Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility

You might be wondering what such a title is doing on my list, following such books as Mutants, Pigtopia, and The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break. However, you would only be wondering if you were unaware of Quirk Books new series of what might be considered fan fiction, of a sort, with adaptations of classic English novels into, eh-hem, rather new forms.

I read the first of these offerings, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, a few months ago, to great delight. I read Sense and Sensibility as a warm-up for the second in the series, Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters.

That said, I found the original, monster-free though it is, to be quite good. Not quite as strong as Pride and Prejudice, but enjoyable front to back. It concerns, as is the formula for Austen, a family of lovely young women, eager to find husbands. They fall first for the flashy man-about-town types, only to be heartbroken by them, and then to come eventually to see the attractions of the quieter, more sensible and stable types.

The family intricacies, here were a bit difficult to keep track of (*Who* is Lucy, again?), but such problems do not mar an enjoyment of Austen's sharp, satirical wit. Here, it is again the E. sister (Elizabeth in P&P, Elinor in S&S) who is the smart, sensible one, but even she is often skewered by Austen's constant jibes. I am left to wonder at her original audience's reception. Surely, they were the very sort of people that she routinely attacks. Did they, as her characters surely would, merely look across the ballroom at other members of their set, and assume that Austen was mocking those types, unaware that they themselves were, likewise, targets?

Tune in again for a review of S&S&S-M, when I've had the chance to read it...