Murder by Death

I thoroughly enjoyed this read, a book I found through Reflections review of the same book.  It's very Austen-esque in tone and wit, but the story itself starts where most others leave off:  with the wedding and the aftermath:  two people who do not know each other at all, trying to be husband and wife.

I knocked half a star off because I struggled quite a bit with the two main characters, Teviot and his bride Helen.  The reader never meets them before the wedding as individuals and for most of the book one is left to know them only through their reactions to each other.  This feels unsatisfactory, because the whole premise of the story is the misunderstandings that take place when two strangers marry and try to live with each other.  Not having any idea of the normal character of each, I never quite knew who was being unreasonable or misreading signals.

This isn't the case with the rest of the cast: each of the supporting characters thoroughly came alive for me, even down to Helen's maid, who had the fewest number of scenes.  Helen and Teviot aren't the only ones having a hard time with romance and interpersonal relationships either.

Helen and Teviot came together for me about 2/3s of the way through the book when circumstances force them apart and they have to deal directly with each other without interference; the story gets a bit sappy here, but by this time I was so invested in the outcome it didn't bother me.

Jane Austen fans would enjoy this one quite a bit, I think, and I plan on recommending it to a couple of RL people I know who have worn out their copies of Austen's books and would enjoy something "new".