Sense & Sensibility (The Austen Project #1)
By Joanna Trollope
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Recommended Ages: 17+

John Dashwood promised his dying father that he would take care of his half sisters. But his wife, Fanny, has no desire to share their newly inherited estate with Belle Dashwood’s daughters. When she descends upon Norland Park with her Romanian nanny and her mood boards, the three Dashwood girls, Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret-are suddenly faced with the cruelties of life without their father, their home, or their money.

As they come to terms with life without the status of their country house, the protection of the family name, or the comfort of an inheritance, Elinor and Marianne are confronted by the cold hard reality of a world where people’s attitudes can change as drastically as their circumstances.

The Gist:

Sense & Sensibility is an adorable modern retelling of the classic Jane Austen novel. The characters are just as delectable and the story line just as heart-wrenching. While slow in spots, it does track well with the original classic. It’s an enjoyable read if you’re looking for something fun and light to read.

What I Liked:

This retelling stuck very close to the classic with modern additions like driving and calling instead of walking and writing. I’m a HUGE Jane Austen fan (she’s one of my favorite authors) so for me the storyline was already perfect, and I appreciate people not trying too hard to improve on it.

I’m also an old-fashioned gal and appreciated that the modern part of the retelling didn’t involve sex. I’m a firm believer that you can show attraction and love without sex scenes so I’m glad the author recognized they didn’t need to be added in. It was nice to have a sweet romantic story to read with no sex, so if that’s important to you, this would be a good book.

I liked that it was a quick, easy read and it’s what you’d expect from a modern, light romance.

What I Didn’t Like:

It’s a cute story, but not a particularly thrilling one.  Not that I expect contemporary novels to be action packed like fantasy or thrillers, but I think this book could have used some more momentum to keep the story going. In a modern retelling, I’d expect a lot of the less than necessary and exciting scenes to be cut, the ones that don’t do much to carry on the plot.

I also didn’t like how the Dashwood sisters all seemed like completely useless and dependent woman who didn’t know how to handle themselves. Elinor definitely stepped up, but it seemed unrealistic that in modern times, none of those women would have jobs or be clueless as to how to live without husbands or servants. That annoyed me a lot.

I also wish we would have gotten a little more glimpses of modern times. I mean, come on, you know that Marianne is gonna be on social media all day, but I don’t remember her ever mentioning it. Small things like that would have helped me remember this wasn’t taking place in the early 1800s, because sometimes it felt like it was.

LunasLuckyRating: 3/5 Lunas