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Readingomnivore Reviews

CHOSEN is the first volume in Sarah Johnson's Leaving Bennet Behind series of variants on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. CHOSEN resembles a serial publication more than sequels since it leaves many story lines unresolved. It was published in digital format in 2014.

~~~SPOILERS AHEAD~~~

Johnson uses the names of Austen's originals, but she changes them beyond recognition while introducing Hugh Fitzwilliam, the Earl of Rosebery, and his family as major characters. The Earl, Darcy, and Bingley, all invested in business, respect Edward Gardiner as friend and astute entrepreneur; no one (except Caroline Bingley} attribute any stigma to Trade. All the relatives close to Darcy respect his choice of wife and welcome Elizabeth. Henry Bennet is loving and affectionate to his wife Susannah Gardiner Bennet, who controls her nerves. With much improved manners, she is a sympathetic mother who insists each daughter should marry only for love. Kitty Bennet, only lately allowed into Society, is a skilled artist who experiments in different media, while Lydia, still mostly in the schoolroom, is a devoted violinist who practices daily; both are well-behaved. Mary, pleasant and not preachy, is a gifted pianist. Jane is too naively trusting to be safe out alone. The Hursts are a loving couple who resent Caroline's constant presence and behavior, but jellyfish have more spine than the Hursts and Charles Bingley show in dealing with her. Georgiana is an invalid following a coaching accident. Recovering from a broken hand and severely damaged legs, it's unclear if she will walk again.

Most changed are Elizabeth and Darcy. Elizabeth is blandly nonjudgemental and compliant, her vaunted skill at judging character omitted and her wit more alluded to than displayed. Johnson's Darcy bears no resemblance to Austen's. He is a curious blend of modern attitudes and high sentimentality more typical of mid-nineteenth century novels than the Regency period. He is determined to marry only for love, decides to marry Elizabeth before the end of the Meryton assembly, where he does dance and does not insult, and weeps openly in public several times. Guilt-ridden over Georgiana's uncertain prognosis, he visits Bingley Netherfield because his relatives fear he's having a nervous breakdown. On the other hand, he has taught Georgiana that their parents are stars in heaven looking down to protect them; he refers to his father as Polaris, the Pole Star that always shows direction to the traveler. When he wins Elizabeth, Darcy explains to her that their meeting came about because George Darcy had promised to provide with the wife he needs.

Johnson greatly changes events. Mr. Bennet and Georgiana's carriage accidents, the forgotten episode in Elizabeth's past, Darcy and Elizabeth's meeting without negative impressions, their instant attraction and quick decision to marry, the lack of obstacles and angst, and Bingley's staying at Netherfield are all new. She suggests continuing story lines: Mr. Bennet's plan to buy William Collins out of the entail, Mrs. Philips's plot against her sister's family, Caroline's scheme to poison Mary's mind against Viscount Primrose, Lady Catherine's off-stage outrage, George Wickham's escape after leaving Georgina to die.

Things that bother me in CHOSEN include overt Christian references with Elizabeth, Darcy, and others praying at every opportunity, which are not authentic Austen. Johnson's use of apostrophes in plurals and possessives is often erroneous; every smile is either sly or a smirk (these words are ubiquitous in recent Austen fan fiction for some reason). Some facts are questionable or inaccurate. Johnson has Elizabeth gather and satisfy her hunger with wild elderberries, which are toxic when eaten raw. She makes Jonathan Lucas just returned from the Grand Tour, then later says it was a year traveling around England. The Grand Tour historically referred to a prolonged tour of the Continent, unlikely in 1811. She has Mary Bennet in the woods in October to cut blooming crocuses though most species of crocus bloom in early spring. Her worst anachronism places Elizabeth and Darcy on Oakham Mount in a reprise of the Jack and Rose "flying" scene on the bow of the Titanic.

I will probably continue the series to see what Johnson does with the open story lines, but CHOSEN is more Days of Our Lives than Austen. (D)
 
Peter Bannen summarizes THE ENDS OF THE WORLD: VOLCANIC APOCALYPSES, LETHAL OCEAN, AND OUR QUEST TO UNDERSTAND EARTH'S PAST MASS EXTINCTIONS in its subtitle. Understanding of the chemical and geologic processes of the earth has changed radically in the past fifty years, greatly to impact current ideas about the history of life on the planet. Published in 2017, the information in THE ENDS OF THE WORLD is as current as is possible in a hardcover book.

Brannen discusses each of the great extinctions, sketching its extent and the development of various theories as to its causative mechanism(s). The extinctions are, in his view: the End-Ediacaran, around 540 million years ago, caused by the Cambrian Explosion of complex life forms; the End-Ordovician, 445 million years ago, when approximately 85 percent of life went extinct; the Late Devonian, 374.359 million years ago, with a second pulse at 359 million years ago; the End-Permian, 252 million years ago (aka "The Great Dying"), the greatest mass extinction, the one that almost sterilized the earth; the End-Triassic, 201 million years ago; the End-Cretaceous, 60 million years ago, when the non-avian dinosaurs died off; and the End-Pleistocene, beginning 50,000 years ago and extending into the near future. The final chapters deal with the status and prognosis for this current extinction and speculate about the final extinction in some 800 million years.

