Please open https://hotaudiobook.com ONLY on your standard browser Safari, Chrome, Microsoft or Firefox to download full audiobooks of your choice for free.

Title: Miss Darcy's Companion

Subtitle: A Pride and Prejudice Variation

Author: Joana Starnes

Narrator: Stevie Zimmerman

Format: Unabridged

Length: 8 hrs and 24 mins

Language: English

Release date: 11-08-17

Publisher: Joana Starnes

Ratings: 4.5 of 5 out of 37 votes

Genres: Romance, Historical

Publisher's Summary:

Miss Georgiana Darcy is need of a companion, and she would much rather not have Mrs. Younge. The recently bereaved Miss Elizabeth Bennet is in need of a position. When she accepts the one Mr. Darcy offers, she finds herself in his near-constant company and gets to know him at his best. Not as he would present himself to strangers in some remote corner of Hertfordshire, but as his nearest and dearest know him. An excellent brother, landlord, master. A wonderful man, noble, kind and impossibly handsome. So who falls in love first? What of Mr. Wickham and his dastardly ploys? And how is a lady's companion ever to have a future with one who could marry into the best houses in the land?

Members Reviews:

Absolutely Wonderful Variation!

This Pride and Prejudice variation begins with very different circumstances for the Bennets. Mr. Bennet has passed, Mr. Collins has inherited Longbourn, and the Bennet family has been thrown into the hedgerows. Jane is in London with the Gardiners, Mrs. Bennet and the other girls living with the Phillips in Meryton, and Elizabeth has gone to work as a governess for Col Fitzwilliam's nieces. It's there that Elizabeth meets and befriends Georgiana. When Elizabeth is about to leave her position, Georgiana begs her brother to hire Elizabeth as her companion.

Darcy hires Elizabeth and they happily settle at Pemberley. Elizabeth has daily proof of Darcy's kindness and worth as she witnesses his interactions with his sister and the people on his estate. And Darcy delights in Elizabeth's intelligence, wit, and her kindness towards his sister. But Elizabeth is no longer a simple gentleman's daughter, equal in standing if not in wealth. She's a paid companion in Darcy's employ, and any future between them seems impossible.

This is a lovely Pride and Prejudice variation with just a pinch of Jane Eyre sprinkled in for extra sweetness. The book is broken into two parts. The first half is told entirely from Darcy's point of view, and the second half switches between Lizzy and Darcy's points of view. This is my favorite type of variation, one in which the characters' personalities are true to the original, but the entire story and setting have changed. Most of the book is set at Pemberley, which means that we don't see much of Mrs. Bennet and the other girls, the Bingleys, the Gardiners, or Mr. Collins. The author puts our favorite characters into a completely new plot, and not a single scene is repeated from the original. She subtly weaves sentences from the original into her work and each time I recognized one it made me smile.

The author writes such wonderful dialogue, and there are so many sweet moments between our couple. Of course, this wouldn't be a Joana Starnes novel without heartbreak and a lot of tears. She never disappoints. There are several emotionally charged scenes that had me frozen motionless while I listened. Lizzy and Darcy's series of misunderstandings are painful, and their journey to happiness isn't smooth. This book is well written, passionate, and emotional, a special story that's so worth the read.

I can't decide whether to just buy every Joana Starnes book published so far, or wait for Stevie Zimmerman's narration to bring them to life. Her performance is outstanding. She has the perfect voice for Darcy, deep, vulnerable, and intense.