recommend – Carwicky

‘Death comes to Pemberly… This is the story of how I died… Who am I? I’m Denny… What do you mean ‘Denny who?’? You know… Lydia said my name once – no? Okay, so I told Elizabeth that Wickham wasn’t coming to the Netherfield ball because of a certain person…? Yeah, that Denny!’

Latimer: Okay admission time, I have a major addiction to Pride and Prejudice (P&P).

Yup…! I also have a minor addiction to Pride and Prejudice variations and sequels.. ahem, yes…

Basically these (variations really) are self-published stories where people use the P&P the storyline but tweek it; for example, say there’s a storm after Darcy proposes to Elizabeth for the first time and he gets stranded at the parsonage and the story just continues onward, with parts changing due to that incident… yup.

The reason I like them, is because I love Darcy and Elizabeth. As long as Darcy and Elizabeth fall in love, then it’s all good.

My love of all things P&P meant I was really happy to see a three-part drama, ‘Death comes to Pemberly’ advertised on BBC over Christmas. It’s a P&P sequel (not quite a variation, but someone’s take on ‘what happened next’). It’s a murder mystery story. We meet the characters six years after P&P. Darcy and Elizabeth are hosting the annual Pemberly ball and Wickham and Lydia (not actually invited) arrive in Pemberly causing all sorts of trouble.

On the way to Pemberly, Wickham and Corporal Denny (Denny NOoo!) have a fight in the carriage as it clip-clops through Pemberly forest. Denny jumps out of the carriage and angrily storms into the forest, Wickham following after him. Denny is then found dead in the woods with Wickham as the prime suspect.

These were roughly my thoughts on watching the series…

Denny… Denny… who… oh yeah, Denny… *ahem, yes of course*
Wickham, you are a perpetual arsehole!
Lydia… the impossible girl, ha

The Impossible Lydia... see what I did there! — The Impossible Lydia… see what I did there!

Why does Elizabeth continue to call Mr Darcy… ‘Darcy’? Not even Mr Darcy, just Darcy… hmm.
Is their son, young Fitzwilliam (original) going to speak at all in this? (no not really)
Matthew Rhys is a fine Mr Darcy (and a fine Russian spy – when is The American’s starting back?!)
Miss Elizabeth doesn’t have very many gowns considering Darcy’s 10,000 a year, what’s going on?
Someone online said; “why is Elizabeth wearing a Georgian shoe buckle in her hair?”, now all I can see is a shoe buckle every time she turns around!
Out loud I’m saying; “Mr Darcy don’t go being an arsehole again and ruining your relationship with Elizabeth (again)!”; (in my head though: “Mwhaha, yesss, be an arsehole again, hehe… excellent…”)
There’s some fan-service, which would have made Austen blush *hehe*
Ah, it’s over, what can we watch now?

This was a fun period drama that fills the period drama void!

I love the BBC P&P with Colin Firth (its epic)… but you know *whispering for fear of being attacked by inner fan-girl*… it might now be time for the BBC to make another adaptation of P&P!

There is always room in the world for another …. always!

We are fan-girls – we get obsessed about anything and everything, very quickly… it’s a curse and gift (sort’a!) that we both share!

When we find something we love, we stand up on virtual rooftops and scream – “watch this! go here! eat this! love this! listen to this! read this!”

We have so many obsessions, big, small, wonderful, weird,… weirder. We accumulate new ones by the month! Like hoarders.

We give an RSA (Ridley Stamp of Approval) or an LSA (Latimer Stamp of Approval) to the things we like best – if one of us gives one, then the other knows it’s something is good!

One of us will ask; “Ah, but does it have an R/LSA?” 🙂

We’ve decided to share one of our R/LSA’s each and every month!

Yes, welcome to *drum roll* —- THING OF THE MONTH! (*boom*)

Latimer’s LSA: For me, it’s a book series!

You know how it goes; you find a series of books you love and you just devour it like it’s chocolate – you ride the book high. And you feel awesome! (that was me, I found a series that had me riding that high!).

That series is The Seven Realms by Cinda Chima Williams (4 books total – I like a good sized series me!). It was recommended by mseregon (who mentioned it on deviantart)!

The Seven Realms series - soooo pretty, neh? — The Seven Realms series – soooo pretty, neh?

I’d never heard of it before! So I owe mseregon so much!

The Seven Realms is a good old-fashioned pure fantasy series. It has been a while for me, a long while, since I stepped back into that world!

It made me want to seek out the Belgariad series (by David Eddings)!

I read it so long ago, I hardly remember it – but I remember that I loved it (if that makes any sense!). It’s in my attic somewhere – I went looking, but I had to fight a bird and a massive spider up there, so I got freaked out and ran away screaming!

Anyways, The Seven Realms is a great fun, high-fantasy series, with magic, adventure, romance and mystery! Ah, but beware, with great joy comes sadness – when it ends… argh, you hit the book-low!

Yep, you know the feeling, the ‘what now?!’.

It’s chasing the dragon and getting burned.

Hopefully, by sharing this series, someone will recommend me a new one! But please, chase this dragon… it’s worth the burn!

Ridley’s RSA: My thing of the month isn’t as impressive as Lat’s, I didn’t have a dragon chasing experience, though I plan on it soon as she passes on that series she’s just finished (I know they’ve been bagged up and they’re just now waiting for my grubby hands to get on them, haha).

It has a serious LSA attached, so I’m really looking forward to delving deep and not coming up for air until I’ve devoured each book and have slumped over in a fit of depression where I fully believe that nothing else will ever top them. You know how it is. 🙂

This month I started a new comic book series, Fables. It was not in any way what I expected. Basically all the well known characters from our fairy tales (Snow White, Prince Charming, Red Riding Hood etc) have all been driven out of their magical lands and they’re currently etching out a life in New York city. As you’re a child when you read these stories, I came to the series (without realising I was doing this though) expecting it to be a little like the fairy tales of old, I thought it would be quite light-hearted, little childish, maybe just a new take on the old stories. I was quite wrong. It’s very much for adults, where in the opening pages there is an apartment trashed and covered in blood, then there’s Prince Charming seducing a waitress into paying for his restaurant bill and bringing her home for the night and the Big Bad wolf is an old school smoking Columbo like detective who has a serious crush on Snow White (can you tell I’m already rooting for them to get together?? 😀 ).

It’s an absolutely massive series with something like 133 issues, which is both fantastic – knowing I’ve so much I can work through – but daunting at the same time.

My one gripe with this new reading genre that Latimer and I are trying to break into (she’s doing such a better job of it than I am too!) would be how quickly you go through a comic, I read volume one of Fables in one sitting, so then you’re left sitting there wanting more. With a book you can just sink your teeth into it, and then when you’re left waiting for a sequel you know when you get it, it’s going to be enough to slake your thirst, you’ll get to find out what happens to the characters. Though I suppose the exact same could be said for manga and I still love those too!

We’d love to hear your Thing of the Month, here in the comments, or if you want to post one to your blog – maybe we could make a chain of fan-girls sharing fandoms!

As hoarders we love to collect new obsessions! Hopefully we’ve given you some fun things to check out too! 😀