Common factors between the extinctions include disruption of the carbon dioxide cycle, producing climate change with acidification and anoxia of the oceans. The most devastating extinctions (End-Ordovician, End-Permian, End-Triassic, End-Cretaceous) coincide with long periods of volcanic eruption of flood basalts in almost incomprehensible volumes. The End-Ordovician, the End-Triassic, and the End-Cretaceous extinctions also involve asteroid strikes. Brannen concludes: "The cause...of the End-Permian mass extinction and our own looming modern catastrophe might have been one and the same. The Siberian Traps intruded through, and cooked, huge stores of coal, oil, and gas that had built up over hundreds of millions of years during the Paleozoic. The magma...burned through huge reserves of fossil fuels in a few thousand years as surely as fossil fuels ignited in pistons and in power plants." (126) Scary!

Brannen is an engaging writer, informally storytelling in style, lightening a grim subject with humor, showing researchers as believably human and not austere thinking machines. His survey of the hypotheses about the extent and causation of each of the mass extinctions reinforces that scientific knowledge evolves over time and is, like all human activities, political.

That being said, THE ENDS OF THE WORLD contains only one map in eight pages of color photographs, printed two or three to a page in no apparent order. It's often difficult to identify the feature(s) to which they refer or the reason for their inclusion. Brannen includes 15.5 pages of closely printed bibliography, but nothing ties specific pieces of information to their sources. He includes no diagrams, tables, or time lines. Global maps showing the continents and oceans at each extinction would help. For easy reference, readers need an a one-page table comparing the extinctions: length of the eras, dominant life forms, time frame of die-offs, probable causes, species gone extinct, surviving species.

Editing inconsistencies bother me. One is alternate use of "CO₂" and "carbon dioxide" for no apparent reason for the change. Brannen also uses "earth"--the corporeal planet--and "Earth"--the name of that planet--interchangeably. Writing of numbers is not uniform. Older times use the form "252 million" while dual forms--"ten million" or "10 million"--show up elsewhere.

THE ENDS OF THE WORLD is accessible for beginners, but it is Natural History Lite for a more informed reader. (B)
 
MR. DARCY'S PROPOSAL is Martine Jane Roberts's novel using names from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice; she changes the characters and action so much that I hesitate to call it a variant. It was published in digital format in 2017.

Fitzwilliam Darcy leaves Netherfield Park the day after Charles Bingley's departure on business, but he remains in London only long enough to convince Bingley that Jane Bennet is not appropriate to wive. By the end of a week, Darcy recognizes his love for Elizabeth Bennet and his desire to marry her. He returns to Netherfield to ask Mr. Bennet's consent. Recognizing Elizabeth's dislike of Darcy but also believing Darcy's declaration of love for his favorite daughter, Bennet consents with two conditions: Darcy must immediately communicate his intentions to Elizabeth, and he has one month until Christmastide in which to win her acceptance. Impressed by Darcy's profession of love and his promises to provide for her mother and unmarried sisters after her father's death, under pressure from her mother to make reparation for having refused Mr. Collins, Elizabeth tells Darcy that she does not love and does not know if she can learn to love him. When he perseveres in his declarations of love despite her doubts, she consents. Disagreements over George Wickham, a physical altercation with him, Caroline Bingley's egregious insults to the Bennets and Darcy, her revelation of Darcy's role in separating Bingley and Jane, and Lydia's elopement all threaten to end the courtship before the month is up.

Editing problems are legion. Word choice often ignores connotations of words that may be listed as synonyms. Words may be misused, as "pedantic" to mean "fastidious" and "deportation" to mean "transportation" (shipment of debtors and prisoners to penal colonies, most famously Australia following the American Revolution). "Disorientated" is not the adjective form of "disorientation." Some words are anachronistic, while slang expressions intrude in formal conversation, e.g. "spread" to describe a formal meal, "cherry pick." Modern ideas--"soul mates, "the media" hounding Darcy--abound, as do sentence fragments and dangling modifiers. Use of apostrophes in possessives and plurals is consistently incorrect.

Other errors include reference to Charlotte's father as Sir Lucas when correct address would be Sir William. Meal courses served at Longbourn are modern rather than Regency. Passage London to Boston, Massachusetts, is to last 25 days, unusually quick for crossing the stormy North Atlantic in the depths of winter. No date is indicated for the action in MR. DARCY'S PROPOSAL, but it's unlikely that the Royal Navy would be welcome in Boston Harbor by December 1811 or thereafter. Even though war was not formally declared until 18 June 1812, armed conflicts between the U.S. and Royal Navy ships over impressment had occurred for years. Why involve the Royal Navy when Wickham was clearly guilty of deserting from the militia? Penalty for desertion in wartime was death.

