An Assembly Such as This

This is the first in a series of three books that retell the story of Pride and Prejudice from the perspective of Mr. Darcy. I had just about sworn-off Jane Austen sequels and spin-offs, having read some terrible ones, but I decided to give this a try based on the positive reviews on Amazon. It's actually kind of entertaining, although I've always had my own interpretation of Mr. Darcy that differs from this author, namely that shyness causes some of Mr. Darcy's seeming rudeness early in the book. The A&E/BBC mini-series (the Colin Firth version) seems to have a heavy influence here too, though I am going to have to re-read P&P to double check some lines. Interestingly, when read from Elizabeth Bennett's perspective in the original, you put yourself entirely in her shoes, so when reading this version, I found myself getting a little jealous of Darcy's high opinion of her- he is supposed to be mine!! There are some subplots that are added which aren't really working for me, but I enjoyed the book as a whole and plan to read the next two books.