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The repetitiveness and the chaotic involuntary time jumps are A MESS !

This is the second near identical scene where Elizabeth refuses Darcy’s proposal made because of demands upon his honour. It’s been MONTHS, supposedly, in which Darcy has been procrastinating any decisive action because of dishonourable gossip (months & months at Netherfield), enough for Hurst to do a full makeover & turn into a fitness buff

It gets worse = it’s been 3 times in which Darcy has expressed the need to talk to Elizabeth’s father because of how bad town’s gossip has affected Elizabeth. And yet he didn’t do it… Duty Darcy who does what he ought and who is the Paragon of Proper Behaviour, doesn’t speak to Mr Bennet after it becomes public knowledge he compromised Elizabeth. Does this make sense to you??

The editing is poor in the sense that there are time jumps, and scenes take place in a disorderly manner, which is challenging for readers to follow!

Lizzy and Darcy have several repetitive conversations, as if the scenea were written as alternatives and the author could not decide which one to pick so they added them all at random.

The storytelling is very detailed, meticulous, descriptions of dishes, smells, the texture of fabrics, all quite thorough. The scene building is immersive, and the overall feel is quite oppressive.

Dialogue is refined, with double meanings and a tab bit convoluted, adding to the oppressive feel — as if one was imprisoned at Netherfield alongside the party!

The story STILL doesn’t make any sense = Lizzy has been repeating a mantra all along about Not Wanting to Marry, and Darcy has been repeating how unsuitable Elizabeth is because of her connections. They have absolutely no relationship or common ground at all, they can perfectly exist separately for the rest of their lives, more so since Lizzy has ghosted Jane altogther and moved away with Charlotte !

The entire story doesn’t make any sense = Lizzy is secretly a wealthy and savvy business woman who is the powerhouse behind her uncle’s commercial success ! But this is a secret from her mother and sisters as she continues to carry out a parallel life of poverty and “normalcy” at Longbourn.

Lizzy doesn’t want to marry, she wants to be “independent” and to keep her wealth a secret from everyone forever

I despise tales where characters cry “Compromise!” as if it was a Bingo scene that grants the player an automatic win (and everyone plays along to this silly, fake, irrational rules)… it’s farce, it’s cheap, it’s not believable and it demeans the whole story in my opinion.

Thumbs down!

The subplot about Caroline Bingley is ridiculous from the start. Her personality and slights are written in shorthand and exaggerated relying in canon, but really described or explained. The Bennets were prejudiced against her thanks to Mr. Darcy being an indiscrete gossip, and Jane showed herself as a manipulative, schemening girl by playing Bingley against his own sister! Nasty plot…

Book 2 is a cynical story of a bitter, violent Lizzy who lashes out at her own disappointment with her family. She is cruel and leaves Longbourn. All the sisters have boring, comfortable, dispassionate fates, and yet Lizzy gets her Darcy in the end (in a boring, second-best sort of way!).

I am afraid of what the third book will bring !

3 separate stories; alternate storylines where Jane is married as the remaining daughters cope with her absence.

1st story starts out interesting and with some promise, until the author gets bored and starts just lazily “telling” instead of SHOWING. The story is supposed to be about Jane being unhappy — turns that everyone’s life is ruined except for Charlotte’s!

2nd story is violent so far, concerning

This is absolutely boring and ON HOLD !

Now Lydia ia being punished by forced work, humiliation, and physical pain in some strict boarding school for unruly girls…

Not only is the storytelling very poor, but the misogyny reeks !!!

Why do some authors crave this petty revenge and to inflict sadistic torture over Austen’s characters ????

Of course Lady Catherine is sent to an assylum for thr mentally insane! [ eye roll ]

The entire tone of the story is Farce (capital F!)

Canon traits are exaggerated to peak tackiness; for example, Mr. Bennet’s benign selfish neglect is turned into sadistic mockery, cruel manipulation, and perverse toying with his wife & daughters, he has no love for any of his daughters, including Lizzy.

Mrs. Bennet, Caroline, & Lydia are delusional monsters of mean understanding.

Lizzy is a total Mary Sue.