~~~POSSIBLE SPOILERS~~~

I dislike what Roberts does to Jane Austen's most famous characters. Elizabeth's feelings for Darcy change from distaste to love so rapidly that they seem superficial. She loves being loved. Her compliance with Darcy and her family's expectations contradicts her claimed independence of spirit. Elizabeth largely ignores Darcy's interference between Bingley and Jane. Darcy is neurotic about being rejected, self-righteous in his pride, a control freak. He acknowledges no need for change and, indeed, changes little. He wallows in guilt, obsessing about his perceived failures in duties as gentleman or brother. I most dislike Roberts having Darcy and Elizabeth anticipate their marriage vows at least twice. Without bringing in moral judgments, I have grave doubts about their lovemaking outdoors on Oakham Mount on a cold December day.

Because I am of two minds about MR. DARCY'S PROPOSAL, I assign two grades: plot changes with good potential for development (B+) but characterization and editing failures (D-)
 
CHERISHED is the second installment of Sarah Johnson's Leaving Bennet Behind accounts based on characters in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. It adds too many new characters and changes the original characters and events too much to be called a sequel. It was published in digital format in o2014.

~~~SPOILERS~~~

CHERISHED begins immediately following the wedding of Elizabeth Bennet to Fitzwilliam Darcy. The Darcys honeymoon in London, while Georgiana Darcy remains at Netherfield with her cousins Lord Primrose and Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam and her friend and companion Mary Bennet. Charles Bingley courts Jane Bennet. Lord Primrose loves Mary, whose mind has been poisoned against him by Caroline Bingley who, since Darcy is no longer available, will settle for the heir to the Earl of Rosebery. Colonel Fitzwilliam and Anne de Bourgh plan to marry when he finds the man who killed two of his soldiers. Charlotte Lucas is increasingly desperate at her unmarried state. Affection grows between Jonathan Lucas and Kitty Bennet. The reader needs a scorecard to keep up with the lovers.

Johnson resolves only a few story lines. Bingley eventually proposes to and marries Jane. Elizabeth becomes pregnant. The Hursts adopt an orphaned newborn left on their doorstep in Brighton. Charlotte and Lord Ashbourne are engaged. Caroline Bingley's tirade about the Hursts' adoption causes a second banishment from Netherfield.

Johnson advances but leaves many story lines open: Colonel Fitzwilliam's case and romance; strange bequests in the will of Sir Lewis de Bourgh; Lady Catherine's increasingly severe headaches and rages; her plot to destroy the Bennets and free Darcy to marry Anne; William Collins's role in his patroness's schemes; a mysterious stranger who spies on Lydia Bennet in Brighton and watches Longbourn; the plot against the Darcys orchestrated by Mrs. Younge; two strange incidents involving Elizabeth; Collins's decision about selling his interest in the entail; Georgiana's continuing rehabilitation; Mary's confusion about Lord Primrose; what's to become of Caroline Bingley. Will she ever learn?

Editing in CHERISHED needs work. Word choice does not fit the context in several places. Slang ("opened up"--to confess, "make it"--to attend a function) and anachronisms ("choreograph," "trek") mar the attempt at Austen's language. Apostrophes in plurals and possessives present usage problems.

Larger problems include no clarification of the Bennet-Collins connection that accounts for the Longbourn entail that makes Collins Mr. Bennet's heir. Characters bear little resemblance to Austen's creations. Shifts in focus between them produce most of the characterization but make for disjointed reading. Often attitudes and behavior are modern rather than Regency. Mr. Bennet promises Lydia a Sweet Sixteen party. Darcy gives Elizabeth a mother's ring, its initial two-stone setting representing the parents with the appropriate birthstone added as each child is born. Child care practices are distinctly non-Regency: every male insists on holding young Amelia Grace Addison Hurst; Mr. Hurst is an active father who changes diapers and gets up in the night with her; she's constantly with the Hursts, who take her along on a shopping trip that ends in a tea shop. Where is her nurse? Several of the men weep in public. Charlotte proposes marriage to two different men within hours of each other. Only Collins, Lady Catherine, and Caroline Bingley show much concern about social status or connections to Trade.

CHERISHED ventures away from Austen into a fairy-tale where every sympathetic female is Cinderella and there are at least two wicked witches. But Johnson's convoluted plot keeps me coming back to see what happens next. (C-)
 
PURSUED is the third installment in Sarah Johnson's Leaving Bennet Behind quartet using the characters from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. I call it an installment because novels, novellas, and short stories almost always contain a resolution of the main story line. PURSUED does not. It was published in digital format in 2015.

Attitudes are modern. Fewer anachronisms intrude. It is unlikely that petunias, native to South America, grow wild in the woods of Dalmeny for Mary and Anne de Bourgh to pick. Editing problems include incorrect and inappropriate word usage (effect-affect; "punished" from the barn), nouns of direct address not set off by commas, and use of superlative (-est) when comparative degree (-er) needed.

Johnson uses Mary Bennet's journal and her musings as the primary means to characterize her. This gives insight, but Mary's constant yo-yo of emotions becomes tedious. She calls herself a cynic about people's acting from self-interest, yet she believes every bit of gossip about Alexander Fitzwilliam she's fed by vengeful females. Alexander Fitzwilliam's acceptance of Mary's wildly fluctuating attitude toward him is masochistic.

~~~SPOILERS~~~

Action in PURSUED is daily slice of life activity of the extended cast of characters. Elizabeth's pregnancy advances uneventfully. Characters change location en masse as occasion warrants. Jane becomes pregnant, and the Bingleys look for an estate near Pemberley. Alexander Fitzwilliam celebrates his thirtieth birthday and assumes management of the Dalmeny estate. He and Mary Bennet marry with the blessings of all the family except Lady Catherine, whose headaches and rages increase. Machinations against the Bennets and the Darcys continue, as does Colonel Fitzwilliam's investigation of the murder of his soldiers. The plotters include Mrs. Younge and the twin sons borne by the wife of Pemberley's steward sired by Sir Lewis de Bourgh, leading the Colonel to suspect the two cases related. Unfortunately, the final installment does not appear to be available, so resolution of the plots must wait.

Maybe I'm becoming more tolerant, but PURSUED reads better than the previous two installments. It's still a long, long way from Austen. (C+)
 
OFF KILTER by Hannah Reed is a generic cozy mystery, a classic example of the genre's template where a heroine, after life-changing events, receives the opportunity for a fresh start in a new locale. There she makes new friends, at least one of whom is attractively male, and becomes involved in some mystery. She may or may not cooperate with the police but, after several incidents dangerous to herself, solves the case. It generally uses first person narration and often "had I but known" foreshadowing.

OFF KILTER's protagonist is Eden Elliott, a 38-year-old would-be romance novelist who's to spend up to six months in the Highlands of Scotland near Inverness in Glenkillen, where she plans to complete her first book. When her new friend Vicki MacBride is suspected of murdering Gavin Mitchell, she inserts herself into the case. Eden is a curious blend of passive and stubborn. She accepts, despite misgivings, her friend Ami's arrangement of the sojourn in Scotland; however, while poking around the Mitchell case, Eden ignores all threats and warnings-off. Eden waffles about Vicki's innocence while trusting that everyone else is what he or she appears and claims to be. She makes unwarranted assumptions, as when she thinks Leith Cameron's reference to "his girl" refers to a girlfriend. She exhibits TSTL behavior, roaming without a cell phone, not telling people her itinerary, driving a car long distances on a sealant-inflated tire.

Other characters are not well defined. Love interest Leith is standard romance stud muffin. Reed tells without showing the attraction between them. An experienced reader may well detect the killer far before Eden. Reed's failure to explain the MacBride family solicitor's role leaves a hole in the conclusion. Despite the Highlands' unique beauty, sense of place is not developed. Scotland seems chosen to allow double entendres about men in kilts.

Two sets of problems in OFF KILTER irritate me. The lesser set is editing. The digital format includes no title page, no table of contents, no copyright information. Reed refers to Vicki MacBride as half-sister (109 and earlier) or stepsister (101 and later) to Kirstine and Alec MacBride. Which? The Whistling Inn is first said to be operated by husband and wife, then by father and daughter. Which? There is at least one error in subject-verb agreement.

The greater problem set involves common sense applied to situations in OFF KILTER. Eden sleeps for an extended period while a fire burns in her en suite bathroom at the inn; smoke is so dense that it pours from her window, yet she suffers no smoke inhalation. She doesn't cough, much less require treatment. When Vicki survives a horrific automobile wreck that leaves her with both legs broken, internal injuries, and partial amnesia, less than 24 hours afterward she is not only conscious but coherent. She's never sedated when Eden sneaks into hospital to question her. The killer fails to destroy the incriminating notes that set up Mitchell's murder, instead tears them up and leaves the pieces where the police can find them. Surely a killer with any smarts would burn the evidence. The biggest improbability has Eden move bales of hay up a narrow flight of barn steps into a hayloft--using no pulley system or hoist, lifting in her hands, carrying upstairs, and stacking multiple bales. Because a standard small hay bale's dimensions are approximately 3x1.5x1.5 feet and it weighs fifty to a hundred pounds depending on the amount of moisture left in the cured hay, and since Eden never claims to be an athlete of any kind, this simply is not realistic. Reed doesn't even give her a pair of gloves to protect her hands from the wire or string binding the hay.

