Book 670: A Weekend with Mr. Darcy (Austen Addicts #1) – Victoria Connelly

Hello, TBR pile, it’s been a long time. I picked this e-book up EIGHT YEARS AGO. Who knows why I didn’t read it that summer, but I finally read it and thoroughly enjoyed it.

When I picked up the book, there were only three books in Connelly’s Austen Addicts series, but since then it’s increased to six. I’m not sure I’ll read past Mr. Darcy Forever since it looks like Connelly may have switched publishers and those last three covers are frightful, but never say never right? It’s also probably a good thing I didn’t read it eight years ago when I had more time day-to-day because Connelly introduced me to the Republic of Pemberley, a Jane Austen message board/forum. I did a cursory look over it and yeah, I definitely would’ve gotten lost in that quagmire!

I think what I enjoyed most about this novel was you get a two-for-one romance. I don’t know if this is the case with all of Connelly’s novels, but I thoroughly enjoyed the parallel romances of Katherine and Warwick and Robyn and Dan.

The premise of the novel is a four day Jane Austen conference, Katherine is an Oxford professor who studies Austen, Warwick has a major Austen secret, Robyn is an Austen enthusiast, and Dan is an innocent bystander. Connelly clearly knows the Austen community well from the uptight Mrs. Soames through to her main characters, all the views were there:

“It’s soft porn dressed in a little fine muslin.” (13)

“It wasn’t seemly to have one’s bottom pinched at a Jane Austen Conference.” (45)

“How is it that every conversation about Jane Austen inevitably turns to Colin Firth in a wet shirt?” (122)

And, like quite a few Jane Austen enthusiast authors she either threw some shade or a shout out to Charlotte Brontë and Star Wars 😀

“‘I’m not being fair? I’m not the one who has a wife tucked away in the attic somewhere,’ Katherine cried.” (8)

“I know you women. You don’t care who the man is as long as he’s on a bloody horse. Put bloody Jabba the Hutt on a horse and you’d all be swooning over him.” (65)

I appreciated that even though she had the two pairings meet and fall in love within one weekend, the entire story didn’t take place in one weekend. They sensibly went back to their everyday lives to sort out whether they wanted to be together in one case and work through the drama in the other. So Connelly gets bonus points for a little bit more realism than many I’ve read.

I also happened to finally read this article (photo essay?) at the same time which fit really well with this.

Figures in empire gowns clambering over five-bar gates, Regency girls sleeping on IKEA cushions, Austenian gangs gossiping under telegraph wires: @acarlestolra's photos of 'Janeites', now on @lithub https://t.co/wCERvB9xD8 pic.twitter.com/lllr7qYia5

— Ellie Broughton (@___ellie) July 10, 2019

Recommendation: I thoroughly enjoyed it and it would’ve been a perfect beach read. I smiled through most of it, shook my head at some of the idiocy of the characters and wanted more. So it’s a definite read from me if romance/RomCom/Austen are on your regular read lists.

Opening Line: “Dr Katherine Roberts couldn’t help thinking that a university lecturer in possession of a pile of paperwork must be in want of a holiday.”

Closing Line: “She turned around to take one last look at Jane Austen’s resting place and then the two of them left the cathedral together and, when Warwick held out his hand, Katherine placed her own inside it.” (Whited out to avoid spoilers, highlight to read.)

Additional Quotes from A Weekend with Mr. Darcy
“Honestly, any man who wasn’t safely tucked between the covers of a book was a liability. You couldn’t trust any of them. Was it any wonder that Katherine turned to fiction time and time again? Ever since her father had left home when she was seven, she’d hidden from the world around her, nose-diving into the safety of a friendly paperback. Books had always rescued her and remained the one constant in her life.” (9)

“There was so much time for her hanging around sets and his mother had been a passionate reader, telling him the plots of all the novels she read and encouraging him when he sat down one day, determined to rewrite the story of Wuthering Heights and give it a happy ending that had more to do with Hollywood than Brontë.” (25)

“A writer should never turn a good idea away just because it might offend somebody.” (29)

“The last thing she was looking for was another relationship. She needed a break from men. Well, real ones anyway. Fictional men were fine: they knew their place. You could just pick up a book, flick through to the right page, take your fill of your favourite hero and then return him to the shelf. Job done.” (73)

“That was the thing about Jane Austen’s books—they felt intimate, like a cozy chat with a best friend. Readers always felt exceptionally close to the characters as if they were extensions of the readers themselves or at the very least family members.” (101)

“It was the same for all true fans. There could be a new version of Pride and Prejudice every month, and the fans would still want more.” (170)

“I am who I am, and Jane Austen is as much a part of me as the blood that pumps through my body. Her words are my life and I can’t be with somebody who doesn’t understand that. I just can’t.” (254)”

“It was more complicated than any of his plots. At least if they got too complicated, he could go back and delete things. You couldn’t do that with life. There was no Delete button to help you erase an awkward scene. You couldn’t hit Backspace to get rid of all the rubbishy bits. You had to live with the decisions you made.” (304)

“Say you’ll give me another chance. Say you know I’m an idiot but that you forgive me anyway. Say you’ll let me hold your hand and that we can start again.” (343)