The Independence of Miss Mary Bennet Book

Set twenty years after the end of Pride and Prejudice, the chessboard of characters are in some new positions: Mary has spent the last seventeen years caring for Mrs Bennet, who has just died; Kitty married a Lord who kindly left her a young, wealthy widow; Lydia is carousing and drunk, sleeping around while George is on duty in America; Jane has had 12 pregnancies and they're worried about her health; and Lizzie is unhappy in her marriage to Fitz (Mr Darcy), who thinks their first and only son, Charlie, is a weakling and possibly gay (thanks to Caroline Bingley's poisonous remarks), and whose big ambition is to be Prime Minister - Lizzie's family is even more of an embarrassment now than they were twenty years ago.

The sister who has changed the most is Mary: her spots have cleared up, her crooked tooth has been extracted, she's as beautiful as Lizzie if not more so, and she's had seventeen years to read an extensive library that's broadened her mind but not softened her frankness. If anything, life as a dutiful spinster has hardened her. Now that Mrs Bennet is gone, she feels free for the first time and, encouraged by the impassioned writings of "Argus" in the Westminster Chronicle, decides to set out and see the plight of the poor and working classes in Manchester and elsewhere and write a book on them - no matter what Fitz wants.

Declining a female companion is her first act of independence, and moving her money from Fitz's investment into her own bank account the next. She becomes good friends with the publisher of the Chronicle, a Scotsman and friend of the Darcy's, Angus Sinclair, who falls in love with her but wisely doesn't declare it.

With her plans set and in motion, Mary starts off on her travels across England, only to fall prey to the worst sort of man: a highwayman. Left for dead in the forest, she ends up disappearing altogether.

I wasn't all that surprised to read mainly negative readers' reviews of this book, which I think stems mainly from the relationship of Lizzie and Fitz. Fitz doesn't come off well for most of this book, having become even hautier and snobbier than ever, and says some rather mean things to Lizzie, such as regretting having married her. He also has a curious relationship with a man called Ned Skinner, who does Fitz's dirty work for him - often on his own initiative.

People have said that they don't think McCullough stayed true to the characters, or took them in a direction that they agreed with - to the first I would disagree, it's just that we don't like to have the romantic bubble burst; and to the second, well, it's just an opinion. I approached this book knowing that, like all the P&P spin-offs, it wasn't going to please everyone, but I was very curious and excited about what McCullough would do, and open to something new: which I got. I haven't read many spin-offs but they were all dreadful, soap-opera-ish, melodramatic waffle, badly written, straining to be "Austen-like" in prose and style, and skirting around anything remotely interesting.

McCullough's prose, on the other hand, is effortless. Smooth, graceful, flowing, and never dull, I read this book in a day. I couldn't put it down. It was exciting, and because McCullough's a modern writer writing for a modern audience, she could delve into the world better than Austen could, or would want to. It's refreshing, and more honest. People sometimes seem to forget that the "prim and proper" world of Austen etc. wasn't a true reflection of the period or the people - that they swore, drank, etc. with just as much abandon as today, and with just as much observance of social norms as today. We aren't as liberated in this regard as we think we are.

Another thing that I loved was the bringing into the story of the lower echelons: the working poor, the orphans, the destitute, the thieves and prostitutes, the practices of slavery and factory. When you read a book like Pride and Prejudice, one thing that is very noticeable is how far removed the gentry are from the realities of the Industrial Revolution - and P&P is smack-bang in the middle of the Industrial Revolution. It's all gorgeous countryside, polite dinners and pretty frocks. The biggest concern of the Bennet sisters was finding a husband. The biggest concern of most of the population of the time was having anything at all to eat. The Independence of Miss Mary Bennet doesn't go so far as Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South (written around 1850), but it does bring Austenland into Dickensland.

This is the only spin-off that even remotely does justice to Austen's characters while breathing fresh and exciting life into their story. Neither has it destroyed my love for P&P or Mr Darcy (I thought it a nice touch that he's almost always referred to as "Fitz" here, which in a way creates a distinction between the two and allows you to separate the characters in your head, while also allowing for the fact that people do change, and not always in the best direction, but that there's probably a very simple reason for it) - I can still watch P&P without thinking "Oh but their marriage won't be a happy one" or "he'll turn into a right bastard that one" - I can separate these stories without a problem.

Don't be put off by the disappointments and anger between Lizzie and Darcy - all I can say without spoiling it is that it has a very happy ending. It's just so nice to read a historical fiction like this where the dialogue and prose aren't stilted, stuffy, and awkward because the author's trying for "accuracy" and to mimic a style long dead and which they aren't at all comfortable with. McCullough has a firm grasp of the period, the bigger picture, the small details and the social customs, and shows a great depth of love for the characters. Most importantly, she really brings Mary alive - poor Mary, the neglected and despised sister - who loses her narrow-mindedness but not her way with words. She's a joy to read.