OFF KILTER leaves me unimpressed. (C-)
 
A MATTER OF TIMING is Linda C. Thompson's 2017 novel-length variant on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. It is available in digital format.

When Fitzwilliiam Darcy returns home two days ahead of the Bingley house party, he find Elizabeth Bennet and her relatives Edward and Helen Gardiner touring Pemberley. Anxious to show Elizabeth that he has taken her Hunsford comments to heart, he shows them every courtesy, introduces his sister Georgiana, invites them to Pemberley; he and Elizabeth soon express their regrets over previous behavior and agree to begin anew. They become engaged the next morning, the same morning Elizabeth receives a letter from Jane telling of a serious accident to Mr. Bennet and a second announcing the elopement from Brighton of Lydia with George Wickham. Darcy refuses to allow Elizabeth to end their engagement, and he and the Gardiner party depart for London to recover Lydia. With Elizabeth included to help deal with Lydia, Darcy soon locates the runaways. Lydia is recovered unsullied but disillusioned by Wickham's frank appraisal of her character and behavior, while Wickham is turned over to Colonel Forster for military justice.

When Elizabeth and Darcy return Lydia to Longbourn, they find Jane engaged to Charles Bingley and Mr. Bennet much changed in personality. He angrily refuses consent to Elizabeth's marriage and collapses. He undergoes surgery to relieve pressure on the brain resulting from his riding accident. While the Bennet daughters are in London for Jane and Elizabeth to buy their trousseaus, Mr. Bennet deals with descent on Longbourn by Mr. Collins, who thinks he's already inherited, and Lady Catherine de Bourgh, who thinks she can overawe or bribe Mr. Bennet to end Elizabeth's engagement. Wedding plans for September 6 continue, since Elizabeth comes of age on September 3 and will no longer require her father's approval. The story concludes with the double wedding and the Darcys' return to Pemberley.

A MATTER OF TIMING is one of the more faithful fan fiction adaptations of Pride and Prejudice. Thompson preserves Austen's characters as she wrote them and introduces no new major ones. She fleshes out characters Austen mentions, such as the Earl and Countess of Matlock. Her depiction of Charlotte as a skilled manipulation of Mr. Collins about Mr. Bennet's accident and Darcy's engagement is masterful indirect characterization. It's quite satisfying when Darcy has footmen expel Caroline from Darcy House and Mr. Bennet has Hill and a groom remove Collins and Lady Catherine. That Lydia receives no punishment whatsoever for her scandalous behavior is less than satisfying.

Events in the plot are believable, even if some seem more modern than Regency. Scenes involving all the Bennet sisters and Georgiana discussing the Wickham situation resemble group therapy sessions. Knowledge about closed head injuries and Dr. Lennox's insistence upon sterile surgical conditions seem too early historically. One glaring modern allusion is Darcy with a thin wet white shirt clinging to his manly torso when Elizabeth first sees him at Pemberley--shades of Colin Firth in 1995! On the other hand, Wickham's fate is authentic to the period.

Minor editorial problems include Colonel Forster being called "Foster" on occasion and failure to set off nouns of direct address with a comma. Thompson's use of anachronistic words is not glaring. A few situations are problematical. Given her fondness for Society gossip, would Caroline Bingley miss the newspaper announcement of Darcy's engagement to Elizabeth? Would Wickham respect for ten days Lydia's decision that they not anticipate their wedding vows? The morning after his surgery, would Elizabeth do her hair for the day in her father's sick room in the presence of Mr. Darcy and Dr. Lennox? Would Mr. Bennet recover from surgery so rapidly and totally without impairment?

I recommend A MATTER OF TIMING. The characters remain themselves. The changes in action are realistic and provide enough variety to freshen without changing the main story line. (A-)
 
SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE SOCIETY OF SEVEN is a novella by J. H. Watson, M.D. (the modern transcriptionist's name is not given) based on the characters created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It is a worthy addition to Holmes fan fiction, published in digital format in 2013.

Watson uses the "story within a story" plot device effectively, with Holmes relating the tale of his second case as a professional consulting detective, a failure some five years before his first meeting Watson. Two ships, each carrying artifacts looted from archaeological sites in Tripolitania by minions of the Society of Seven, sink from apparently supernatural causes on the Bodensee (Lake Constance) in front of the castle belonging to the Duke of Wurttemberg, the Society's founder. The first boat was dragged down by a sea monster, the second incinerated by a strange cloud; salvage divers found the most of the antiquities missing from both sunken vessels. Holmes witnessed sinking of the third ship by a pirate ship flying the Jolly Roger but could not explain the occurrences. The Duke is long dead, his personal secretary Oskar Goltzner is prominent in both the Barony of Wurttemberg and the German Imperial government, and now, fifteen years later, Mycroft Holmes recalls Sherlock to the case. Convinced that Goltzner, a member of the Society of Seven, not only set up the robberies and killed his employer but now spies for Germany, Holmes sets a trap for him at St. Ives during a demonstration of naval innovations. He doesn't fail this time.

What's not to like? Watson is faithful to Conan Doyle's characters, showing neat bits of personality too often missing in novella-length stories. When shown a submarine, Watson responds instinctively: "Underwater torpedo-boats?... Bah--work of the Devil, if you ask me, designed for the sole purpose of making sneak attacks, bringing death and destruction, and then slinking away without a fair fight. There's nothing noble in that, and I hope the Royal Navy never sinks to those depths..." Vocabulary, writing style, and plot structure all correspond well with the originals. Explanation of the apparent supernatural elements makes sense.

I enjoy the introduction of Mortimer and Honoria Wimsey, Duke and Duchess of Denver, and their sons Gerald and toddler Peter. Holmes is Peter's godfather and already sees signs of his becoming a great detective. Holmes dealing with Watson's mother-in-law, the formidable Mrs. Morstan, is good fun.

SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE SOCIETY OF SEVEN is one of the best variants on the canon. Highly recommended. (solid A)
 
OUR PARTICULAR FRIEND is Perpetua Langley's variant based on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. It was published in digital format in 2016.