The whole start makes no sense. In one sentence everyone knows Bingley and speak about him freely, next line and it turns out Mr. Bennet hasn’t met him yet and the Assembly hasn’t even taken place yet !

I despise stories featuring medical violence. And worse when that specific plot device is used in a careless manner in the middle of a romance-comedy.

Anne is a psychopathic sociopath who is slowly poisoning Lizzy in the backdrop of Elizabeth’d “forced marriage”, so the new bride spends half the time casting her accounts or with a headache, but hardly anyone notice it !

Almost halfway through, and Darcy & Lizzy’s ending of their half-fake betrothat rings right, merciful and clean to me — is there really a need for the couole to get back together when their past history has been so deeply damaged and tainted? Shouldn’t they start afresh elsewhere for their own peace of mind, instead of “forgiving” such deep wounds???

This Americanized (modern) Retirement Fantasy instantly removes 2 stars from my rating on any Historical Rom, it denotes low quality writing, no understanding of the period, silly personal projection, & poor editing!

“Elizabeth and William ultimately chose to retire to Pemberley’s dower house, handing over the reins to their son so they could travel freely to see their many grandchildren…”

The story feels forced, dragging and awkward. Halfway through and a repentant Lizzy is plotting and scheming to win Darcy back, with the help of half his family, plus the Gardiners’ household — they are mercenary social climbers after all, trying to catch a wealthy bachelor !

This Elizabeth is seriously into home renovation!

“Painting screens was not nearly as impressive as limewashing walls, and netting purses was not as useful as re-thatching a roof.”

The tone of a story, & its story telling iis very important…

“Lizzy said, “I love you, Mary.” She reached out her hand, and they did their special handshake as they said, in unison, “Two sisters versus the world.” After one more quick hug, Mary left.

Elizabeth told Mary her situation, then she LIES to Darcy by telling him that she’s told ONLY him because he is so special to her; then she tells Cnel Fitzwilliam, then she tells Jane, and so far she also goes and shares her BIG SECRET with Aunt Gardiner as well (LOL).

Descriptions of time slowing or slowly passing are tiresome and repetitive; plenty of clocks ticking, winds breezing, meaningful looks spreaing through several paragraphs.

The whole idea of Lizzy re-living the whole story all over again (only screwing it this time around) makes little sense unless there is a goal to achieve, or a task to complete. Nothing clear so far at this stage!

The manner in which Elizabeth faces her supernatural situation makes no sense. She oscillates between sneaky inuendo, sharing clues here and there, then shutting down the next munute becauase she must conceal her secret — why can she tell Mary so easily, and then she CAN’T tell Darcy?? She has already changed the story, why play-act the rest and pretend ignorance for propriety’s sake?

Dialogue is convoluted. Descriptions have a strange way of using words that are unfitting; not quite wit, not quite poetry… more like a bad translation or using a defective synonym dictionary !

References to canon are forced and don’t add anything to the story other than puzzlement >> like Lizzy talking to Darcy about Lady Catherine’s garden… when she never visited Rosing OR Kent !

“… he had expected to meet her in Kent that spring”

>> this makes no sense, because in this version Collins doesn’t marry Charlotte or anyone from Meryton, he ends the entail and cuts all association with the Bennets, so WHY would Lizzy go to Kent at all, and WHY would Darcy “expect” to meet her there for Easter, since he & Bingley left after the Netherfield Ball without goodbye?!

There is a very loud “confrontation”, then constables(?) appear -very Deux ex Machina- and the senior Bennets are sent to trial (no clarity on what the crime is, aside from mistreating Lizzy and some lying, so the meanie Bennets are both sent to Australia and the remaining girls remain alone (unchaperoned??) at Longbourn which is perfectly normal for this story…

People keep “collapsing on the floor crying”, dialogue is over dramatic and fake sounding, use of modern phrases is consistently interspersed.

My final rating keeps dropping, which surprises me, since my initial expectation wasn’t very high in the first place…

NOTHING MAKES SENSE! The “big mystery” of Elizabeth’s parents relationship is a convoluted mess that no one with a brain could remotely believe for a second, let alone try to understand or empathize with.