcy tries desperately to remain aloof, the single women on the ship are speaking to him without introduction – all except Elizabeth Bennet.  He notices that she walks the deck early every morning and soon joins her.  Eventually, they begin to converse and find that they both look forward to their daily conversations.  It’s from Elizabeth that Darcy learns about the illness among the steerage passengers.  Her walks are the only breaks she takes from caring for her fellow passengers.

Elizabeth becomes seriously ill and Darcy knows he has the only empty bed on board.  The only solution is to be married by Captain Wendell and then annul the marriage when he returns to England.  It’s the only way to ensure her reputation remains intact.  He gives his pledge that it will be a purely platonic relationship. Elizabeth reluctantly agrees, as does the captain.  However, sometime during the voyage they fall in love, only they don’t realize it.  Separated on docking in New York and not knowing where Elizabeth lives, Darcy has no way to find her until he returns to England.

With this alternative beginning, Louise manages to maintain the emotional appeal and tone of the original Pride and Prejudice.   There are a few events from the original story line that take place earlier but once Bingley leases Netherfield, the original story is on track, except for a few key elements, and the story unfolds much as it did originally.

In other variations,  the variation causes such divergence from the original storyline that the author ends up having existing characters doing very uncharacteristic things in order to force events to unfold as expected.  Louise, on the other hand, manages to seamlessly weave this new relationship into the original story line by not forcing things to play out exactly as they did in Pride and Prejudice but as they would if this variation had occurred.

You’ll find some of our favorite scenes and dialogue included, but some of the dialogue may be uttered in similar, but different, circumstances and by other characters. I found it amusing to hear the same lines from someone else’s mouth but it didn’t take away from the story or my enjoyment.

This variation was a pleasure to read.  Louise honors the characters and the story of Pride and Prejudice and yet makes it new, exciting, and just as endearing. I highly recommend Darcy’s Voyage if you enjoy variations of the theme of Pride and Prejudice. I’d also mention that this book is appropriate for all ages.

It was a beautiful day in our neighborhood today — engines being revved as someone worked on it, the birds in the trees, and some strange cracking and breaking of branches in the woods.  We had to get up early for an appointment, but then spent most of the day on the deck with the cat, just enjoying the chance to be outdoors while it wasn’t hot enough to melt one’s body or cold enough to freeze.

But listening to the sounds of nature, I realized that woodpeckers and sewing machines have the same sort of sound.  A rapid buzz or series of taps and stop.  Repeat indefinitely.  For the sewer it’s to reposition the fabric and continue — especially when sewing short seams like in a quilt.  I’d imagine the woodpecker gets a headache from banging about on the trees trying to impress the females with his drumming.

Then the cat took a lot of naps.  At one point he stretched out to about twice his usual size and twisted his upper body to the east and the lower to the west as he laid on his back.  Cats must have the best backs of the universe.  I envy him his ability to twist about and not feel pain.  Sigh…if only humans had it so good.

We never figured out what animal was crashing about in the woods.  Usually when it’s deer you can see them as they move through the trees, but not today.  We’ve seen turkey, quail, possum, and hedgehogs but today it was just noises.

Picked more tomatoes from the garden and the butternut squash (since the vine was dead).  Lots more tomatoes ripening.  This was also a pretty good year for the garden.

Bad Heir Day: A Comedy of High Class and Dire Straits by Wendy Holden. Sourcebooks Landmark; Reprint edition (September 1, 2010); ISBN: 978-1402240614; 352 Pages. Price: List $14.99 (Amazon: $10.79 / Kindle: $9.99).

Anna Farrier’s life is going nowhere when Bad Heir Day begins. She’s living with Sebastian “Seb” Lavenham, an upper-class playboy with commitment problems. After attending a wedding of one of Seb’s school friends at Dampie Castle on the Island of Skul, Anna begins to take a hard look at her current situation and reluctantly admits it’s going beyond depressing. She hasn’t written anything in a long time and in reality she’s nothing but Seb’s live-in maid with benefits. She’s ready for a change.

Luckily, at the wedding, while Seb was making out with all his old girlfriends, she met Geri, a woman with a plan for her life, who was full of helpful hints on how to get Anna’s life on track, beginning with becoming an author’s assistant. Anna puts up an ad and gets a call from Cassandra Knight who just lost her au pair – again – and needs a replacement but the service won’t send anyone else out to care for her hellion of a son, Zachary. Anna accepts the position thinking it’s to help with research and writing and ends up being an extremely low-paid babysitter and household help.

It turns out the waiter she met at the wedding actually owns the castle and he’s in desperate need of a wife. By the time he shows up in London, Anna’s experience as Cassandra’s pseudo-slave, Zach’s victim, and Jett’s (Cassandra’s husband) potential conquest has not helped her self-esteem or her writing. She’s ready for a change.

