Lydia Bennet's Blog

Lydia Bennet's Blog - the real story of Pride and Prejudice by Valerie Laws

A FB friend posted that she'd just bought this, and intrigued, I went off to Amazon to have a look at it. It's a self published Kindle book. I loved the idea so bought it, and read it immediately.

If ever a self-pubbed book deserved wider recognition it's this one. Brilliantly laugh-out-loud funny, very clever, and such a great idea you wonder why no one thought of it before. Basically it tells the story of P&P from Lydia's viewpoint - remember her, she's the youngest sister who runs off with the tasty Captain Wickham - but using modern-day teenspeak. ('Blog' is short for Buddies Log, where buddies is a corruption of rosebuds - Lydia's friends. We're to imagine she's writing these blog updates and posting them to her mates.)

The writer had to jump through a few hoops to make sure Lydia was there, or overhearing, or was informed of, all the main events of P&P because of course, the Lizzie/Darcy (or Arsey as Lydia calls him, snigger) and Jane/Bingley stories have to be told. So Lydia spends a fair amount of time listening at keyholes or hiding in the shrubbery, or mobilising her network of spies. But it works - it works all the way through, and because you know what all the outcomes are it's even better.

Lydia is such a great character, and the author of this novel has really brought her out. Thoroughly recommended, especially if you're an Austen fan!