Murder, She Smartly Penned ~ A Book Review of ‘Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor’ by Stephanie Barron

It was Mr. Darcy with his knickers down to his knees accompanied by Lydia Bennett in his private bedchamber.  Since it seems as if Jane Austen is everywhere in current culture, primarily because everything she wrote, along with herself as a writer, is now part of the public domain.  Now, with the aid of Stephanie Barron, she is now a private eye...a gun for hire...just waiting for a distinguished gentleman, with a certain swagger and in need of a wife, to walk into her dingy fourth floor office.  Actually, she is still Jane Austen, but I garner by the series of Barron written books she plays a role similar to that of Angela Lansbury in the senior citizen inspired television classic, 'Murder, She Wrote.'

            Published in 2002, Barron confesses in the Editor's Foreword that in the spring of 1995, due to extensive restoration, in what used to be used as coal cellar of a home of an old Baltimore family, several boxes were found containing entire manuscripts believed to have been written by Jane Austen.  I know, I know, it really is a corny concept but Barron writes it all with a competent skill that Austen herself may have approved the usage of her person as a crime sleuth.  That is if Barron didn't put her in such compromising positions (compromising for a lady of Austen's class and stature, not compromising as the term is understood by today's standards).

            'Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor' begins with Miss Austen attending the country manor homecoming of her dear friend, Isobel Payne, Countess of Scargrave who is newly married and only recently returned from an extended honeymoon on the continent.  I'm sure Barron wrote about how the two met, but for the life of me I can't remember reading it.  Nevertheless, Austen is very good friends with the newly appointed Countess who is five years Austen's junior - Austen at the time of the story was 27. 

            Everything is all peaches and cream when the Count/Groom is found struck with a mysterious illness during the ball to only die later that evening.  Could it be murder?  When Austen's dear friend is accused of the deed, Jane, being inquisitive gentle mind that her readers have always imagined her to be, springs into action to prove that the accused parties in this terrible matter are indeed innocent.  Once again, it sounds very hokey but believe me, it comes off better in written form.

            "Discover the truth, my dear Jane," she pressed me,

her brown eyes dry and her carriage unbent, as she prepared to be shut up in her rooms.  "It is beyond my power to do so.  As God is my witness, I am innocent of my husband's death.  Sir William is unmoved and the townsfolk easily led; but your penetration, your understanding, must be my only hope.  Do not fail me, Jane!" (page 157)

            We were ushered to a snug parlour, where a bright fire cast its glow on several easy chairs; and Mr. Cranley's card had barely been delivered, then Mr. Hezehiah Mayhew appeared to place himself at our service.  He was a portly gentleman of some seventy years, quite stooped, with a shining pate that had long since lost its hair, and two bushy white eyebrows that attempted to supply the difference. (page 247)

            I thought the second paragraph almost comes across as a Charles Dickens imitation. 

            'Scargrave Manor' was a better book than what I was expecting - you know that there is a variety of quality of all things put out under the auspices of Jane Austen.  Seriously, this book could have easily taken me into another dimension where Austen wears high-heeled boots and cracks a mean whip for all I knew about it.  Thankfully, Barron stayed fairly true to Austen's writing style, even at some points sampling the gothic style that sometimes Jane herself liked to play with.  Further, she gave editor footnotes which expanded various elements of the story so that readers were clued into the traditions and pop culture references of British life amongst a certain social set during the early nineteenth century.  

            Overall, I would recommend 'Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor' for any fan of Jane Austen or even any fan of mysteries.  Barron did a fine job of writing a Regency Period who done it that even without all of the Austen trappings would have worked well.  She throws in enough red herrings that made it, for me at least, guessable until the end as to who murdered the Count and why.  There are eight books in the series thus far and I would gladly read more of them.

Westerfield © 2009