Snowbound at Hartfield: A Sweet Tea Novella - Pride and Prejudice Sequel

Sweet Tea Stories, Book 2

By: Maria Grace

Narrated by: Melissa Durbin

Colonel Fitzwilliam should have been happy facing retirement. No more Napoleon, no more tromping the Continent, and his distant cousin had unexpectedly left him an estate. What was more, two of his favorite people, Darcy and Elizabeth, were travelling with him to visit his new home.

But the colonel wasn’t happy, not when he was forced to watch Darcy exchanging enamored glances with his wife. No, he wanted to pitch his cousin out the window. It didn’t help when Darcy kept lecturing him on the joys of wedded life - as if women like Elizabeth Darcy grew on every tree.

Then the snow started.

Now they were stranded at the home of George and Emma Knightley, another intolerable, blissfully wedded couple who wanted nothing more than to see his bachelor days come to an end. Thank heavens they never thought of matching him with the proud spinster who had also been caught in the storm. That would have been utterly intolerable.

Or would it?

A Jane Austen-inspired sweet Regency romance.

©2017 Maria Grace (P)2019 Maria Grace

A happy ending

I always had a guilty sympathy for Elizabeth Elliot. I felt she always got the short end of the stick. No wonder she was a bit sour. In this story, a humbled Elizabeth meets the newly decommissioned Fitzwilliam, who just inherited a small estate. What starts out as a practical arrangement quickly becomes a budding love.

Cute romance of secondary Jane Austen characters

This is a lovely Jane Austen crossover sequel: we get to see Darcy and Elizabeth as well as Mr. Knightley and Emma about a year after their marriage, as well as secondary characters from both novels and from Persuasion. The protagonists are Colonel Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth Elliot, the former having inherited an estate and considering settling down as a country gentleman, the latter trying to cope with being on the shelf after the double betrayal of William Walter Elliot. As the large company of travelling Jane Austen characters end up ensconced with the Knightleys and Mr. Woodhouse, forced to spend time together because of a snow storm, the Colonel starts an unconventional courtship of Elizabeth Elliot who might be a suitable wife for him and mistress for his estate. They both first intend a marriage of convenience, but will Elizabeth Elliot be able to live within the modest means of the Colonel, and cope with the PTSD the traumas of war left our hero with? Dare he expose his affliction to her? And on Elizabeth's part, is she enough incentive for the gentleman to court her, to see her apart from her insufferable father, for him to choose a woman openly scorned for being jilted and a spinster, with a questionable dowry?
This is indeed a sweet story, in which we see known characters from a novel angle through the eyes of other Jane Austen characters, and we find surprising depth in Elizabeth Elliot, who after some self-examination accepts her faults and chooses better principles to guide her decisions.
The competent narrator brings the text to life, shows us the feelings of the characters and ensures a comfortable listening experience of this enjoyable Regency romance, a cozy time spent in Jane Austen's world.