Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters (Quirk Classics)
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The reinterpretation of Jane Austen's novel (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) will be followed with the release of Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters... The books were created by US-based publishing house, Quirk Books. Jason Rekulak, the editorial director, said he pioneered the format after meeting dozens of Austen fans at a Californian sci-fi convention. He told the Independent that he was a "lifelong fan" of the works of Jules Verne, and thought it would be fun to enliven the follow-up with some rampaging giant squid and man-eating octopuses...'
--The Telegraph, 13 August 2009
The crossover between fans of Jane Austen and lovers of B-movie horror is small, but it is enough to warrant a follow-up to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. An instant classic that saw the Bennet sisters meet the undead, it sold more than half a million copies in English and was then translated into 17 languages. This follow-up literary 'mash-up' has the Dashwood girls looking for love in a watery England at the mercy of vengeful sea creatures. Forget sprained ankles in Devonshire, Ben Winters has introduced a gigantic, man-eating jellyfish and packed the poor girls off to the Pestilent Isle under the care of retired adventurer Sir John Middleton, who sports a necklace of human ears, while Colonel Brandon's sideburns are a horrific abberation. Winters lets Austen set the tone and the plot swims surprisingly faitfully in her wake. It's a very silly conceit, mixing Regency manners with a Jules Verne topography, but it is as attention-grabbing as a two-headed creature rising from the deep, while diving suits are far more becoming than frocks.
--The Guardian, 3 October 2009
--The Telegraph, 13 August 2009
The crossover between fans of Jane Austen and lovers of B-movie horror is small, but it is enough to warrant a follow-up to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. An instant classic that saw the Bennet sisters meet the undead, it sold more than half a million copies in English and was then translated into 17 languages. This follow-up literary 'mash-up' has the Dashwood girls looking for love in a watery England at the mercy of vengeful sea creatures. Forget sprained ankles in Devonshire, Ben Winters has introduced a gigantic, man-eating jellyfish and packed the poor girls off to the Pestilent Isle under the care of retired adventurer Sir John Middleton, who sports a necklace of human ears, while Colonel Brandon's sideburns are a horrific abberation. Winters lets Austen set the tone and the plot swims surprisingly faitfully in her wake. It's a very silly conceit, mixing Regency manners with a Jules Verne topography, but it is as attention-grabbing as a two-headed creature rising from the deep, while diving suits are far more becoming than frocks.
--The Guardian, 3 October 2009
Product Description
Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters is expanded edition of the beloved regency romance--with thrilling all-new scenes of giant lobsters, rampaging octopi, two-headed sea serpents, and other biological monstrosities. As our story opens, the Dashwood sisters are evicted from their childhood home and sent to live on a mysterious island full of savage creatures and dark secrets. While sensible Elinor falls in love with Edward Ferrars, her romantic sister Marianne is courted by both the handsome Willoughby and the hideous man-monster Colonel Brandon. Can the Dashwood sisters triumph over meddlesome matriarchs and unscrupulous rogues to find true love? Or will they fall prey to the tentacles which are forever snapping at their heels? With many strange and wonderful illustrations throughout, Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters invades the prim and proper world of Jane Austen with the outrageous mythology of Jules Verne, H.P. Lovecraft, Lost, Spongebob Squarepants, Red Lobster, and Popeye the Sailor. Let the monster mash-up begin.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
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I picked up Sense & Sensibility & Sea Monsters (S&S&S) mostly out of curiosity. I had read Quirk Book's first 'Austen Mash Up', Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance-now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem! (Quirk Classics), and found it to be, as my review said, a 'A Disjointed, One Joke Effort' that just about scraped two stars. I was interested therefore, to see if trying the same trick with a slightly less well known Austen novel, a different sci-fi genre and a new co-author would result in a more successful outcome.
