Where I Say What I Really Think

Jane and the Year Without a Summer by Stephanie Barron
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

What a pleasure. Truly. Beginning to end.

And a pleasure even now, after finishing, reflecting on the closed book beside me, calling to mind particular scenes and lines. (The last two or three pages! Dang.)

Well done.

I was inclined to think well of the book, I'll admit, even before opening it. My fondness for the author, the series, and the protagonist prepared me to be a sympathetic reader, ready to overlook any of the small disappointments one sometimes encounters even in highly anticipated novels. However, I'm happy to report that nothing of the sort was required of me. No grading on a curve. Without resorting to polite hedging, I can report that I liked it as much as I had hoped and more, finding it clever, touching, inventive, and intellectually satisfying.

It was fun to read, which to me is the test.

The Jane Austen character in this mystery is an old friend for all of us who have read the previous books in the series, and it's nice to see her again, but even new readers will find her familiar, in a way; she embodies many of the characteristics of a Jane Austen heroine, being intelligent, witty, confident, long-suffering, and considerate, and could have featured in any of the original novels without alarming anyone. This Jane is less proper at times, perhaps, but is no less ladylike for that. Less "missish," as they say, than similar characters--but I consider that a decided virtue. Probably more willing to return rudeness for rudeness (the Garthwaites! Ugh!), which I admired, although she would then be all politeness again. Unfazed by ugliness and danger. Direct when directness is required. She's a great heroine, one of my all-time favorite characters, and she is fully present in this novel.

The plot is well crafted and nicely paced, with the romantic elements and the mystery arc integrated with the garden walks and dances and theatre visits one looks for and expects in a Regency novel of any type. All of it seamless. And the author's research contributes so much to the feeling that this story could have actually happened. First, the setting, a small English spa town in 1816, is fully realized, right down to the streets and assembly rooms and nasty water; and second, Jane's real family and history are incorporated into the story, harmonized with real events, in a very believable way. The work in the "suspension of disbelief" is pretty much done for us.

This book is, at its heart, a mystery, and the author doesn't try to outstrip the conventions, doesn't try to swing for the fences, but there is more resonance here, more significance, than one would expect in the 14th installment of a series. The added emotional heft of Jane's incipient but undiagnosed illness, along with the effect that has on her family and her romantic entanglements, makes the novel hit a little harder and mean a little more. We know how events turn out in real life, and the weight of that is felt throughout. I felt it, anyway. So--a mystery, yes, with crimes and clues and sleuthing, but resonance, too. Impact.

In terms of craft, probably the best thing about this work and the series as a whole is the language, specifically Jane's voice. That's what strikes me every time. Stephanie Barron delivers pitch-perfect prose, writing in a way that manages to evoke the cadence and tone of Jane Austen and Regency fiction while still remaining accessible to modern readers. That control is *chef's kiss*.

(I tried desperately to frame a question for the author on this subject at a recent book event, wanting to ask how she manages to walk that line so successfully over so many pages and so many books, but every version I tried out seemed like "more of a comment than a question," so I gave it up. Safer to dork out here, I guess.)

To sum up--this is an outstanding mystery novel in an outstanding series, and I recommend it to all good people, especially readers of mystery, Jane Austen, and historical novels. And if you're not caught up, you totally should do that.

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