BOOK REVIEW: Darcy and Anne

Title: Darcy and Anne

Author: Judith Brocklehurst

Rating: (3)

ISBN 9781402224386

WANTED: Single rich heiress approaching the unmarriageable age of five & twenty desperately seeking husband. Prone to extreme pallor, bilious headaches and fainting spells. Will pay for own medication. No experience in household matters of finance but willing to hand over fortune to right man. Titled gentleman a must. Poor dukes, old widowed lords and 1st cousins welcome. Laborers and weak at heart need not apply. Must pass inspection by potential overbearing mother-in-law. A singles ad written by Anne de Bourgh might read something like this.

What else should a near spinster in Georgian England do? Especially with Lady Catherine, Anne’s mother, pushing her from the nest with all the force of an English gale. Determined to find a husband for Anne at almost any cost, Lady Catherine ships her off to Pemberley and cousin Fitzwilliam Darcy in search of fresh suitors. Though few appear, Anne is fortunate enough to meet someone of interest. Lady Catherine, however, is not content to let the nature of love take its course. She begins to do what she does best, which is interfere. This spurs Anne into a new found independence that could mean disaster for her mother‘s plans of bouncing a new grandbaby on her fashionably clothed knee anytime soon.

Darcy and Anne is written in a fresh style geared towards the more recent of Austen reading generations. Those of us more familiar with the traditional Austen speak of old will still enjoy the book as a brief escape into the pomp and grandeur of old Georgian England. We see woven throughout the book, a glimpse of the difficulties of social caste and dutiful lack of choice ever present in this period. With aspects of romance, drama, humor and suspense, it’s a simple, clean and entertaining read for ages teen and above.

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