It turns out that it does, but only just. S&S&S is certainly a better written book than P&P&Z was. The original Austen text and Ben Winter's aquatic mayhem are far better integrated this time around. Whereas P&P&Z felt like Austen's novel with chunks of zombie related action sort of 'tacked on' here and there, the old and new parts of S&S&S are more closely and cleverly intertwined and Winter is far better at aping Austen's style of writing so that the additions are less jarring. S&S&S is also funnier than P&P&Z, although its by no means a work of comedic genius. The latter took essentially what was a single joke and stretched it to breaking point, whereas S&S&S riffs on a variety of genres such as monster movies, pirate adventures and steam punk. It also makes more successful use of the humour that stems naturally from the odd juxtaposition of Austen's writing with attacks from giant fish monsters. Whilst never subtle S&S&S is a far more cleverly written book than P&P&Z.
What it isn't however, is a very satisfying book. S&S&S is certainly not an improvement on the original novel or a particularly good tale of monsters and mayhem in its own right. Winters additions weaken many of the strengths of Austen's original work. The changes made to Austen's text mean that you know longer really care about the fates of the characters and much of the social observation and commentary is lost. Equally the compromises needed to fit the new parts of the book around the existing plot mean that the book doesn't work as a straight horror or comic-horror story. Its amusing in place and gory in others, but not to the extent that it can be recommended for either its horror or comic credentials alone.
All of which leaves me wondering what the purpose of these books is (Quirk have a third on the way). Die hard Austen fans will probably hate them for the changes made to the original text. Sci-fi and horror fans will find the new additions rather insipid. Those who dislike Austen's unaltered novels will be put off by quantity of the original text and plot that remains. For everyone else the sheer ridiculousness of both the concept and events on the page will prevent the book from being anything more than a midly humorous diversion. Its interesting to see what changes Winter's has made to the original novel but at the end you don't feel like you've read a proper, emotionally satisfying tale. Instead its more like you've witnessed an interesting but rather uninvolving literary and comic experiment.
It turns out that it does, but only just. S&S&S is certainly a better written book than P&P&Z was. The original Austen text and Ben Winter's aquatic mayhem are far better integrated this time around. Whereas P&P&Z felt like Austen's novel with chunks of zombie related action sort of 'tacked on' here and there, the old and new parts of S&S&S are more closely and cleverly intertwined and Winter is far better at aping Austen's style of writing so that the additions are less jarring. S&S&S is also funnier than P&P&Z, although its by no means a work of comedic genius. The latter took essentially what was a single joke and stretched it to breaking point, whereas S&S&S riffs on a variety of genres such as monster movies, pirate adventures and steam punk. It also makes more successful use of the humour that stems naturally from the odd juxtaposition of Austen's writing with attacks from giant fish monsters. Whilst never subtle S&S&S is a far more cleverly written book than P&P&Z.
What it isn't however, is a very satisfying book. S&S&S is certainly not an improvement on the original novel or a particularly good tale of monsters and mayhem in its own right. Winters additions weaken many of the strengths of Austen's original work. The changes made to Austen's text mean that you know longer really care about the fates of the characters and much of the social observation and commentary is lost. Equally the compromises needed to fit the new parts of the book around the existing plot mean that the book doesn't work as a straight horror or comic-horror story. Its amusing in place and gory in others, but not to the extent that it can be recommended for either its horror or comic credentials alone.
