Thursday, August 16, 2012

Book Review: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Book Review: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Genre: Classic romance
Rating: ★★★★★
For: a read along, and book club sort of
From: free from Amazon for my Kindle

I'm not sure I've ever done an official review of this book on the blog and having just finished it recently with a read along, I thought I'd go ahead and seal the deal with a review!

Has anyone NOT read this book yet? If not, here's a quick summary just for you! There's this family of five daughters... two silly youngest ones, two fairly level headed oldest ones, and the middle one is lost in the shuffle. (She's a bookish sort, we should all relate to her the most!)  Oh, and their parents are quite the characters too... a mom who is shallow and silly and a dad who, like his middle daughter is a bookish sort, but very witty.

So anyway, one day a bachelor (Mr. Bingley) moves in "next door" (next door being a relative term in the English countryside!) and of course all the girls become very excited at the idea that perhaps this could be "the one" for one of them. They manipulate matters in order to meet him, and they eventually end up at a couple of balls. Sweet. Things seem to be going as planned!

But, he has this friend... a proud, handsome, rich dude, Mr. Darcy. He snubs one of the daughters (Elizabeth) and she is forever after thinking of him as a snotty, stuck up, obnoxious guy. They have a couple of encounters that don't go so well which appears to create a wall between them. Meanwhile, her sister (Jane) is falling in love with the first guy, Mr. Bingley... Mr. Darcy's friend. This is cool, perhaps a bit awkward, but it's all good.

Then, suddenly, they disappear... gone, moved back to London. Everyone is baffled that things seem to NOT be working out after all. When Elizabeth goes on a little trip, she meets up with Mr. Darcy again, and then things begin to explode and go all sorts of crazy directions!

As you know I, along with so many others, adore this book. I love the wittiness of Elizabeth and her father, I love the silliness of her sisters and mother, I love the crazy characters that are so well drawn that we love to hate them, I love the change the characters make as more and more things are revealed about them, I love the romantic sparks that are constantly flying, I love the old fashioned rules and etiquette... I just love it all. The story will never get old and I predict I'll be doing re-reads of it for as long as I keep reading.

Bottom line: I will love it forever!

How about you? Are you a fan? If so, how would you describe, in just a few sentences, why you love it?

Other Reviews:

Jenni Elyse
Rebecca Reads
Becky's Book Reviews

6 comments:

  1. Very nice recap of the book. And don't think everyone has read it. Just look at Jenni. ;)

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  2. A really amusing review Suey. The book is my favourite too. Have you read 'Persuasion'?

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  3. The timeless, romantic tension in this novel keeps me coming back over and over again. It's simply the best! :)

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  4. Persuasion is my favorite Austen, but P&P is tied or second, depending on my mood. :) I just love Austen's social commentary and her characters are fantastic. Glad you loved this one, too.

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  5. This is the only Austen I have ever read. One day I will explore her more...

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  6. I just finished the book and I LOVED it! It was also surprisingly easy to follow, I had always feared reading this because I thought it was going to be as hard as a Dickens novel but in reality is wasn't hard to read!

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