NB: We received two different reviews for this book, and thought both perspectives were interesting and thoughtful. We’re sharing both to encourage discussion and to highlight different expectations and results of reading anticipated books – and we definitely want to know what you thought, too!
This guest review is by PamG.
PamG is a life-long reader who began her word addiction as a kid wandering the library stacks and choosing books by blurb and cover art. Her best decades were her thirties and forties when she returned to school to complete a BA in English, then returned to normal family life and she became a Judo mom and judoka for +/-10 years. She is now approaching 30 years as a reference assistant in the library media center of her Alma Mater and is still choosing books by blurb and cover art–though digitally now–and by the wisdom of the Bitchery.
Thanks, Pam!
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I’d been looking forward to this book so hard. Everything I’ve read by Lucy Parker has been a five star/A+ read. Her stuff is evocative of the best of Ngaio Marsh and has so many clever little references to theatrical culture and and various fandoms. Plus yummy romance. Her characters, situations, and settings are detailed, realistic, interesting, and immensely likable. All of these adjectives apply to The Austen Playbook as well. Yet, for me The Austen Playbook was a 3 star/C read. Mind you, I enjoyed it as I read it. It was a pleasant entertainment and the relationship was “cherce,” but there were a couple of serious problems with this book that left me gaping at the end.
Though Freddy Carlton is young, she is a seasoned player, born to a theatrical family and bred up in the trade. She is also, endearingly, the very opposite of a prima donna. At this point in her career, Freddy is managed by her father and has definite daddy issues complicated by the theatrical legacy of her famous actress/playwright granny, Henrietta. Freddy is no diva, but she is beginning to wonder if the pursuit of her father’s dreams and her grandmother’s artistic heights is really the right path for her. Her warm and merry personality seem more suited to musicals and comedies than high drama though she has the talent and training for both.
Relaxing with her sister and a friend in a pub after a performance, Freddy encounters J. Ford-Griffin (Griff) a theatre critic who has been harsh in his assessment of her past performances yet disturbingly accurate. His comments highlight Freddy’s own sense of being steered into a future not of her own making and losing the joy of her vocation en route. Griff actually seems to see Freddy’s bifurcated longings as no one else does. In this first face-to-face meeting, while her attraction is hinted at, what dominates their exchange is Freddy’s humor and civility meshing with Griff’s seriousness and icy perceptiveness. So, not an enemies to lovers tale at all, though there’s definitely some opposites attract action going on..
Chapter two opens six months after the meeting between Freddy and Griff. Griff also has family issues as he tries to hold on to Highrock, the family home, despite the gold-plated hobbies of his artistic yet feckless parents. His dreamer brother Charlie is also a trial, going off half-cocked on impractical projects to save the old homestead. The latest of these is a one night, live performance of a country house murder mystery based on a popular game that is in turn based on the works of Jane Austen. Said performance is to be televised and guided by audience participation as viewers vote for the direction that the plot should take at four separate points during the play. Yes, folks, that is just as convoluted as it sounds. Since all of this is to take place at Highrock, Griff is less than thrilled. Freddy is offered the role of Lydia in this epic and elects to take it in spite of her father’s almost guaranteed disapproval. Several of the other characters are familiar from Parker’s earlier work, as is Freddy herself, but knowledge of these earlier incarnations isn’t necessary to appreciate their roles in this novel.
It is difficult to give an effective and concise synopsis of the plot of this book, not simply because of spoiler danger, but because the plot is so freakin’ complicated. So just a few more points before I get to the actual reviewish stuff. Freddy’s granny Henrietta and Griff’s grampa George had a rather flamboyant extramarital affair back in the day. Fortunately, both are dead, so we don’t have to actually deal with them. Gramps built the private theatre, The Henry, for Henrietta on the grounds of his estate, and the theatre is the site of the Austen Playbook broadcast. It is also the birthplace of Henrietta’s greatest creation, a play called The Velvet Room. Griff is planning a film around the writing of Henrietta’s iconic drama, to raise funds to support Highrock. Meanwhile, Freddy’s Dad has already written his Mum’s autobiography & is also looking to resurrect it in film as well. Hence, Freddy and Griff have a little family feud thing going on. Confused yet? Yeah, me too. And amazingly enough, I don’t think I’ve even dropped any significant spoilers.
I cannot repeat it often enough that I love the relationship between Freddy and Griff. They are opposites on the surface, but they share the most fundamental values and are empathetic, ethical, and mutually supportive in the most satisfying ways. There really is minimal conflict between them. They have one actual fight that is triggered by external pressures and they reconcile like actual adults. Conflict in this story is mostly external and has to do with the competing claims of family on Freddy and Griff. The downside of all this compatibility is a slight shortage of major growth in their character arc. Each influences the other in positive ways. Freddy finds the courage to make hard decisions while Griff begins to revise his dismissive attitude towards his brother. I probably should have missed having more strife in the relationship, but no, I actually loved the warmth and tenderness and sweet, sometimes awkward sex.