Bad Heir Day is a lot of fun even while being totally predictable. However, I read this almost immediately after reading Farm Fatale and found the underlying structure to be quite similar. I think if I’d had more time between the two books, the plot structure wouldn’t have been as noticeable. Even so there were some great one liners and lots of eye-rolling moments as the story unfolded. The characters are more archetypes than fully developed but in the context of the odd-ball romantic comedy story, it really doesn’t matter.

Bad Heir Day is pure entertainment with a mild message of “don’t ruin your life trying to be someone you’re not”. Just grab a cup or glass of your favorite beverage, put up your feet, and enjoy watching someone else’s life going off the rails and somehow finding a perfect mate in spite of the chaos their life has become.

I noticed that today would have been Julia Child’s birthday. I remember seeing her on TV when her cooking show was new and I was young. I remember her voice and the fact that she made it look like no matter what happened, or what went wrong, it was okay, because who’d know what went on in your kitchen if the guests were all in the living room. I have to wonder what she’d think of the popularity of open floor plans where your guests gather around the kitchen island and watch you get dinner ready. Somehow I doubt that it would bother her.

Last week we finally watched Julie & Julia based on the book by Julie Powell. Powell wrote a blog where she cooked her way through Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I, in a period of 365 day making 524 recipes. You can still read the blog online — the Julie / Julia Project. The last post is about when Julie heard that Julia Child died. (Amazon has the book available in paperback with a look inside so you can get a taste of the writing.)

Julia Child was an amazing woman. She did so much at a time when women were so circumscribed in what they should or shouldn’t do with their lives. If you haven’t seen the movie here’s the trailer — maybe you’ll decided it’s a must see too.

I thought the movie was informative and affirming. I like cooking and I’m no great chef — I’m more a plain home cooking type with once in a great while a foray into making something fancy. I admire Julie Powell for working her way through all those recipes — that’s a lot of work, especially when holding down a full-time job. Seems there are lots of daring women in the world we just need to keep our eyes and ears open.

One Fine Cowboy by Joanne Kennedy
Sourcebooks Casablanca, ISBN: 978-1-4022-3670-9, pages 416
(List: $6.99 / Amazon: $6.99 / Kindle: $4.79).

Charlie Banks is a graduate student in psychology who is looking to do research on non-verbal communication, especially between species.  Her advisor has sent her to a clinic at Latigo Ranch with Nate Shawcross who is a horse whisperer.   It seemed like a great idea to Charlie except that the ranch is out in the middle of nowhere Wyoming, with no sizable town, let alone a city, for miles in any direction, and she’s a city girl through and through.   Of course her car breaks down just short of the ranch. Luckily, a cowboy stops by to offer assistance.

Nate Shawcross, her cowboy rescuer and the owner of Latigo Ranch, doesn’t know a thing about the clinic, or the people who signed up.  Seems his girlfriend wrote the brochures, sent then out, collected the deposits, and then wiped out his bank accounts, took the deposits, and left for Denver.  Charlie, of course, is attracted to Nate in spite of herself, and steps in to help him out.   Luckily the other three guests are understanding and more interested in learning to work with the horses than in having a fancy dude ranch experience.

Being a novel,   the readers, know that that’s not the end of Nate’s problems or Charlie’s or the last we’ll see or hear of Nate’s ex-girlfriend, Sandy.  In fact, as a romance this story is predictable; however, that doesn’t take away from the fact that the story is absorbing.  Kennedy manages to stay to the usual tropes of romance writing but give as an intriguing story of people and relationships on many levels.

“No one is an island” said John Donne, and that is still true today and in this story.  Each character acts upon the others and together that forms a community that supports and helps them to cope with their problems and issues rather than retreating into isolation.  Charlie being a graduate student in psychology is not simply a device to get the character out to a ranch in Wyoming, but a choice that allows the author to explore relationships a bit deeper within the story.  It also brings up the question of what is the best use of a person’s talents.  Aren’t the people who work quietly in the background making contributions to society as much, or even more than those on the public stage?  (Discuss among yourselves after you finish the book or bring your thoughts here and share.)

Whether you’re looking for a typical romance or a story that has people dealing with real problems then give Joanne Kennedy’s One Fine Cowboy a try.

Finally, a weekend day with no appointments or meetings scheduled. Managed to do the shopping for food and mail out books and made it to the bank before checks were too old to cash. Didn’t get to recycling though so guess that has to collect until next week — we don’t have a trash pick up where we live and we pay a private company to pick up the trash. Then since we recycle, we have to take all the recyclables to the center ourselves. Question why does doing the right thing always mean more work?

Heard a noise on the porch a while ago and Paul went to check it out because last night two raccoons were out there eating the cats food.  Tonight, we thought they were back but it was a feral cat who dropped by for a late snack with our Emnot.  However, Emnot decided to hide behind the blueberry bushes we have on the deck until it finished eating.  The feral just moved away to the edge of the car port and sat to wait.  Paul put some food out downstairs — maybe the feral will come back.  We could always use another good mouser/moler out here in the woods.  Since Emnot came to live with us the side yard is much less spongy to walk on with a less holes than it did have.