Langley's fundamental change in OUR PARTICULAR FRIEND makes the insult at the Meryton assembly originate with Elizabeth Bennet, who describes Fitzwilliam Darcy, whom she believes to be Charles Bingley, as mediocre and unremarkable looking. He overhears her and takes offense, beginning a cycle of misunderstandings, hurt feelings, thawing relations, and repeated hostile confrontations. She adds several characters, the most important of whom are Miss Mayria Hoppenstack, Caroline Bingley's particular friend from their days at an exclusive boarding school, and Hamish Mackay, Darcy and Bingley's friend who owns Black Heath in Scotland, an estate twice the size of Pemberley. Several individuals are not what they seem, and their machinations generate much of the conflict in the story.

Changes in the protagonists exaggerate their defects. Elizabeth's snap judgements and her readiness to repeat those opinions generate most of the tension between herself and Darcy. She has no filter between her brain and her mouth. After their initial exchange, she seems to look for reasons to despise Darcy, and she's so quick to jump to conclusions that she needs a trampoline. Despite her pride in her ability to read character, she encourages Wickham's derogation of Darcy and is completely taken in by Caroline Bingley's letter. Elizabeth's impulsive outspoken behavior does not change.

Darcy is no better. His high-handed advice to his friends, pride in having eliminated all flaws in his character, coldness and arrogant behavior to "inferiors," and refusal to explain himself make him unappealing. He accepts Elizabeth's accusations to the point of masochism. Darcy flees from Rosings after Elizabeth's furious refusal without understanding or asking what she's talking about. He promises Elizabeth that he will no longer presume to advise his friends, yet when Miss Hoppenstack elopes, Darcy takes over direction of the pursuit, ignoring that her recovery is Bingley's responsibility. His parenting style veers so far from his own father's that he indulges his own children to excess.

Several problems intrude. Mistakes in apostrophes in plurals and possessives and use of modern-sounding expressions (e.g., Mary as a "dark horse in the race" for Mr. Collins, "rake over the coals," "at sixes and sevens") irritate. The epilogue accounts for all the major characters through the second generation. Elizabeth's child-rearing ideas are closer to Dr. Phil than to the Regency period. Common sense says that Mrs. Younge would recognize Miss Hoppenstack's financial status if casual male observer Mackay sees it. Even more unlikely is Wickham's being sent to America, which completely ignores the consequences of his deserting the militia in time of war, the penalty for which was generally death.

Enjoyable elements in OUR PARTICULAR FRIEND include Langley's giving Darcy and Mr. Collins relationships with their respective fathers that explain their adult characters. Mary's reformation of Collins and her management of Lady Catherine is satisfying. Hamish Mackay's Scottish stories are humorous. Most pleasing is the ironic karma that catches up with Wickham, Miss Hoppenstack, and Caroline Bingley.

OUR PARTICULAR FRIEND is a pleasant diversion for a summer's day. (B+)
 
Catriona McPherson's QUIET NEIGHBORS was published in hard cover in 2016. It is a cozy mystery set in Wigtown, Scotand, in a November of the recent past, using limited third person narration as its primary means of characterizing protagonist Jude Hamner. A London librarian who specializes in cataloging, she's forty years old, in shock over the death of her parents in a freak accident, still reeling from the break-up of her marriage to alcoholic EMT Max. On the run from the police Jude returns to Wigtown where, the previous summer, she'd had met Lowland (Lowell) Glen, a kindred spirit who owns the rundown, overstuffed LG Bookstore. He offers her refuge and a job to catalog and arrange the store's contents.

The action includes three subplots. One is Jude's story, Why is she running, visualizing herself behind bars in an orange jump suit? Another belongs to Eddy Preston, nineteen years old and eight-months pregnant, who turns up to claim Lowell as her father; delighted, he accepts her without question, but her stories and actions are so inconsistent that Jude suspects the pregnancy is faked. What is Eddy up to? Why did her mother Miranda conceal Eddy's birth from Lowell all those years and only on her deathbed tell Eddy about him? The third involves Jude's discovery of notes written by Todd Jolly in his books, now in Lowell's shop, notes that indicate a serial killer had murdered four of his elderly neighbors in the mid-1980s. Was Jolly correct, and who's the killer?

The setting is well established with atmospheric detail: "Books. Wavering, tottering piles of books. Brick-stacked towers of books. Woven dykes and leaning spires and threatening landslides of books. Unsorted. Fs upon Bs upon Ns, paperbacks and hardbacks, outsized to Mr. Men, novels and cookbooks and crosswords and plays. Jude snapped her eyes away and faced forward. The passage was perhaps five feet wall to wall; the way through the middle of it, defended by carriers full of books wedged like sandbags into the bulges of more book behind them, was eighteen inches wide and not a squeak more." (3)

QUIET NEIGHBORS fails me on several fronts. One is Jude's drawn-out uncertain situation. She obsesses, paranoid about police pursuit over something involving Max and new spouse Raminder, desperate to know what's happening. Yet she Googles them only once and does not read beyond a "tragic young wife" headline. Her lack of curiosity is matched by her inconsistency. At the same time she's anxious about police and the media finding her, Jude trusts naively, showing up and staying with Lowell after one brief meeting the previous year, believing what she's told with little question, living alone in an isolated cottage in a graveyard without a phone. Jude never gels as a believable person.

May-December love between Jude and Lowell (some 25 years the older) seems more the romantic motif required in the cozy genre than genuine emotion. Early identification of the serial killer should not be difficult for an experienced mystery reader. What bothers me more is the improbable "family by choice" conclusion.

QUIET NEIGHBORS reads as a mechanical construct rather than as an organic story. C)
 
HENRY: TO PROVE HIMSELF WORTHY is the first story in Leenie Brown's new Other Pens series. A sequel using characters from Jane Austen's Mansfield Park, it was published in digital format in 2017.

Henry Crawford, some months following his infamous elopement with Maria Bertram Rushworth, has repented of the deed that cost him any chance to win the hand of Fanny Price. He's spent the interval at Everingham learning the finer points of estate management from his neighbor Trefor Linton and modifying his view of marriage. To regain admittance to polite Society, Crawford decides to change, to make himself a gentleman fit for a gentlewoman to marry and, to that end, asks Constance Linton, Trefor's sister, to mentor him in respectable behavior. Crawford's sister Mary tries to drag him from dull respectability back to their racier Society set.

