Sonderbooks Book Review of Suspense and Sensibility

Reviewed June 20, 2005.
Forge Books, New York, 2005. 301 pages.
Available at Sembach Library (MCN F BEB).

Here’s another fun and amusing look at the further lives of Mr. and Mrs. Darcy as it might have happened after the end of Pride and Prejudice.

In Suspense and Sensibility, Elizabeth gives her younger sister Kitty the much longed for London season. There, Kitty meets and falls in love with Harry Dashwood, a character from Jane Austen’s novel, Sense and Sensibility.

However, the course of true love never does run smoothly. Complications develop, during which Elizabeth gets to meet more of the delightful people from Sense and Sensibility, and we can see how they turned out.

This novel was a lot of fun and nicely captured the flavor of Jane Austen’s world. The one thing I didn’t like was that again the solving of the mystery involved supernatural events. I found them a bit hard to believe. Like Mr. Darcy, I’m something of a skeptic. Unlike Mr. Darcy, I couldn’t see for myself that this was true. Happening in a mystery novel, it felt a little unfair. One usually expects a mystery to have a natural explanation, not a supernatural one.

However, I was able to forgive Carrie Bebris for this plot device because she did give plenty of warning that supernatural events might occur, and besides, the book was simply a lot of fun. It made me want to read Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility yet again.

Review of other books by Carrie Bebris:
Pride and Prescience
North by Northanger,

Austenalia

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Book Reviews by Sondra Eklund

****Suspense and Sensibility*

(Or First Impressions Revisited)

A Mr. and Mrs. Darcy Mystery

by Carrie Bebris