i saw this book on display in barnes and noble and was immediately drawn to it- pride and prejudice was one of my favorite pieces growing up and even now, and having it remixed to be gay, and trans especially, seemed exactly up my alley as someone who is trans myself. i acquired an ebook of it and decided to read it in my spare time to see if it was all i had hoped.

to summarize a review, no- this felt like a very shortened version of pride and prejudice in a way that reads as fanfiction. fanfiction is not inherently bad, persay, but this one skips some major plot points that easily could have been twisted or adapted for the new subject matter. wickham, for example, has always been a man of relatively ill intent, but the way he is presented here feels almost like a fantastical movie villain. not to mention changing some of the origin of him and darcy's original bad blood. not a big complaint, but considering i love pride and prejudice enough to want to see it in a more relatable light, well...

it moves fast, as other have said. the development of feelings i feel also betrays some of the original slow burn. there was something to pride and prejudice as it stood feeling like a "will they-wont they" piece. interactions that made the scene of him holding her hand to help her into the carriage feel almost as scandalous as smut. that is what really eats at me in a piece of regency fiction, and i found it completely missing here.

a complaint that may be centric to me as someone who is an adult now, and this piece is likely meant to target a younger audience, is that i thoroughly did not enjoy the depiction of trans individuals in this. this piece tells but does not show enough, and when it does, it feels cliche. there is certainly something to being trans, and being dysphoric, but it carries so much weight in the forefront of this book that it almost feels like it is trying to explain transness to someone who may not have any grasp on what it is, let alone in ways that are amenable to what an uneducated 12 year old, or closeminded adult, would expect. might sound rude, but it feels like "babies first trans fiction" and it does inevitably become a bit hard to read. especially at the end, where i feel that a struggle within the family could have easily been pulled for more chapters, or even ultimately playing on the idea that oliver and darcy could have married under "normal" circumstances, and lived their lives comfortably otherwise.

regardless, i cant say i'd outright recommend this book to anyone who is over 16. all the failings before may be excusable in YA to some degree, but i do think children deserve enjoyable fiction, and especially lgbt romance. and it, point blank, isn't that good of a romance novel. i did not leave feeling attached to these characters, rooting for their relationship. i think there are much better pieces out there to provide young adults a way to navigate these complicated concepts.