I’ve Got Your Number

Poppy Wyatt has just lost her fiancé’s family heirloom emerald engagement ring and then her phone gets nicked. Luckily, she finds a discarded phone in the trash bin and gives that number to everyone in the hotel in case they find the lost ring. Clinging to that phone as her last hope, she becomes involved in the life of businessman Sam Roxton—the phone previously belonged to his incompetent PA and has important emails and messages in it. With a week before the wedding, Poppy is doing everything in her power to find the lost ring without having to tell fiancé Magnus Tavish or his parents.

This hilarious romantic comedy by Sophie Kinsella will have you giggling from page one all the way to the thrilling climax. Told in the first person by Poppy—who has included her asides in the form of footnotes—you quickly learn the trials and tribulations involved with sharing a phone with a complete stranger. As she snoops into Sam’s life, she becomes so embroiled in his office drama that she fails to notice the drama enfolding in her own.

Kinsella has written an addictive chick lit novel that sucks you in before you even realize it. Drawing inspiration from classic Jane Austen characters—whether purposefully or not—you’ll find it impossible not to fall in love with these characters. Add this to your summer reading list before the season ends!

Death Comes to Pemberley

Six years after the events of Pride & Prejudice, Elizabeth Darcy is throwing the annual Lady Anne Ball and everything is going smoothly. But, as close friends and family are celebrating the night before, her sister Lydia unexpectedly bursts into Pemberley screaming that her husband Wickham is dead. So begins the latest work of crime fiction by master writer P.D. James.

Turns out, Wickham isn’t dead; but he is found holding the bloody corpse of his friend Captain Denny in the middle of the woods. Darcy himself is quickly involved and stays involved throughout the investigation and trial of Wickham. The novel gives a very interesting look into the British legal system of the time. And James gives some very Dickensian twists to our favorite Austenite characters.

Many secrets abound in this tale, but James juggles them easily while also seamlessly introducing us to some of the other new characters that didn’t exist in Pride & Prejudice. (Austen fans will also enjoy the few moments when characters from other Austen books are fleetingly referred to.)

Although some parts of the book seem to drag, know that everything will be resolved in Elizabethan fashion—in other words, 3-page-long monologues delivered in the final chapters will reveal all.  And if, in your course of guessing whodunit, you begin to suspect lycanthropic involvement (Full moons! Mysteriously ill people!), then you have merely read too many supernatural books. Don’t worry; this isn’t Pride & Prejudice & Zombies (although that book is also really good, just in a different way).

Death Comes to Peberley is great way to revisit old friends and see what they’ve done with their lives. James creates believable futures for Austen’s characters while also reexamining their choices made in P&P. Just be warned, Austen fans, that after reading this book you will want to revisit Austen’s classics.

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