HENRY: TO PROVE HIMSELF WORTHY is light and appealing. Henry Crawford is the least objectionable of Austen's villains, largely because he has the intelligence and good taste to recognize Fanny Price's superiority to Maria and Julia, her Bertram cousins. He'd shown amendment of his ways under Fanny's influence, so his change is a believable result of his suffering over her loss. His handling of Mary's attempted sabotage of his new life demonstrates his growing maturity and strength of character. Brown uses Crawford's ruminations effectively to convey Regency Society's marriage practices.

New characters are well developed within novella-imposed limits. Crawford's male friends--conscientious Trefor Ltnton and scandalous Charles Edwards--are interesting foils, the standards by which he can measure his evolving self. Constance Linton possesses the intelligence and outspoken personality of Elizabeth Bennet but with higher social status and better connections.

HENRY: TO PROVE HIMSELF WORTHY is a good selection for a lazy afternoon in the shade with a glass of sweet tea. (A-)
 
DEATH OF A NURSE is the thirty-second book in M. C. Beaton's long running Hamish Macbeth series. Set in and around Lochdubh, in Sutherland, Scotland, it chronicles the latest cases solved by the unambitious police sergeant. It was published in 2016.

When he meets sexy Gloria Dainty, the new private duty nurse attending wheelchair-bound Percival Harrison, Macbeth invites her to dinner. She accepts but then does not show up at the restaurant. Four days later, Macbeth and his new constable Charlie Cart, find her dead. She'd been strangled and her body thrown over a cliff at nearby Kinlochbrevie. Confident in Macbeth's ability to solve the murder and eager to bed Charlie, Detective Inspector Fiona Herring uses intimidation and superior connections (she's married to a High Court judge) to oust from the case Macbeth's longtime enemy, Detective Chief Inspector Blair. His vendetta and corruption taint the investigation, which soon shows Gloria Dainty to be a fortune hunter after Harrison, a former drug dealer, and a blackmailer. Three more people die before Macbeth fixes on the murderer, but then that person is also strangled. Who's guilty of each murder, and what is its motive?

DEATH OF A NURSE is a considerable improvement over the previous few Hamish Macbeth books. The plot is reasonable, though the Priscilla Halburton-Smythe secondary story line is tangential at best to the main action, perhaps intended to illuminate Charlie Carter's nature. Macbeth's release of his pet Sonsie, a critically endangered Scottish wildcat, serves the same purpose. My major complaint about the plot involves the motive for Gloria's death--for the murderer to achieve the desired end depends on too many factors outside direct control; in effect, four people die on speculation.

Hamish is consistent with the original, though new facets of personality or elements of growth would refresh. It's long past time for him to find the wife he claims to want. Charlie Carter and DI Herring are believable additions, as is Colonel Halburton-Smythe as Beaton increases his role in the cast. Continuing characters receive further little development; every character ever named as living in or near Lochdubh seems included, whether their role is essential. Beaton adds numerous new characters. Fewer, with more individualization, would be preferable.

While there are occasional bits of atmospheric description, sense of place is average at best. Humor is largely absent, though DCI Blair's schemes to discredit Macbeth recall Wile E. Coyote's pursuit of the Road Runner. DEATH OF A NURSE is much better written than the previous few books. (B)
 
TOO FOND OF STARS is the first in Meg Osborne's Fate and Fortune series of variants on Jane Austen's Persuasion. It was published in digital format in 2017.

Changes to the canon are minor. Captain Frederick Wentworth leaves the Royal Navy and, unable to face the memories of Anne Elliot that would surface if he visited his family who have leased her home Kellynch Hall, goes to Bath. Contemplating his future and determined not to risk his heart again, he is surprised to discover Anne in Bath, where she receives marked attention from William Elliot, heir presumptive to her pompous social-climbing father Sir Walter Elliot. He and Anne soon discover their separation has only deepened their love, and they are soon reconciled.

Characters are as Austen originated, if somewhat sharper. Elizabeth Elliott criticizes Anne to her face, blaming her for everything including the foul weather at Bath; Sir Walter simultaneously deplores Anne's unfashionable dress and resents her least expenditure. Lady Russell persuaded him to oppose the 1806 engagement and, when the Crofts rent Kellynch, maneuvers Anne to Bath to prevent a possible reunion. William Elliot is a speculator trying to gain Royal Navy inside information from Wentworth and Admiral Croft. He clearly means to disrupt any reconciliation between the lovers. Angst is minimal since both Anne and Wentworth are mature enough to confront and to confess their feelings quickly. Anne's ability to confront her godmother directly is encouraging.

Osborne keeps new characters to a minimum, the only additions of importance Samuel Lennox, an invalided officer who'd served under Wentworth, and his caregiving sister Frances. The Musgroves and Wentworth's brother Edward are referred to but not involved. Sense of place is not much developed. That sequels will follow is obvious in the lack of resolution.

TOO FOND OF STARS is refreshingly free of grammatical errors. Anachronistic words are unobtrusive. I noted an occasional need for a comma and a couple of redundancies. My only questions on social customs involve William Elliot's "warm embrace" (Osborne's word choice) of Elizabeth and Anne Elliot on his first arrival at Camden Place and his announcing dinner service at Sir Walter's home as if he were the host.

TOO FOND OF STARS is well written, a quick soothing read, but it is so faithful to the events of the original that I fail to see the need for this "variant" version. (B+)
 
A TEMPORARY PEACE is the second installment of Meg Osborne's Fate and Fortune series of variants on Jane Austen's Persuasion. Its action begins immediately following TOO FOND OF STARS. It was published in digital format in 2017.

Frederick Wentworth lives with the Crofts at Kellynch while Anne Elliot visits her sister Mary Elliot Musgrove at Uppercross Cottage; they plan to marry when the banns are called. They lease nearby Hanford for their first home, Wentworth wanting Anne to be near her family in case he's recalled to active duty if Napoleon returns. William Eliot charms all and sundry. Anne accepts his spin on his actions involving Jane Smith's husband; Wentworth convinces himself that he is misguided in his instinctive distrust of the man. Sir Walter and Elizabeth Elliot return to Kellynch to plan Elizabeth's wedding in the new year to William Elliot. The three Wentworth siblings and their spouses enjoy Christmas together at Hanford.

Characters are faithful to Austen's originals, and A TEMPORARY PEACE introduces no new ones. Seeing the action through Anne and Wentworth's eyes adds to their realism. Their openly expressed feelings and maturity are refreshing. Osborne subtly suggests that William Elliot and Lady Russell still scheme, while the title itself implies that Captain and Mrs. Wentworth face future troubles.

