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Love & Romance
Topic: Looking for some good Mr. Darcy books
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There are a lot of books written with his character and I'm looking for some recommendations. I've read several, which I can't remember off the top of my head, but I'm looking for some more.
Any suggestions?
Thanks! |
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Kimberly, I am a HUGE Austen fan. Because of that, I can't really give you any good recommendations. I tried picking up a "continuation" of Austen's Pride and Prejudice, I think it was called "Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife." It was a bit too racy for me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a prude by any means when it comes to my romance reading, but I got to a section in the book where Darcy...ahem...pleasures Lizzy orally, and I immediately put it down. Since then, I've sworn off all Austen knock-offs. Some things are sacred to me, Austen's characters included. Maybe this is the kind of thing you're looking for, but if it's not, I thought I'd warn you away from that book in particular. :-) I did read one book a few years ago called "The Man Who Loved Jane Austen" by Sally Smith O'Rourke which wasn't bad. It had a time travel element to it, but was a contemporary story about a woman who buys an old vanity table and finds letters written to Austen by one Fitzwilliam Darcy. It's kind of a "what if he was a real person" look at Austen's life. Sorry I couldn't be a better help!
(Edited to add: I hate my Internet browser! It won't let me put paragraph spaces in my posts. My apologies to those who have to read these ginormous paragraphs that I'm forced to write.) Last Edited on: 8/5/09 11:42 AM ET - Total times edited: 1 |
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The Man Who Loved Jane Austen is one of the books I read. I think I read one other one, Mr. Darcy's Diary, which I really enjoyed. I'm just in a P and P mood and looking for something to read other than P and P itself since I've read it so many times. I've also watched the movie too many times to count. Last Edited on: 8/5/09 11:44 AM ET - Total times edited: 1 |
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Gina, I hated that book too- it was a DNF for me. I got maybe 1/3 of the way through. In general I like books that are a bit racy, but in an Austen, it was just too much. I also thought that the author was trying WAY too hard to write in the same style as Austen, and it came off as a cheap knock-off to me. Blecch- couldn't get that one out of my house soon enough! I haven't tried any others after being so disappointed with that one. I just reread P&P every once in awhile instead. |
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Mr. Darcy's Diary is from his point of view and I found that one to be interesting because you really never know what he is thinking and this puts his thoughts out there. |
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It's very rare that I don't finish a book I start, but that was one exception. And Lesley, you're right, the author put way too much effort into writing in Austen's style (which cannot be replicated, IMO). Don't mean to sound like a book snob, but I was a literature major in college, and Austen was my "specialty." lol Kimberly, when you say you watched the movie over and over again, do you mean the Keira Knightly version (a favorite of mine, by the way)? This may be a silly question, since most Austen lovers have watched it, but have you ever seen the A&E miniseries version of Pride and Prejudice? If you haven't, I HIGHLY recommend it! :-D
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I have both versions of the movie and admit I only like the A&E version. I just think that Keira Knightly makes Elizabeth seem too immature. She giggles and in my view, Elizabeth wouldnt' giggle :-) My sister and I argue about this all the time. |
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Hmm, you may have just given me an excuse to watch that movie again....lol. You're right, Elizabeth wouldn't giggle, but she would laugh. I'll have to watch again to see how Knightly handles that difference. But I personally thought Matthew Macfadyen made a fantastic brooding Darcy.
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I actually really like both movie versions, though Kimberly, you are right about Keira's Elizabeth being more immature. But I like her, and I thought she had great chemistry with Matthew MacFadyen and I liked most of the other cast. I do adore the BBC version, especially Colin Firth! Unfortunately, it being 6 hours long, it's not one I can watch very often, which is why I've seen more of the other version. It's funny, I have thought that if they could combine some of the cast from each of the movies, that would be my ideal! I loved Judy Densch as Lady Catherine, but I strongly preferred the Mr. Collins from the BBC version. The one from the Keira Knightly version was not pompous and self-important enough- to me, he came off as maybe being somewhere on the autism spectrum rather than full of himself, which Mr. Collins was supposed to be. I also liked Lydia from that version, but preferred Jane in the KK version. I think I would have liked KK as Elizabeth more if some of the writing had been different- such as when she threw the fit at Charlotte for wanting to marry Mr. Collins, or giving Wickham the evil eye after he married Lydia- that made her seem more like 16 than 20, but that was the fault of the script. She was a more tempermental Elizabeth than the other one, who was more true to the book, but that's Hollywood for ya. |
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I like to use library thing for finding stuff like that. the 1st is the library of someone who just has all Austen in their library. The other is anything tagged with pride & prejudice. You can link to the books and see how many have cataloged, rated, reviewed. http://www.librarything.com/tag/pride%20and%20prejudice&more=1
I actually liked Seducing Mr Darcy the best of the ones I have managed to read. It is not really a Mr Darcy book, it is a weird time travelling book and it looks like I am one of the few on librarything who liked it a lot. It is a little weird on the sex side too, but I thought it was funny. The Pamela Aidan trilogy of the P&P from Darcy's perspective is very popular. Most people find the middle book to be rather silly and unnecessary. I agreed the 1st and 3rd books were good and the 2nd one was OK. Now movies - the BBC one is so good and very true to the story, but I liked the KK as well, they took a different more earthy perspective with it and really changed most of the characters basic natures to some small degree, but I thought it worked well too, just not true to the book. |
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Are you only interested in published paperback novels? I ask because I know a lot of the P&P fics out there started off as stories posted on a few different forums (I think Pamela Aidan's was one of them)... And I'll be honest, some of them are awful, but I've found some novel length stories that are much better then some that have been published...They're all online though... Though I do think there are a few in pdf format you can download for free :) They vary on the amount of sex in them though... Some site's have got only PG rated stories, others have much more explicit scenes...it really does depend on what you're looking for. On a side note I was able to get through Mr Darcy Takes a Wife mainly because I convinced myself Linda Berdoll's Mr Darcy wasn't the "real" Mr Darcy, and the same goes for the rest of the chracters... So long as i did that, I could stomach it. |
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