Sadly, the stuff I didn’t love kind of overwhelmed the romance. First of all, the title of this book almost felt like a bait and switch. Aside from the names of the characters in the play, WHERE THE HELL WAS JANE!?! If the readers are aficionados, all they get are scraps of Austen. Freddy is Lydia; Maya is Elizabeth; Dylan is Darcy; Sadie is Emma and so on and so forth. Shouldn’t there be some of the delicious wit that is Austen? I couldn’t find it. What about interactions between the populations of different novels? Most discussion of the production is taken up by the technical difficulties of staging this live, interactive performance and the difficulties of learning a script that has all the stability of a fractal. While that was interesting, it left the reader with a sense of potential unfulfilled. If the reader is not familiar with Austen, the ironies of the casting are completely lost and some of them are pretty important. Even the concept of Austen’s oeuvre as the basis for an online game is a pleasure completely unexplored. So that was a major disappointment for me.
I also had a problem with the sheer complexity of the plot. Mind you, it was not all that difficult to follow the story as one reads it, and the build-up of suspense as I realized that there was some sort of actual mystery emerging was done fairly well. On the other hand keeping track of the historical and multi-generational timelines was a bear. And the subplots, omg, the subplots! You have the sister in a bad relationship, the whole elaborate weirdness created by Griff’s parents, the problem of the grandparents’ relationships, and the machinations of Sadie the bee-yotch who was introduced in Parker’s earlier work. The love story between Griff and Freddy becomes an absolutely necessary lodestar to guide you through this thicket of plots.
I want to avoid spoilers, but I find myself driven to talk about Sadie because she becomes the linchpin of so many of those subplots. Sadie is the absolute epitome of celebriwitch to the point where she becomes a caricature. She has no redeeming features and no complexity of character. In the Playbook she graduates from the vicious cattiness of the previous novel to actual blackmail of her fellow cast members. Freddy is one of her primary victims, but Freddy, for the most part, rises above it.
However, others are seriously damaged by Sadie’s constant bullying and inappropriate revelations.
The disposal of Sadie creates a huuuuuugggge plot hole. Some of the other events around the end of the story seem equally holey.
The near accident that threatens our heroine’s physical well-being late in the story comes out of left field. It’s caused by Ferren, her sister’s cheating ex, whom no one else actually interacts with in any significant way before the last chapter. He’s mostly referred to in the third person and serves as a catalyst more than a well-developed character. This comes across as a somewhat manipulative and gimmicky quirk in the storytelling.
The big scandalous revelation that Sadie promises Freddy happens, but the mechanics of how and why it happens are a whole new mystery to ponder as it happens completely off-stage. A seemingly minor character, TV presenter Nick Davenport breaks the story, but how he gets the information and the actual content of his big scoop aren’t revealed. We know that he is Griff’s friend and Sabrina’s professional rival, but that’s it–another thin character seemingly plugged in to further the plot. Ferren’s and Nick’s roles aren’t a revelation based on information hinted at over the course of the story; they suddenly became dei ex machina within the confines of the last two chapters. The major problems raised by the big reveal of family skeletons are soothed over way too easily, and a lifetime of family angst mended PDQ in the last chapter. Our principals all seem to get what they need to be happy, but beneath the surface, there seems to be a lot left hanging. . I’m thinking that these unresolved plot points and puppet characters may be a set up for future books, but much as I really want to know what becomes of Parker’s supporting characters, I am outraged by the raggedy-assedness of these concluding chapters.. I wtf-ed so much, it sounded like a stutter.
If, like me, you plan to grab the next book in this series the minute it’s up for pre-order, then of course you should read this one. The Austen Playbook was a fun read, but simply didn’t meet the high expectations inspired by Parker’s earlier work. I may even read this again, if only to see if I somehow missed something or even several somethings. So balancing Parker’s excellent writing and characterization against the severe plot issues and lack of actual Austen feels, I have to give this a C+ grade.
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Thanks!
You nailed it! I, too, loved Freddy and Griff’s relationship but both the abundance of subplots and the bitchiness of Sadie irked me to no end.
What bothered me the most was I thought Freddy was black or had black heritage, but other than her hair that wasn’t mentioned. If her grandmother was famous in the forties, shouldn’t that have been huge, for a black woman to have written this great play? Or if her grandmother was white, wouldn’t that have been something that would have influenced her relationship with her? I just expected there to be more story about that than there was. It also felt like Freddy’s sister was being set up to be the next heroine, which would explain some of the weird plot contrivances near the end. I’m hoping something awful happens to Sadie in that one.