Osborne's plot structure in the Fate and Fortune series is satisfying. Both TOO FOND OF STARS (the lovers' reunion) and A TEMPORARY PEACE (their engagement and wedding) have believable resolutions while the main conflict--what William Elliot is plotting--continues.

Editing problems are minimal. "Shambolic" and "pulling some strings" jar in otherwise formal language. My other complaint is that Osborne often presents events as remembered by Wentworth or Anne, distancing the reader from direct action. A minor caveat, indeed. (A)
 
HERE COMES THE FLOOD is the fourth book in J. J. Salkeld's A Natural Detective series featuring Owen Irvine and the personnel of the Cumbria CID unit headed by DI Andy Hall. It was published in digital format in 2016.

Two investigations make up the action in HERE COMES THE FLOOD. The official case involves PC Kathy Stone and DS Ian Mann trying to discover who looted gold jewelry from four flooded houses in the village. With no physical evidence surviving the flood, no witnesses, and the only suspect firmly alibied, they make no progress. The second investigation is personal. Kathy Stone's sister Sarah has a new boyfriend Darren Capstick, whom Kathy distrusts. To protect her sister, Kathy insists that Owen Irvine check Darren out. When he discovers some £20,000 in cash hidden in Darren's house, Owen agrees that he's a criminal. After Owen rescues him from a knife attack, Darren admits that he locates accommodations in Cumbia for pop-up brothels run by the Russian mafia using Eastern European illegal immigrants.

I give up about sixty percent through HERE COMES THE FLOOD. I lack the emotional stamina to read novels involving human trafficking and the sex trade.

To this point, HERE COMES THE FLOOD does not much impress. Salkeld introduces characters in abundance, many of them tangential to the two story lines, and few much particularized. No new personality traits or back stories freshen the continuing characters. Sense of place, done so well in the earlier stories in the series, is average at best. No grade because not finished.
 
LETTERS FROM THE HEART is a novella written by Rose Fairbanks and based on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. It was published in digital format in 2014.

Events in LETTERS FROM THE HEART begin shortly after Charles Bingley's removal from Netherfield. His friend Fitzwilliam Darcy is miserable, in love with Elizabeth Bennet but constrained by family expectations and her inferior connections from marrying her. To clarify for himself his emotions, he pours out his feelings in a letter which he has no intention to mail; when he realizes that a maid accidentally posted it, he recognizes the compromise to Elizabeth's character by clandestine correspondence from an unmarried man. His honor demands that he preserve her reputation by marrying her. At Longbourn, Elizabeth realizes that, despite Darcy's toplofty behavior, reported bad treatment of George Wickham, and suspected interference between Jane Bennet and Bingley, she loves him. Attempting to understand herself, she examines her feelings about Darcy in a letter that is also mailed by mistake. The letters cross en route and, each assured of the other's love, Elizabeth and Darcy are soon happily engaged.

