2008-07-03 Blood-thirsty, and not very inventive

I bought this book in anticipation of having a good read. It wasn't. But I did learn a lot about the authoress, Emma Campbell Webster. She is a blood-thirsty soul.

This book is divided into five parts, and generally you read page after page of Jane Austen's novel, summarised and commented, though I disagree with a lot of the comments.

You will then have a question with two choices. Sometimes the wrong answer leads to disaster. For example, the first question is whether you will walk down the left road or the right road. Choosing the left road leads to you being attacked with permanent disfigurement and THE END, with a comment that "you deserve to be disfigured. Be ashamed." So my "Jane Austen adventure" would have ended after Chapter 2. Not really the sort of book Jane Austen would have written.

The sudden and bad endings continue throughout the book. You could have married and then eventually have murdered Mr Collins. If you refuse to speak to Mr Darcy during the dance, you slip on some ice and break your neck (why?). Other endings include Miss Bingley killing you, and not only Lady Catherine killing you, but also Darcy killing everyone else, including himself. As I said: blood-thirsty.

The safest course of action is just to do as Miss Bennet did in the book - but then what's the point? Where is the "Create your own...adventure" in doing that?

Towards the end of Parts 1-4, you are given a 3 choice question. One of the choices is as per Miss Bennet's original choice, and so you go progress into the next part. The other two choices transport you for a time into a pastiche of a different Jane Austen novel - fairly badly incorporated into the P&P novel. For example, Mr Elton might make an appearance at a party. Very clumsily done, and not really interesting.

So the book is not good reading as a Jane Austen novel - what about as a comedy book? No, it is too badly paced for that. A comedy book would not have page after page after page of Jane Austen's original novel (summarised). The comedy moments outside of Miss Austen's novel are too spaced out.

As a "Create your own" book, the introduction says "...your mission will also be influenced by... your Accomplishments, Intelligence, Confidence, Connections and Fortune". No it isn't. You make a list of them as they arise, but with no purpose whatsoever. The only question that you are asked occasionally is about your Intelligence. Apparently if you are too intelligent, you will always make a bad marriage.

When you reach the end of the book, it is made clear that apparently only someone with more Intelligence than Jane Austen's Miss Bennet could have written this book. What conceit!

Basically, the best bit in this book is the original story - but why would you spend the money when the original and better could be bought for a couple of pounds? The dust jacket says "This is her first book". I disagree. The better bits are Jane Austen's book - as she says "I would like to thank Jane Austen, very much, for being out of copyright". Right... Having read this book, I wish it was still in copyright.