Pride, Prejudice, and Peril
Series: A Jane Austen Tea Society Mystery Book #1
Author: Katie Oliver
Publisher: Berkley Prime Crime
Page Count: 320
My Rating:
Book Summary
Jane Austen meets reality TV and murder in this quirky cozy mystery—the first in a new series!
Phaedra Brighton is perfectly content with her life of lecturing college students, gossiping with her best friends, and dreaming of Mr. Darcy. As a young, respected (if somewhat peculiar) English professor, her expertise lies in all things Jane Austen—but she knows that the closest she’ll ever get to being a real-life Elizabeth Bennet is in her dreams.
When Who Wants to Marry Mr. Darcy, a new reality TV show, starts filming at her best friend Charlene’s estate, Phaedra is intrigued. And when the producer asks her to lend her Austenian knowledge as a consultant on the show, she’s over the moon. But on the first day of filming, when Charlene’s new husband is found electrocuted and Charlene herself is accused of the crime, Phaedra comes crashing back to reality.
With murder on the syllabus and her best friend in dire straits, there’s no Mr. Darcy around to help Phaedra—she’ll have to get to the bottom of this mystery herself.
More Facts for Readers about our Sleuth & Setting:
Main Sleuth: Phaedra Brighton
Best friends (sort of): Lucy Liang and Marisol DuBois
Physical Description: Phaedra is white, either late twenties or early thirties and her appearance is a mirror of the famous Jane Austen character, Elizabeth Bennett.
Location: Laurel Springs, Virginia
Profession: Jane Austen scholar who teaches nineteenth century literature at Somerset University, a small liberal arts college.
Time of Year: Spring
Pet: Himalayan Cat name Whickham “Wicks”
Love Interest: Possibly Mark Selden, but she’s pretty put off by the idea of dating.
Family: Phaedra has a younger sister, a mom, dad (married), and Aunt.
Diversity? Yes! While most characters seems to be white, there is some diversity in culture and physicality. Lucy Liang is Asian (she’s adopted so I think we’ll learn more about her ancestry in the 3rd book), Marisol is plus-size and respectfully described and handled as a character, Mark Selden is white but he’s from England so it’s nice to not have all Americans, especially given the Jane Austen theme, Detective Morelli is described as being from an Italian family although he himself is American.
My Review
I was really excited to delve into ‘Pride, Prejudice, and Peril’ by Katie Oliver when I found it because I’m one of those girlies who has read Pride & Prejudice and has watched every version of of the film adaptations (several times) – it’s a comfort go-to, so to find a cozy that combines my love of that story with a murder mystery aspect – I was sold! Unfortunately I had to give this book 3 stars because it fell short in some areas. So let’s start with the negatives;
- The main sleuth Phaedra was really back and forth about her romantic interest. It’s ok not to have one in a cozy mystery! But to she was really hot and cold on the idea and it became annoying while reading. I don’t mind a slow burn, or even an enemies-to-lovers, but this was all over the place, and her character was pretty irrational and reacted in an out-of-line kind of way toward what I *think* is supposed to be the Mr. Darcy romantic interest. She just kind of seemed like a nutjob who was being mean to a relative stranger who didn’t do anything wrong to her.
- Phaedra’s age isn’t clearly stated at any point in the novel, a move that I think the author intended to make her more ambiguous for readers. She could be somewhere in her twenties or thirties – but the author definitely should have just stated her age BECAUSE of a very good reason – the sleuth’s last romantic relationship was from high school and she was bitter because she got ditched a prom, and she never dated again after that experience and wanted nothing to do with men – talk about weird and kind of icky. No offense to the author (if she was drawing from her own experiences) but to be a “spinster” who was that jaded from an old teenager romance (sexless from the sounds of it) is just really odd these days. Again! No disrespect to folks who decide to abstain and then just never couple-up, but the Phaedra character seemed kind of obsessed about it and made it part of her personality. I found myself rolling my eyes and thinking ‘get over it, and move on’ the whole time I was reading.
- The actual ‘Jane Austen Tea Society’ aspect of the book was virtually non-existent. Phaedra and her friends met once and started talking about the murder and going over clues, but didn’t revisit it.
- There was less of a Jane Austen vibe throughout the novel than I would have expected (or preferred).
Overall I think there was too much being introduce and established, which took away from the actual murder mystery aspect of the story. The whole thing was improbable, with characters acting a a bit ‘too much’ off the rip like caricatures. I know it’s a fictional story, but even within the realm of fiction there is a sense of what does and doesn’t make sense. I wish the author had scaled back all of the introductions and establishments to save some of that for later on in subsequent novels.
But there are some fun elements here! The main sleuth, Phaedra, wears regency clothes even in a modern setting to go along with her career (which is really fun to visualize while reading), there are nice side characters and a fun mystery at the center. It’s just that Phaedra is a little too off the cuff with her reactions and the things she says, making her pretty unlikable.
