Austenland by Shannon Hale

It’s been a slow blog week – Laura was visiting from London so most of my free time was occupied with good old fashioned sister time. And today I had to say goodbye to her until I visit her in London in June, so I figured I’d go Austen today in her honor!

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Synopsis

Jane is a young New York woman who can never seem to find the right man – perhaps because of her secret obsession with Mr. Darcy, as played by Colin Firth in the BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. But when a wealthy relative bequeaths to her a trip to an English resort catering to Austen-obsessed women, Jane’s fantasies of meeting the perfect Regency-era gentleman suddenly become more real than she ever could have imagined. Is this total immersion in a fake Austenland enough to make Jane kick the Austen obsession for good, or could all her dreams actually culminate in a Mr. Darcy of her own?

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Review

Austenland is one of the few books where I watched the movie before I read the book. Usually I have a hard stop rule against this, but… I really wanted to watch the movie when it came out. Mostly because I, like Laura, like Jane Austen, and secondly because I love Keri Russell who plays protagonist Jane. The movie was entertaining, and reminded me of another retelling of Pride & Prejudice I liked, Me & Mr. Darcy, a book I enjoyed in college.

I debated if the fact that I already knew how the story would end if I would enjoy reading the book after seeing the movie and I am happy to report that… I did! I never really harbored a Mr. Darcy fantasy as many of my friends growing up did, but I can appreciate him as a character and, while I wouldn’t want my husband to be anything like him, I can suspend reality for the sake of reading and lose myself in Jane’s world for a bit. It’s a fun read and Shannon Hale’s writing is always decent, her storytelling compelling.

Continuing my present audiobook obsession, I listened to Austenland and found that the reader, for the fact that she wasn’t Keri Russell, sounded a lot like Keri Russell, which made me really want to watch the movie. When I did, I was reminded of an incident in the film that, viewed now through the 2018 #MeToo lens, caused me to squirm. Jane is assaulted by an intoxicated male in the book, and subsequently in the movie. It is something that Jane does not report and it is not mentioned again after it happens. It just goes away because, terrifyingly, at the time, it was considered normal. Something that women just had to deal with – the unwanted and unencouraged advances of men they had no interest in. For a book just over 10 years old to treat such an event as normal, makes me simultaneously disheartened and elated. Disheartened that women had to go through these experiences without the expectation of any sort of help after they occurred, and elated, because times are finally starting to change.

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars

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