I really liked all the details about putting on the play, those are always my favorite parts of these books.
One of the strangest things about Sadie was that she appeared to be so contemptuous of Griff who was in a position to damage her career, even Freddy seemed perplexed at Sadie’s recklessness. She is almost too horrible to be believed because it seems so motiveless, though unfortunately I have met people whose one joy in life is to cause as much harm as possible.
Gonna tell you the truth: You nailed it for me.
I would’ve expeted to have a lot of Austen references and romcom vibe or else had a story that followed the basic plotline of one of her novels.
Also, I decided about two thirds of the way through the description that the book was too complicated for me.
I prefer my romance to be more straightforward with fewer byzantine asides.
Thank you!
@Emily I also had always pictured Freddy as black. Rereading Pretty Face, I don’t know why I thought that, maybe sheer wishful thinking that a series I otherwise love might not be so whitewashed.
I got just past the halfway mark, and the adorable H & h were not making up for the lack of Austen and convoluted mystery, so I skipped to the last 2 chapters. Enjoyed the characters, not the book, so I re-read Act Like It as a palette cleanser.
It’s interesting how different the opinions are. I read the book as soon as it came out and loved it. I had this huge happy smile on my face the entire time. I loved Freddy’s openness and optimism, as well as Griff’s sardonic humour. I loved how profoundly decent they both are, no pettiness or possessiveness or sexist “manliness”. I also loved the slow mystery around their grandparents. The plot didn’t feel convoluted to me – it’s all about this old pair. Admittedly, the shenanigans around the play took a backseat to that.
So I kind of get where your review is coming from. I hated Sadie’s bitchiness too, it felt way too one-sided. But Austen – frankly I’m glad the author kept away from using her classic characters and words too much. Almost always, these takes on Austen work out very awkwardly. And yes, a lot of intrigue and scandal happened in the last chapters. But while I could have done without it, or didn’t bother me too much. I very much appreciated how the father is not simply forgiven and forgotten. I appreciate that both Freddy’s relationship to him will have to change as well as her sister, who is still understandably upset with him.
All in all, I loved this book a lot. I can get your points, and it’s nice to see that people agree with you, since we can all love books differently. I’ll be rereading this a lot!
Yes. This is perfect. I was actually harsher to the book – it’s a DNF for me, although I love the earlier ones & have reread them as well (always a mark of high praise). This one… I think there was a good book there but it just didn’t work for me.
I just finished this book last night so it was perfect timing to find the two reviews. I thought PamG and Catherine both made good points; it’s illuminating to see how the same book is seen by different readers.
Funny, I actually liked the plot and the subplots, and been wondering if it’s not setting up a romance between Freddie’s sister Sabrina and Nick, an enemies-to-lovers type story. He seemed pretty into her, but then went ahead and aired the story about the scandal, so who knows.
My problem at the beginning was not buying into the Freddie and Griff romance. Seemed very quick, and less believable than in Pretty Face. Maybe because we knew Freddie was attracted when they first met at the bar, but we had no point of view from Griff until much later? As the book progressed, I got over that and loved the book from then on. Probably an A-/B+ for me, but a vast improvement on Making Up, which wasn’t anything like Act Like It or Pretty Face, which are A++ses for me.
I was so disappointed that this is the first time I’m actually commenting on a review. Loved previous books by Lucy, pre ordered this and waited, waited, waited. But I hated it. Really did not enjoy it at all, it annoyed me for many of the reasons outlined above.
I loved the romance in fact I believe Freddy and Griff are Parker’s best couple, but the plot is terrible. I had forgotten Sophie was in Pretty Face as the main antagonist. Boy was that a big mistake on the author to even write someone like that in this book. Sophie aka “the plot device” was everything you said and more and I didn’t get ANY satisfaction. NONE!
The lack of Austen substance didn’t bother me as much, but I get your point. Where was Jane?
I think LP is probably going to write Sabrina and Nick as her next couple and Sophie will get her comeuppance because she is probably slated to be the villain “again”. BIG mistake IMO.
Pam your review is fabulous!
You know, I saw the Austen references more on the large scale, with the characters as refractions of Austen characters dealing with contemporary variations of the same challenges. Freddy looks to me like a mashup of Elizabeth and Jane, with Elizabeth’s verve and wit, but Jane’s flaw: she’s too accommodating rather than too quick off the mark with her judgments. Griff has Darcy’s cold demeanor, sharp mind, strong sense of honor and family, and tendency to keep believing a false-but-convincing story about his own superiority.
Coping with Sadie doesn’t look that different, to me, from coping with a Catherine de Bourgh or (particularly) Caroline Bingley. Other challenges also looked familiar: How do you deal with spendthrift or otherwise flawed parents? How do you honor a beautiful estate? Etc. With a touch of Northanger Abbey, of course.