Problems include use of titles, especially in informal direct address, and a mistake in dating. Except for the one brief expository flashback, the action is chronological. The story opens on 10 December, flashes back to Monday, 9 December, returns to 10 December through chapter 6, then dates chapter 7 Wednesday, 7 December; chapter 8 begins Wednesday, 11 December.

~~~POSSIBLE SPOILERS~~~

. Changes to the plot in LETTERS FROM THE HEART include its shortened period. Darcy and Bingley return to Netherfield within a few days of their leaving. The action covers 9-19 December 1811, with an epilogue dated 11 December 1812. Angst and family opposition are minimal. Action is told, not shown, and the epilogue gives everyone (except Wickham) a happy ending.

Characters are more modern than Regency. When a wife referred in public to her husband as "Mr. Whoever," the unmarried Elizabeth and Darcy use terms of endearment. Most speak freely about their feelings, with Georgiana telling Bingley and Lydia about her planned elopement with Wckham. The Fitzwilliams are much taken with the Gardiner family despite the social class differences. Complaints include addition of the Darcy siblings' Fitzwilliam cousins who serve no purpose in the plot and the marriage of Colonel Fitzwilliam to Caroline Bingley. Change in both Caroline and Lydia Bennet is too sudden and complete to be believable, especially since Fairbanks gives no indirect characterization as support.

Though nothing much is wrong with LETTERS FROM THE HEART, it's dull as ditch water. Time rereading the original is better spent. (C)
 
MURDER AT THE FLOOD is the ninth in Bruce Beckham's police procedural series set in the English Lakes District of Cumbria, featuring Detective Inspector Daniel Skelgill. It was published in digital format in 2017.

After massive rains, the county is beset by widespread flooding that does tremendous damage, though Skelgill in his fishing boat, other volunteers, and rescue workers remove the stranded without apparent loss of human life. Then Maeve Alcock reports her husband missing. A world-class kayaker and half-owner of River Nation, a company that sells outfitting and organizes outdoor experiences, Roger Alcock received a telephone call from partner Nick Bridgewater that prompted him to kayak the swollen Cockermouth River to their flooded shop in the village. Four days later, a fisherman finds his kayak on the Solway coast near Flimby, and a dog walker finds his body on the coast near Maryport, some two miles farther north. The kayak is holed; he wears no wetsuit, and his life jacket is not inflated because its carbon dioxide cylinder had been empty. What was so important at the shop that Alcock set off under extremely dangerous flood conditions without adequately equipping himself? Is he a flood or a murder victim?

Having read thirty percent of MURDER AT THE FLOOD, I give up. No new insights enliven any of the continuing characters. Events unfold from Skelgill's viewpoint, but Beckham qualifies everything to cast doubt about Skelgill's perceptions: "seems rather exasperated," "indicative of some vicarious journey, perhaps," "a considerate gesture, perhaps too blatant." This ambiguity reflects an unreliable narrator: "...he does not seem to be too upset by the matter. Whether it was a kind of reserve that has been instilled in him--or if he is trying to make light of a dismal predicament--it is hard to judge. Notwithstanding, Skelgill seems a little puzzled by the explanation." Consistent use of present tense verbs irritate rather than convey immediacy of action.

Easily the strongest element in the story is the sense of place. This, however, is insufficient because nothing in plot or characters piques my interest. Like Rhett Butler, I frankly don't give a damn. No grade because not finished.
 
PROPERLY HUMBLED is April Floyd's 2017 variant on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. It is available in digital format.

The story opens with Jane and Elizabeth Bennet\ visiting the Gardiners some months after the removal of the Bingley party from Netherfield. Jane's acquaintance is dropped by the Bingley sisters, forcing her to conclude from his acquiescence to them that Charles Bingley is not the man she'd thought. Elizabeth, furious with Darcy's perceived interference between Bingley and her sister and his treatment of George Wickham, journeys to Hunsford to visit her friend Charlotte Lucas Collins. Surprised by the arrival of Darcy and his cousin Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam, then by Darcy's botched proposal, she gives him a furious refusal. Charlotte enlightens Elizabeth about George Wickham and convinces her that she owes Darcy an apology and, knowing of Elizabeth's attraction, acceptance. Meanwhile, Anne de Bourgh overhears her male cousins discussing the proposal; determined to reconcile Elizabeth and Darcy, she drives her gig to the parsonage to fetch Elizabeth. En route to Rosings, the horse is spooked, the gig wrecked, and both women injured. Lady Catherine tries to refuse the unconscious Elizabeth admittance to Rosings, but Darcy commands her care and summons his own personal physician from London to treat both patients. He also calls to Rosings Jane to nurse Elizabeth and the Fitzwilliam family to comfort and distract Lady Catherine. As the patients recuperate and Elizabeth slowly recovers her memory of the accident, love blooms despite the older women's opposition. The epilogue reveals a magnificent triple wedding in the gardens at Pemberley.

PROPERLY HUMBLED is a well-written variant of the Austen original. There are no noticeable anachronisms and only the common editing problem of apostrophes in plural and possessive names. Though somewhat more modern than Regency, characters are faithful to the original. Changes in the action add believable problems that reveal their personalities. Floyd adds few new characters beyond Dr. Harry Green and James Fitzwilliam, the Colonel's older brother; she develops Lady Matlock but minimizes the roles of the Collinses, the Bingleys, and the Gardiners. Geoge Wickham is only alluded to. Angst is minimal and realistic. My only reservation is newlyweds Elizabeth and Darcy consummating their marriage in the carriage carrying them toward their honeymoon--TMI, by far. (A)
 
THE SINS OF THE OLD FELLAS is the seventh book in J. J. Salkeld's A Natural Detective Series set in and around Kendal, in Cumbria. It features Sergeant Kathy Stone, farmer Owen Irvine, and members of the Kendal CID. It was published in digital format in September 2017.

THE SINS OF THE OLD FELLAS is unusual in that it does not involve murder. Instead, Kathy Stone works a high-profile case involving three generations of Tree males; some fifteen years before, Irvine lost his police career when he assaulted the Trees when he caught them poaching his stretch of river. There's no doubt in Kathy's mind that Derek Tree organizes hare coursing and videos it for on-line betting, but she has no physical evidence and no witnesses. DS Ian Mann of the Kendal CID works a case in which Craig Ennis Junior and Senior burglarize warehouses, fourteen-year-old Craig Junior entering through the roof and opening the doors for his father. Mann warms him that modern replacement roofs will not support his weight, but Craig Senior disastrously persuades him otherwise. Owen Irvine goes undercover to identify the poachers who steal pearl mussels worth thousands of pounds from the River Kent, including two beds of adult mussels from his own stretch.

Salkeld is back on form in THE SINS OF THE OLD FELLAS. The cast of characters is small, concentrating on Stone, Irvine, and Ian Mann, Abla Khan, and Sandy Smith of the Cumbria Constabulary. Shifts in focus between the protagonists reveal personalities. All are individual, engaged in personal and professional relationships that lend verisimilitude. My favorite is DS Ian Mann: "He'd get Craig Ennis, and he'd make him pay for what he'd done, if it took him the rest of his career. Ian Mann was a man who liked an aim in life, a clear objective, and, as of that moment, the arrest and conviction of Craig Ennis Senior became that mission. It might take a bit of time, and a bit of patience, but it would be worth it." Even the villains are well-developed.

The action moves briskly, authentic in the restrictions on police work imposed by cuts in personnel and budgets. Finding evidence and solving cases result from teamwork, not lone-wolf grandstanding. Though police arrest five members of the mussel-poaching operation, the conclusion implies that the case is far from over for Irvine. Sense of place is good, as is editing.

I recommend THE SINS OF THE OLD FELLAS. (A-}
 
THE CRAWFORDS OF MANSFIELD is Paul L. Adams's variation on Jane Austen's Mansfield Park that retells the story focusing on Mary and Henry Crawford. They are younger half-siblings of Mrs. Grant, wife to the vicar of Mansfield parish. It is available in digital format. I discovered no publication date.

I give up at sixteen percent, the end of chapter seven. I am unimpressed. THE CRAWFORDS OF MANSFIELD to this point is an unchanged repeat of events in the original. Minutia such as the step by step process of Edward Bertram teaching Mary Crawford to ride bog down the action. Since the Mansfield party has only completed its visit to Sotherton, most of Austen's plot has yet to be touched.

Introduction of the inhabitants of Mansfield Park by having Mrs. Grant describe them to Mary is clumsy. Characters are faithful to Austen but with exaggerated traits. Adams's Fanny Price is more gormless, yet only she sees beyond surfaces to real personae. Edmund Bertram observes Mary Crawford then willfully deludes himself about her nature. Mary Crawford is wealthy, elegant and lovely, corrupted by Society values, and totally self-absorbed. Her casual preemption of Fanny's horse, even though she knows that Fanny must ride to maintain her health, reveals Mary's disregard for others. Henry Crawford, not just careless in his actions toward the Bertram sisters, consciously sets them in competition for his favor; he savors seducing Maria Bertram in the presence her fiance Mr. Rushworth. None are appealing.

Editing problems abound. I almost quit at the title page that names the book THE CRAWFORD'S [sic] OF MANSFIELD. This forming of plural names--the Bertrams, the Grants, the Crawfords--by adding 's to the singular name is consistent. Comma placement with clauses, phrases, and nouns of direct address often errs. Quotation marks do not always accurately demarcate conversations. Whether lack of paragraphing comes from Adams's writing style or digital formatting is impossible to say. Sentences may be convoluted: "The persona of the musical performer, at her vocation, was an image complete." Enough already!

No grade because not finished.
 
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