Actually got some vegetables this year.  Then garden is winding down and I’m going to miss the fresh tomatoes.  The thing is there are blossoms on the tomato plants and the green pepper plants but the night are dropping down to the 60’s and 50’s at night now.  Though today was in the high 70’s.  You can almost taste fall in the air.  Bought a small orangey-red mum to brighten up the living room.

Got to finish up some reviews for here.  Hope to post a review of One Fine Cowboy (Joanne Kennedy) and Bad Heir Day (Wendy Holden) this coming week so watch for that.

Dropped some bookmarks for Capclave at the Border’s in Bowie and Waldorf.  Hoping it spreads the word our our local science fiction convention in Rockville, Maryland in October.  The Guests of Honor are Connie Willis, Jeff VanderMeer and Ann VanderMeer.  I’m this year’s chair of the convention — luckily, I have a great committee but as the date gets closer I get more anxious that everything turn out well for the participants and attendees.

Have you ever been to a science fiction convention?

Georgette Heyer’s Regency World by Jennifer Kloester. Published by Sourcebooks. ISBN: 978-1-4022-4136-9, 387 pages including index. Trade Paperback. $14.99 (Amazon: $10.19; Kindle: $9.68)

Georgette Heyer’s Regency World by Jennifer Kloester is just what the title implies, it’s a book about the Regency World that made up the background for Heyer’s Regency books. It helps to explain to today’s readers the nitty gritty details of what it was like to live in that time, in that society, and explains a lot of the customs, rules, and etiquette of that period. Now I know that makes it sounds like it would be incredibly dull and boring but, in fact, Kloester’s book is extremely readable. I started with the intent to read it front to back and before I was in more than 30 pages, I found myself reading a bit that made me think of a question, so I checked the table of contents and index and thereafter I skipped and dipped into the book at will, checking on those things that had niggled at the back of my brain when reading one book or another.

I wanted to read this book because I read a fair number of books that take place during the Regency Period. I will admit that I don’t read a lot of Georgette Heyer’s Regency novels. So, while the book is filled with examples from Heyer’s writings, I wasn’t familiar with the works cited; however, that’s not a problem because Kloester gives enough background that if you’ve read in the period you’ll get pick up what’s being explained from the books you have read.

Georgette Heyer’s Regency World is well organized so that the reader can go to a specific section to find an answer to questions about what the society was like and how it worked. Chapters are titled: Up and Down the Social Ladder; At Home in Town and Country; A Man’s World; The Gentle Sex; On the Town; The Pleasure Haunts of London; The Fashionable Resorts; Getting About; What to Wear; Shopping; Eat, Drink and Be Merry; The Sporting Life; Business and the Military; and Who’s Who in the Regency. Each chapter in the table of contents is listed with a subset of what’s included in that chapter, for example; the chapter on Getting About includes: All Kinds of Carriages; On Drivers and Driving; Public Transport; On the Road; Long-Distance Travel; and Turnpikes, Toll-gates and Tickets. Each individual chapter starts with an overview of what will be covered in that chapter. I was surprised to learn that long distance travel was considered anything further away than 10 miles. That’s rather difficult to wrap your mind around when most of us travel further than that one-way to work now-a-days.

There are also black and white illustrations throughout the book. I found the pictures of the various types of carriages, the cut-a-way view of a London townhouse, types of dress, and a circulating library, among others to be worth more than words while changing the mind pictures I’d built up while reading. There are also several appendices: A Glossary of Cant and Common Regency Phrases; Newspapers and Magazines; Books in Heyer; Timeline; Reading about the Regency and Where Next?; and Georgette Heyer’s Regency Novels.

For readers of books set in the Regency period, Georgette Heyer’s Regency World is an outstanding resource for understanding the world and society those characters lived in. For those who read books that take place in historical settings, the world has changed. Many of the social conventions that ruled the lives of the people living in Regency England no longer apply. Even during that period people who were born into the lower social classes found it difficult to deal with the myriad levels of behavior that those in the upper class were breed and trained to exhibit in their behavior. Many of the books set in that period mention the misunderstandings and missteps that characters took when moving into a higher social circle than that which they grew up in.

If you enjoy the Regency period, and want to have a better understanding of what society was like, this is probably the best, most accessible and readable book you’ll find on the subject. Even though I haven’t yet read Heyer’s Regency novels (I now have several on my to be read pile), I found Georgette Heyer’s Regency World a wonderful guide to the ins and outs of this social, cultural, historical time period of so many of the books that I read as a Jane Austen fan.

I’d like to hear other readers’ impressions of this work. Have you read it? Do you plan to?