Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monstersby Ben H. Winters and Jane Austen
What is it about:
As our story opens, the Dashwood sisters are evicted from their childhood home and sent to live on a mysterious island full of savage creatures and dark secrets. While sensible Elinor falls in love with Edward Ferrars, her romantic sister Marianne is courted by both the handsome Willoughby and the hideous man-monster Colonel Brandon. Can the Dashwood sisters triumph over meddlesome matriarchs and unscrupulous rogues to find true love? Or will they fall prey to the tentacles that are forever snapping at their heels?
What did I think of it:
You may know by now that I enjoy reading mash-ups where classic stories are given a paranormal edge by adding zombies, werewolves and what not.
Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters is a worthy addition to my growing collection of mash-up books I think.
Winters does a great job adding tentacles, sea monsters and other fishy things to Austen's story about a mother and her three daughters. I really enjoyed the extra adventure and drama Winters contributed and I will confess I think Winters does an even better job of fitting his text to the original as Grahame-Smith did with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.
What I did have trouble with is Austen's original story. I will confess the romance in this book doesn't make sense to me at all! I had two favorite characters and I really felt sorry for them by the end of the book as both were matched with people I think didn't deserve them. (And yes: I checked the original story and there it didn't make sense to me either.)
All in all a very enjoyable mash-up with a disappointing romance.
Why should you read it:
It's got tentacles and sea monsters!!
6 comments:
Tentacles and sea monsters are good enough for me, lol
I've got this one set aside to read, love those mash-ups :D
And the cover!!!
I love the original story! Including the ending, with who everybody ended up with.
But I definitely get what you mean with it, though - that's how I always feel at the end of Pretty In Pink. I always think Andie picks the wrong guy and it makes me so frustrated!
Anyway, I really enjoyed this book, too. :)
http://jaimeliredeslivres.blogspot.com/2011/10/sense-and-sensibility-and-sea-monsters.html
Sounds awesome! This one has been only bookshelf for a while, but I haven't gotten around to reading it yet.
Thanks for your comments everyone.
And I agree about Pretty in Pink
S&S isn't my favorite Austen novel, but I did enjoy it. I didn't like the addition of the sea monsters, so I made it only halfway through this one. Sounds like you enjoyed it for the most part, though.
+JMJ+
The reason I haven't got around to this yet (despite having enjoyed Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) is that I've yet to reread the original! But I have enough memory of it to guess what you mean about the ending, Sully.
As for Pretty in Pink . . . while I love the rejected character as much as the rest of you, I like the movie's ending and don't think it should have gone the other way. (You know the story behind that, right? They were actually going to have her pick the other guy, but the director changed his mind at the last minute, so they filmed it the way it is now--but John Hughes made that decision after the actor playing the choice had shaved his head, so he had to wear a hairpiece for that scene! LOL!)
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