A Peculiar Connection

Lately everyone has been talking about the “Let’s torture Darcy” club, and I admit I am a proud member. But despite being a member of this club, I have always been more of a “Let’s torture Elizabeth” kind of girl.

Jan Han has created a premise that is perfect for me because in A Peculiar Connection she pretty much tortures both Darcy and Elizabeth in the most wonderful manner!

What if in her visit to Elizabeth, Lady Catherine were to reveal the most torturous information? What if she told Elizabeth that she was the illegitimate daughter of late Mr. Darcy, and therefore sister to Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy? How would they react to this information? Would they try to establish a relationship as siblings? Would they prefer to never see each other again? Would they give up on their love? And could fate be so harsh on them?

This premise takes us into a long adventurous journey leaded by Darcy’s hope and persistence. Even though the book is written under Elizabeth’s point of view, it is Darcy’s love and character that makes us travel through England and Ireland in search of happiness. I loved the way Darcy never gave up on his love for Elizabeth. He was just as I imagined him to be under such circumstances: supportive, constant, brooding, passionate and relentless.

As one would expect, Darcy and Elizabeth will spend a lot of time together, and the tension and chemistry between them will be overwhelming throughout the entire book. Jan Han created so many intense scenes I just wanted to carve them all in my memory to access them at any time. I started writing down some quotes, and would like to share one of them with you, it may not be the best of them all, but it touched me deeply:

 

“I am… no one. I am just Elizabeth, and I do not know where I belong or to whom”. I fought the bleakness welling up within me, but I could not hide my sorrow from him.

Mr. Darcy rose to sit beside me, taking both my hands in his. I turned my face away, but he commanded me to look at him. “You belong to me, Elizabeth”.

 

This is just one of those scenes I absolutely adored. But the great thing about this book is that it is filled with great moments, so many that it was hard to choose the ones I would mention on the review. In fact, the story is so interesting, the scenes so intense and Darcy’s character so well developed that when I finished reading the book, I just wished Jan Han had also written the Darcy POV of A Peculiar Connection. I would love to read the scene after Elizabeth leaves Pemberley in a rush under Mr. Darcy’s point of view, or to know how his encounter with Lady Catherine was, or his reaction when discovering the documents in his aunt’s house. And I most certainly wanted to read how he felt when discovering the identity of Elizabeth’s father.

We get glimpses of Darcy’s feelings through Elizabeth’s eyes, but sentences as the ones below just entice me to read more about Darcy’s inner thoughts:

 

“Nothing remained on his countenance other than bleak resignation and a sadness I cannot describe”

“Expressionless, the light had vanished from his eyes as surely as if one had doused a candle”.

 

I could continue to quote the book, but I think it is preferable for you to read it yourself. All I can tell you is when I think about the scenes in the book, I pretty much want to read them all over and over again and also under Mr. Darcy’s point of view, so I’m hoping Mrs. Han reads this review and considers that as her next novel 🙂

 

A Peculiar Connection is available at:

Amazon.com – A Peculiar Connection

Amazon.co.uk –A Peculiar Connection

Amazon.fr –A Peculiar Connection (English Edition)