This Pride and Prejudice adventure book was published in 2007 as ‘Lost in Austen,’ and republished in the UK as ‘Being Elizabeth Bennet’ the following year. Both carry the subtitle ‘Create your own Jane Austen adventure.’ To keep confusion to a minimum, during this review I’ll refer to ‘Lost in Austen’ but the text is the same in each book. Also, by the way, the book ‘Lost in Austen’ has no relation to the British Pride and Prejudiced-based TV mini-series of the same name. What was I saying about minimizing confusion? Never mind.
All fans of Pride and Prejudice must have, at some point, pondered what it might be like to be in Elizabeth Bennet’s shoes. In Lost in Austen you get the chance to enter the romantic world of Jane Austen’s novels and experience them firsthand. The book is written in a ‘choose your own adventure’ style, and playing as Elizabeth you are given the mission to marry well and to marry for love. During your adventure you are judged on the accomplishments, intelligence, confidence, connections and fortune points that you build or lose along the way. You will also face tough questions and will have to make difficult decisions – all dictating the path you can take.
The book allows you to explore a number of Pride and Prejudice ‘what ifs.’ You will find out, rather comically, what would have happened if Elizabeth had accepted Mr. Collin’s proposal. You can also discover if love might have blossomed had Lizzy accepted Darcy’s infamous first proposal. While the main thrust of the story comes from Pride and Prejudice, characters from all of Jane Austen’s six novels make appearances. As well as Mr. Darcy, you get the chance to dalliance with the likes of Mr. Knightley, Willoughby, Captain Wentworth, Henry Tilney, Mr. Crawford and even Jane Austen’s real life love interest, Tom Lefroy.
Although Lost in Austen has the premise of a Pride and Prejudice ‘choose your own adventure’ story, there is a mission to complete, which results in an basically linear storyline. If you take the wrong path or make a decision that does not ultimately fulfil the mission you could end up lonely, sad, or even worse, dead! Adding and subtracting points, depending on your choices and actions, can get a little tedious but does add to the immersion and interactivity of the book. There are a few tricky questions and a degree of randomness, but if you’re a fan of Pride and Prejudice it’s not difficult to complete the mission as it follows the original text pretty closely. The multiple choices and directions lends itself to a number of re-readings, unless you were to tempted to look them up during your first read. Whilst not quite living up to its huge potential, Lost in Austen is a fun and exciting read, and should be most agreeable for Jane Austen fans.
Your lost friend,
Lizzy
