Pemberley Remembered is historical fiction in the broadest sense. Not only does it cover Austen’s Regency England; it is a revealing portrait of World War II and postwar England as well. Any fan of either will greatly enjoy this book. However, it is also a story of romance, the likes of which are unsurpassed in today’s literary climate. . . The most remarkable aspect of Pemberley Remembered is Simonsen’s ability to take multiple stories from completely different time periods and fuse them together into a cohesive whole. Curled Up With a Good Book - Swapna Krishna
http://www.curledup.com/pemberly.htm
Darcy and Elizabeth are introduced by Sir William Lucas.*
Maggie Joyce, a 22-year old American, arrives in London in the summer of 1947. Although the war has been over for two years, the British are still recovering from six long years of war. Despite continued rationing and evidence of the destruction caused by German bombs, Maggie, who grew up in a dirty Pennsylvania coal town, is delighted to be living in one of the great capitals of the world. After weeks of touring the sights in London, Maggie visits Montclair, an 18th Century Georgian country house located in the Peak District of Derbyshire, because she has been told that the former residents of the mansion, William Lacey and Elizabeth Garrison, were the inspiration for the characters of Fitzwilliam Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet in Jane Austen’s masterpiece, Pride & Prejudice, and that Montclair is the novel’s Pemberley.
During her visit to the nearby Village of Crofton, Maggie meets Beth and Jack Crowell, both of whom have ties to the Lacey family and Montclair, and who know if the legends associated with the house and Fitzwilliam Darcy are true. Maggie is befriended by the Crowells, and they share stories of the real people who inspired the Darcys, the Bennet sisters, Lady Catherine De Bourgh, and many of the other memorable characters portrayed in Pride and Prejudice. As their friendship matures, the Crowells reveal the devastating impact that the First World War had on their families—effects that are still being felt 30 years later.
While learning about the romance of Fitzwilliam Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet, Maggie falls in love with Rob McAllister, an American who served as a navigator on a B-17 heavy bomber and who flew 30 missions over Nazi Germany. The effects of seeing planes being shot down or burst into flames is seared into his memory, and he chooses to return to Britain to live among those who have endured so much and understand his loss. Although Rob and Maggie are deeply in love, Rob’s wartime experiences have left him with a reluctance to make any decision that affects anyone other than himself, and that reluctance has consequences for his relationship with Maggie.
*Sketch is courtesy of www.mollands.net.
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