The Other Mr. Darcy

By Monica Fairfew

2/5

Caroline Bingley is not one to admit defeat easily. She set her cap for Darcy, and when he married Elizabeth, she must deal with her broken heart and move on. If only his annoyingly handsome American cousin Robert Darcy wasn’t always around. When a scandal swirls around Caroline, she is forced to enter into a sham engagement with Mr. Robert to save her reputation. But as time goes on, she finds herself more and more attracted to the other Mr. Darcy, and wishing that the engagement was real.

This book was so incredibly slow to start. It took me three weeks to read this book, mostly because the first 100 pages are a snooze-fest. When Mr. Robert brings news that Elizabeth is sick, Jane and Bingley rush to Pemberley, leaving Caroline and newly widowed sister Louisa to follow afterwards. There’s an overly long discussion about which road they should take to Pemberley, culminating in them taking one that turns out to be clogged with geese, going to a fair. They then are forced off the road to stay with an acquaintance. This takes 100 pages. It’s terribly boring, with so much clichéd angst between Caroline and Robert that I thought I was watching a soap opera. I was so unmotivated to read this book, and had to force myself to sit down and get through it. The things I do for you, dear readers.

Once we (finally!) get to Pemberley after GooseGate, the story starts to pick up and get a little bit more interesting. Because she has gotten herself in a bit of a scandal, Caroline and Robert must pretend to be engaged. There are a few funny moments when they have to pretend to be affectionate with each other around everyone else. They have some snappy dialogue and good come backs, which I enjoyed.

Caroline is sort of a strange character in this book. Almost like the author wanted her to have character development, without actually going to the trouble of developing her as a character. Caroline is almost schizophrenic, swinging back and forth from her original character of haughty, cold, and obsessed with status, to a much softer, more vulnerable character, without much development to get her there. I would have loved to see Caroline grown and change, but the change seems to happen all at once, with no explanations. It seems like in this story, the part of Elizabeth Bennet was played by Caroline Bingley, and the part of the entire whiny, socially-inept Bennet family was played by Louisa. And of course the part of Mr. Darcy was played by Mr. (R) Darcy. Caroline is suddenly the model heroine – smart, pretty, able to engage in witty banter. The only remnant of her former character is a bit of coldness when she’s upset. It just doesn’t seem plausible that she is so different from what she is shown to be in the original. I’m not saying she can’t have layers and an inner life, I’m just saying make it believable. Don’t tell me that Caroline is kind and thoughtful inside, show me how she becomes that way.

Also, why do they have to pretend to be engaged, again? I get that it has to happen so they can fall in love, yadda yadda yadda, but the reasoning within the story is so flimsy and contrived. It seems like Caroline’s problem could be solved so much more easily than pretending to be engaged to Robert. Seriously, a little communication could have cleared the whole thing up, and they wouldn’t have had to pretend to like each other in public. It’s not like Caroline is an idiot, she’s set up to be intelligent, if scheming. She really couldn’t think of another way out of her problem other than to pretend to be engaged to a man she doesn’t like? A broken engagement was almost as bad as a broken marriage, in those days. Other men would assume there was something wrong with you, for your engagement to end. They would consider you damaged goods. Rather than solve her problem, a fake engagement makes tonnes of new ones. I would have (semi) bought it if the reasoning was good, but it was so flimsy you could knock it down with a puff of air.

I got the Mr. Darcys terribly confused in this story. There’s Mr. F Darcy, married to Elizabeth, and then there’s Mr. R Darcy, from Boston. It would be fine if they were differentiated, but until they get to Pemberley, Robert is called “Mr. Darcy”. When they’re at Pemberley, he is sometimes called “Mr. Robert”, and sometimes called “Mr. Darcy”. Fitzwillaim Darcy is also called “Mr. Darcy”, so it’s hard to remember which one they were talking about. I found myself getting confused as to which Darcy was doing what. The author should have stuck to his first name, if they wanted to differentiate him from the original. Although, that’s not really the point, is it? The point was to make a carbon copy of the original Darcy, so that Caroline could get a happy ending. He doesn’t even have his own character traits. He’s rude, haughty, and doesn’t like Caroline’s embarrassing family. He fights his attraction to her by being even more proud. Sound familiar?

As always in these kinds of books (so it seems) there were a few really weird choices. Col. Fitzwilliam, for example, acts wildly out of character. Why are people always walking all over the poor man in these books? He’s either a romantic sop, or an insufferable jerk. I don’t know what he is in this one. He acts so out of character that I hardly recognize him. Another weird choice is Wickham. Why is everyone so inclined to feel sorry for him. When tragedy strikes the Wickham family, everyone is inclined to rush to his bedside and tend him. There are even several speeches about him being such a sympathetic character, oh woe is he. Are we forgetting the part where everybody hates Wickham? Even Darcy is inclined to feel sorry for him, which is completely out of character.

And what’s with everyone calling Elizabeth Eliza? Nobody but Caroline calls her that in the original, and it is done in mocking and derision. She is called either Elizabeth, or Lizzy. Apparently everyone calls her Eliza now, even her husband? It is a small thing, but seems to suggest a laziness on behalf of the author, like she couldn’t be bothered to reread the original before she wrote this. It was a small inaccuracy that annoyed me every time.

The story actually does start to get somewhat interesting when they have to deal with their sham engagement, and the reasons behind it. Caroline actually does fit some character development in there, when she realizes that a man she previously liked doesn’t really have anything to recommend him, next to Mr. Robert. I even started to somewhat enjoy it, towards the end. I read the last 150 pages in one sitting, since I was determined to finish this stupid book, as I’d put so much time into it already. I found myself enjoying the inevitable happy ending, as contrived as some plot points were.

I managed to get through this book, but if it wasn’t for this blog, I probably would have abandoned it 100 pages in. It did get better after that, but not enough to justify getting through page after page of Louisa whining and Robert being antagonistic while Caroline gets more and more out of character. The dialogue was boring, the characters were dull and listless, and plot was contrived and cliche. It was basically the same set up as the original, only not as well done. The Other Mr. Darcy is just the same Mr. Darcy, rehashed and given an American accent.