I love reading Pride and Prejudice continuations. This was very enjoyable. ( )

Not a bad Regency romance. However I am never comfortable with authors who use other authors works/characters to make sales. ( )

I felt like this took a very weird turn somewhere. It's not that I didn't like it, more that it certainly didn't have the Jane Austen feel to it. It was still a pretty entertaining read though. ( )

The Exploits and Adventures of Miss Alethea Darcy by Elizabeth Aston is the second book in her historical romance series that is based on the Darcy’s, a well known name from Jane Austin’s Pride and Prejudice. I can assure you however, that these books will not bring Jane Austin to mind as other than character names they are quite different. Unfortunately instead of the charm that I found in the first book of the series, I found this story to be quite tedious.

The story jumps all over Europe as Alethea escapes her pervert of a husband, She and her maid disguise themselves as young men and flee to the continent to find sanctuary with one of her sisters. Along the way they fall into the company of Titus Manningtree, who sees through her disguise and also deduces exactly who she is. Impressed by Alethea’s courage and pluck he watches out of her and eventually ensures she returns safely to England without a scandal breaking out. Eventually, her wicked husband is removed from the picture and these two are then free to declare their love for each other.

I have a soft spot for good historical romance, but this book was over-written, over plotted and just plain unbelievable. I will not be continuing with the series as all this mediocre read did for me was make me wish that I had plucked a Georgette Heyer novel from the shelf instead. ( )

Okay, first off...it's not Jane Austen, not in any way whatsoever. But it is a fun, extravagant, appealing bit of regency fluff. And as such, because it did entertain me greatly, worthy of those four stars above. I think Austen fan fic that doesn't really have her major characters in it works better. Or maybe my weary mind was ready for something thoroughly ridiculously diverting. At any rate, I did enjoy this. ( )