{"id":39270,"date":"2021-04-10T23:53:57","date_gmt":"2021-04-11T03:53:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=39270"},"modified":"2021-04-10T23:53:57","modified_gmt":"2021-04-11T03:53:57","slug":"review-of-longbourn-by-jo-baker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=39270","title":{"rendered":"Review of Longbourn, by Jo Baker"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Longbourn<\/em><\/p>\n

by Jo Baker
\nread by Emma Fielding<\/p>\n

Random House Audio, 2013. 13.5 hours.
\nReview written April 9, 2021, from a library eaudiobook
\nStarred Review<\/p>\n

A big thank you to my coworker Pam who told me about this book after I posted my new Austenalia<\/a> page. Longbourn<\/em> focuses on the home of Elizabeth Bennet during the events of Pride and Prejudice<\/a><\/em> and tells us about the lives of the servants.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the same flavor at all as Jane Austen\u2019s books, dealing with ladies and gentlemen and polite society and appearances and sweetly and innocently finding husbands. Details are a little more sordid, and there are some unpleasant scenes and situations. The book begins on a wash day, and Sarah, a housemaid, has these thoughts about her employers:<\/p>\n

The young ladies might behave like they were smooth and sealed as alabaster statues underneath their clothes, but then they would drop their soiled shifts on the bedchamber floor, to be whisked away and cleansed, and would thus reveal themselves to be the frail, leaking, forked bodily creatures that they really were. Perhaps that was why they spoke instructions at her from behind an embroidery hoop or over the top of a book: she had scrubbed away their sweat, their stains, their monthly blood; she knew they weren\u2019t as rarefied as angels, and so they just couldn\u2019t look her in the eye.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Longbourn is a small household, with the butler married to the housekeeper. Sarah is the older of the two housemaids, and she\u2019s only a teen herself. At the start of the book, a stranger comes into town, and he quickly becomes their new footman. There are some questions as to why a young man would be available during a time of war.<\/p>\n

Something fun about this book is that yes, the events of Pride and Prejudice<\/em> play out among the young ladies, but those things aren\u2019t nearly as interesting to the servants as what is going on in their own lives. The author has given them intriguing back stories.<\/p>\n

So don\u2019t think of this as a Jane Austen read-alike. It\u2019s not. But it is a fascinating and absorbing account of what life was like for ordinary people in England during the Napoleonic Wars. It\u2019s about making do and surviving, but also about finding love and finding opportunities. What would a servant dream of making of themselves during that era?<\/p>\n

I will add that in revealing the back stories of the servants, Jo Baker gives us some surprising back stories of the main characters. Bingley\u2019s family made their fortune in sugar, and there are some implications about one of his servants \u2013 but that\u2019s only the beginning of the back story revelations.<\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t too sure I\u2019d enjoy it as the book began, since I\u2019m used to thinking of only the pleasant side of Austen heroines. But the more I listened, the more caught up I was in the lives and situations of these people who began to feel like they knew a lot more about how the world really works than the fine ladies I was used to reading about.<\/p>\n

jobakerwriter.com<\/a>
\naaknopf.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on Sonderbooks<\/a> at: www.sonderbooks.com\/Fiction\/longbourn.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.<\/p>\n

Source: This review is based on a library eaudiobook from Fairfax County Public Library.<\/p>\n

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.<\/p>\n

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