Billie Piper in a Jane Austen Drama, with Mummies
Or
Mansfield Park and Mummies:
Monster Mayhem, Matrimony,
Ancient Curses, True Love,
and Other Dire Delights
by Jane Austen and Vera Nazarian
Heer in peekturs:
* ** ***
Really wanted to write this recommendation earlier, since I got this book for Christmas, which was really a brilliant present for, haha, a new mummy. Also, I was in no way biased toward the book when I read it (ahemhem). It was the first week of January when I found some time for it (while Jason was still home helping with the baby) and I tore through it, giggling many times along the way, with some loud "a-HA!"s. Few books I've read have played so perfectly like a cinematic experience in my head, and this one stands among them. Yet the depth of the writing still went beyond comedic storytelling (astounding for a book written within a month, if I'm not mistaken). The lead character of Fanny Price is handled with a lot of love and sensitivity (even if she has a bad case of chronic stickupbutt-itis by anyone's standards), and the narrator's voice, well, that alone is worth the price of the book. Other monsters (mummies aren't the half of it) added juicy, unexpected dimensions to the story that surprised in just how well they fit--the end result? I wanted more stories set in this strange world, especially featuring some of the other characters!
Most people are likely to approach Jane Austen's work with some prior experience, positive or negative, even neutral. But I'm certain one doesn't need to be an Austen fan to enjoy MPAM. (I don't really count myself as one, since my response was indifference when I read her in my early teens. I had written her works off as pure romance, but I've seen many readers point out the satire in them. It might have gone over my head then--but not this time or in this version!) My enjoyment of MPAM was greatly magnified for having a good idea of the characters and original story, if only thanks to BBC television (or, er, YouTube). I'll confess I'm partial to screen adaptations of Austen's work--they're always guaranteed soothing entertainment; only minor disasters, and visual cotton candy galore: lovely countrysides, cute guys, quaint costumes and cleavage. What's not to love? And I'd say these adaptations are so ubiquitous as to lend readers good visuals for their own imagining when they're reading Austen. In this monsterized Python-esque take of her work, it's a rollicking mash-up of those, The Mummy movies, and Interview with A Vampire--but good.
So anyway, Rose TylerSally Lockhart Billie Piper was in my headspace while reading this, and the only thing that would have made it better was somehow getting an anachronistic BFG into her hands ala some scifi series season finale. Deftly as this was written, I don't think even Vera could have managed that, but that image is still stuck in my head. And if you get this book and read it, I know you'll have quite the party in yours too. This book is truckloads of fun.
Last note: I have not read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, or Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, and browsing the reviews online I doubt I'll get to those--I'd suspected, and various reviews confirm, that MPAM is the best Austen mash-up among the three books to date (Northanger Abbey and Angels and Dragons is due out May 2010). If you need further convincing, know that ordering this book means you'll be supporting a small press, run by Vera Nazarian (norilana) herself, and she could use the financial support--not that this book doesn't more than stand up on its own merits! Do not eat or drink while reading this book, even if you think you're a seasoned reader. The appendices will slay you.
* Does not the first photo make Jane Austen look bad-ass? And no, I don't know where the second photo came from.
** I hope you like footnotes.
*** I hope you really like footnotes. ****
**** I'm calling this one a footsie-note, just because I can.
Mansfield Park and Mummies:
Monster Mayhem, Matrimony,
Ancient Curses, True Love,
and Other Dire Delights
by Jane Austen and Vera Nazarian
Heer in peekturs:
* ** ***
Really wanted to write this recommendation earlier, since I got this book for Christmas, which was really a brilliant present for, haha, a new mummy. Also, I was in no way biased toward the book when I read it (ahemhem). It was the first week of January when I found some time for it (while Jason was still home helping with the baby) and I tore through it, giggling many times along the way, with some loud "a-HA!"s. Few books I've read have played so perfectly like a cinematic experience in my head, and this one stands among them. Yet the depth of the writing still went beyond comedic storytelling (astounding for a book written within a month, if I'm not mistaken). The lead character of Fanny Price is handled with a lot of love and sensitivity (even if she has a bad case of chronic stickupbutt-itis by anyone's standards), and the narrator's voice, well, that alone is worth the price of the book. Other monsters (mummies aren't the half of it) added juicy, unexpected dimensions to the story that surprised in just how well they fit--the end result? I wanted more stories set in this strange world, especially featuring some of the other characters!
Most people are likely to approach Jane Austen's work with some prior experience, positive or negative, even neutral. But I'm certain one doesn't need to be an Austen fan to enjoy MPAM. (I don't really count myself as one, since my response was indifference when I read her in my early teens. I had written her works off as pure romance, but I've seen many readers point out the satire in them. It might have gone over my head then--but not this time or in this version!) My enjoyment of MPAM was greatly magnified for having a good idea of the characters and original story, if only thanks to BBC television (or, er, YouTube). I'll confess I'm partial to screen adaptations of Austen's work--they're always guaranteed soothing entertainment; only minor disasters, and visual cotton candy galore: lovely countrysides, cute guys, quaint costumes and cleavage. What's not to love? And I'd say these adaptations are so ubiquitous as to lend readers good visuals for their own imagining when they're reading Austen. In this monsterized Python-esque take of her work, it's a rollicking mash-up of those, The Mummy movies, and Interview with A Vampire--but good.
So anyway, Rose TylerSally Lockhart Billie Piper was in my headspace while reading this, and the only thing that would have made it better was somehow getting an anachronistic BFG into her hands ala some scifi series season finale. Deftly as this was written, I don't think even Vera could have managed that, but that image is still stuck in my head. And if you get this book and read it, I know you'll have quite the party in yours too. This book is truckloads of fun.
Last note: I have not read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, or Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, and browsing the reviews online I doubt I'll get to those--I'd suspected, and various reviews confirm, that MPAM is the best Austen mash-up among the three books to date (Northanger Abbey and Angels and Dragons is due out May 2010). If you need further convincing, know that ordering this book means you'll be supporting a small press, run by Vera Nazarian (norilana) herself, and she could use the financial support--not that this book doesn't more than stand up on its own merits! Do not eat or drink while reading this book, even if you think you're a seasoned reader. The appendices will slay you.
* Does not the first photo make Jane Austen look bad-ass? And no, I don't know where the second photo came from.
** I hope you like footnotes.
*** I hope you really like footnotes. ****
**** I'm calling this one a footsie-note, just because I can.