Longbourn
By: Jo Baker / Narrated By: Emma Fielding
Length: 13 hrs and 31 mins
P&P from belowstairs… Grand concept but uneven execution and dark, oh soooo dark, so very very dark… may I slit my wrists now…?
Hmmmm… what to say? what to say?
This was the second time I listened to Longbourn, and I have to admit that I didn’t come away from this listen wanting to cram my head into a plastic bag. Rather, just a tiny bit of wrist slitting would’ve done as, tho’ decently written, good cow! must EVERY character from the beloved Pride and Prejudice be a jerk?
I get it, really I do, and I’ve often wondered about the servants as I’ve wallowed in my adored Historical/Regency Romances. I mean, those chamberpots don’t empty themselves, somebody’s cooking all those many many courses at mealtimes, fires are being started in the weeeeee hours of the morning, and the poor valet is at beck and call at all hours of the day to make just the perfect and intricate knot in that oh so white (And SOMEbody’s laundering those!) neckcloths. So we have Heroes and heroines in our romances, but who, pray tell, are the people stuck doing the dirty work?
Well, serving the Bennet family are Mr. and Mrs. Hill, and here in Longbourn, two maids, our heroine Sarah, and the young Polly. Add to that the good and upright yet totally enigmatic James Smith as Hero, and we’ve got our story.
…but FIRST…
Let’s start with just how WRETCHED it is to be a servant, especially to the self-absorbed Bennets, esPECially to the thoughtless Elizabeth Bennet. In P&P there is an iconic scene where Lizzy Bennet, loving and devoted sister, slogs through sodden fields to get to her ailing sister abed at Netherfield Park. She doesn’t care how she looks when she gets there (And she meets with much derision from Mr. Bingley’s sisters); she just wants to see her sister. Sweet, right? Devoted, right?
Wellll, it turns out that SOMEbody has to wash those skirts, and in the winter, there are sores and chilblains and mud and filth and disgust and despair and pain and exhaustion. Sarah’s about HAD it with Elizabeth Bennet and with her life of drudgery. She remembers a time, before she was taken in as a starving and impoverished little girl, when she had a loving family who taught her and who loved her. Sarah is aware of a big ol’ world out there, and we suffer right alongside her as she dreams of better places, dreams of a life where she has a moment to herself, dreams of a life without cracked, bleeding, itching hands.
When James Smith comes by and is given the job as Footman, a bit of Hell breaks loose. Sarah is intrigued even as she finds him loathsome; Mrs. Hill? Well, our dear old Hill hotfoots it to Mr. Bennet’s study and shrieks her lungs out, tho’ nobody knows what she’s so freaked out about (But we doooo find out, and we doooo discover that Mr. Bennet is a self-serving hypocrite and a total pig… no offense to pigs…).
Day starts well before dawn in each heavy day, and ends only with Sarah and Polly curling in on each other for warmth in the single bed they share in the freezing attic they call home. Each day, Mrs. Bennet has something to freak out about, and Hill is called in to listen to the woman and to soothe her, even as she knows she has so very much work to get to. Lydia and Kitty are a sore trial; Mary is tedious. Jane comes out as a sweet girl, but even she is clueless as to the suffering Sarah et al live with.
Sarah soon has a diversion and a possible romantic interest in Mr. Bingley’s Mulatto servant, the eloquent and irreverent Ptolemy Bingley (It turns out he’s half-brother or something as his Black mother was a servant, taken by Mr. Bingley’s father and kept himself in servitude… see? they’re all pigs, but I do allow that this is the rule of the day). But, much to her confusion, it’s James Smith who keeps most of her thoughts.
Which is where the unevenness of the story comes in. Cuz we jump to James and his decidedly okay but seemingly irrelevant story. I mean, it could’ve been written as a bit of dialogue, or p’raps edited a bit because as is, it just kinda is inserted into the bigger story and takes away from the flow. Plus, a P&P Variation HAS to throw in George Wickham and, while ALL Variations like to jazz him up to be a Mega-Villain, here in this book the man is disgustingly depraved. I’ve listened to worse, but here I found myself yelling: No, Polly, nooooo!!! We’re told Polly believes the best and wants for nothing more because she knows no other world; still, I thought her response to Wickham showed blighted stupidity. I mean, haven’t Sarah and Hill taught her anything?!?
No matter what I say, the book is well-written and the words feel true to the time period. And so do the situations. Author Jo Baker obviously was going for a reality-check; and she succeeded. And Emma Fielding did an AWEsome job with the narration: Boy did she get the fatigue and dissatisfaction in, or what?!?
Still, if you’ve been through Historical Romances and Regencies, and you’ve wondered about the lives belowstairs, the stories of the people whom “God-declared” should seek nothing better/higher, this is a reeeeally good book with no holds barred.
It’s just that you’ll have a bit of a Balloon-Bust when it comes to hearing about much-loved characters, and you’ll see Elizabeth’s Happily Ever After turned into a wretched and miserable existence.
And whooooo wants that?!?
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