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A review by caaleros
The Murder of Mr. Wickham by Claudia Gray
3.0
“The Murder of Mr. Wickham” is a hard book to review and I really wish I could give it a higher rating because there were aspects of it that I loved. The beginning of the book is amazing and it is immediately evident that Lady Gray really gets these characters. There are plenty of moments throughout the book where a character will do/say/think something and it will feel like what that Austen character would do in that moment. I really wished that everything could be nice and that we could all enjoy the nice house party where our beloved characters all interacted. Alas, that was not to be because of the villainous Mr. Wickham.
There are lots of twists and turns and connections that I loved, but ultimately I did not care who killed Wickham. I was not invested in the investigation and I wasn’t invested in the investigators: Juliet Tilney and Jonathan Darcy. I really just wanted a happy moment with characters that I loved to appear on the page! But that wasn’t possible because of plot. And the longer tensions raised amongst the characters, the less like the characters they seemed, but it’s fair to say we’ve never seen Austen’s characters in this type of situation and so it’s natural that they wouldn’t seem themselves. That being said, it was interesting to see each couple work through the problems that arose. Speaking of couples... I wouldn't recommend this to die-hard Fanny/Edmund shippers as they're not shown in a good light.
I normally avoid sequels like this because I worry that it will ruin my view of the characters, but in this case I mostly liked Gray’s version of the characters and it was the mystery I found to be lacking. If you’re a Janeite I do think “The Murder of Mr. Wickham” is worth reading because there are definitely some gems in this book for fans of Miss Jane Austen.
*Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing this E-ARC in exchange for an honest review.
There are lots of twists and turns and connections that I loved, but ultimately I did not care who killed Wickham. I was not invested in the investigation and I wasn’t invested in the investigators: Juliet Tilney and Jonathan Darcy. I really just wanted a happy moment with characters that I loved to appear on the page! But that wasn’t possible because of plot. And the longer tensions raised amongst the characters, the less like the characters they seemed, but it’s fair to say we’ve never seen Austen’s characters in this type of situation and so it’s natural that they wouldn’t seem themselves. That being said, it was interesting to see each couple work through the problems that arose. Speaking of couples... I wouldn't recommend this to die-hard Fanny/Edmund shippers as they're not shown in a good light.
I normally avoid sequels like this because I worry that it will ruin my view of the characters, but in this case I mostly liked Gray’s version of the characters and it was the mystery I found to be lacking. If you’re a Janeite I do think “The Murder of Mr. Wickham” is worth reading because there are definitely some gems in this book for fans of Miss Jane Austen.
*Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing this E-ARC in exchange for an honest review.