All of which leaves me wondering what the purpose of these books is (Quirk have a third on the way). Die hard Austen fans will probably hate them for the changes made to the original text. Sci-fi and horror fans will find the new additions rather insipid. Those who dislike Austen's unaltered novels will be put off by quantity of the original text and plot that remains. For everyone else the sheer ridiculousness of both the concept and events on the page will prevent the book from being anything more than a midly humorous diversion. Its interesting to see what changes Winter's has made to the original novel but at the end you don't feel like you've read a proper, emotionally satisfying tale. Instead its more like you've witnessed an interesting but rather uninvolving literary and comic experiment.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
I think if you enjoy Jane Austen and have a sense of humour you'll enjoy this book. However, as it is written in a style very true to Jane Austen, you might find it hard going, as I did. The idea of giant lobsters, rampaging octopi and two-headed sea serpents interacting with prim and proper 18th century characters is a funny one, and there are laugh out loud moments. The illustrations are also an amusing addition to the book. But it's a long slow read, I found, and I'm a voracious reader. So I'd recommend it if you do enjoy Jane Austen's style of writing, but you need to have a sense of humour about it and not be offended by her work being turned into "tentacled mayhem"! If you normally find Jane Austen heavy going, then this probably isn't the book for you.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
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Some of the negative reviews here seem to be because of the varying expectations of the reviewers: so I guess it's worth saying that this isn't an `introduction' to Jane Austen - this book relies completely on a fairly close acquaintance with the original. In fact it is Austen's original text, intersected and broadened by the interpenetration of the `horror'/SF/imperial adventure genre epitomised by authors like Rider Haggard, Conan Doyle (The Lost World rather than Sherlock Holmes), Jules Verne and later `B' movie spin-offs. And it's precisely the fact that this is written in Austen's measured, balanced formal prose that makes it so funny.
The text investigates the borders of genre in an insistently post-modern way, and finds them to be far more permeable than we might expect. It's not just the Austen romance, we find, that can be hijacked by early horror/SF, but that romance can completely hold its own: the shape of the genre may be bent and distorted but never eradicated completely. By mixing such seemingly-separate genres, this actually serves to draw attention to both their similarity and dissimilarity: refusing to play by genre rules serves not to make genre irrelevant but to actually re-impose its rules.
The eco-message gives this a contemporary edge that taps into C21st anxieties, but at the same time encodes the fragility beneath the ostensible confidence of Austen's own society which had witnessed the French revolution, the American revolution and was in the middle of the Napoleonic wars which take place unnamed in the background to her romances.
So overall I loved this and while it can certainly be read as light and frothy fun, it's actually quite literarily knowing and sophisticated, and requires us to simultaneously recall the original and forget it at the same time.
The text investigates the borders of genre in an insistently post-modern way, and finds them to be far more permeable than we might expect. It's not just the Austen romance, we find, that can be hijacked by early horror/SF, but that romance can completely hold its own: the shape of the genre may be bent and distorted but never eradicated completely. By mixing such seemingly-separate genres, this actually serves to draw attention to both their similarity and dissimilarity: refusing to play by genre rules serves not to make genre irrelevant but to actually re-impose its rules.
The eco-message gives this a contemporary edge that taps into C21st anxieties, but at the same time encodes the fragility beneath the ostensible confidence of Austen's own society which had witnessed the French revolution, the American revolution and was in the middle of the Napoleonic wars which take place unnamed in the background to her romances.
So overall I loved this and while it can certainly be read as light and frothy fun, it's actually quite literarily knowing and sophisticated, and requires us to simultaneously recall the original and forget it at the same time.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Not my cup of tea.
The idea of mashing up Jane Austen with sea monsters and pirates is a great idea and the story fits well with the new additions but personally I just can't get past the old Austen... Read more
Published 17 hours ago by ThatBoyLuke
Better than Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
OK, I like my classics and usually don't like them messed with but I absolutely loved Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. Read more
Published 3 months ago by The Honey Monster
loved it
I'm not a Jane Austen snob (though I did used to correct my English teacher when she misquoted), but I loved this book. Read more
Published 8 months ago by C. Smith
Holiday Read
Bought this book as a holiday read, going next week so fingers crossed its going to be a good read!
Published 10 months ago by D. A. Hart
See Sence Sea Monsters and Sensibilties abound
What a hilarious idea, to rewrite the classics with sci-fi type twists haha
In this case the traditional story sets off as usual but in a slightly different universe and after... Read more
In this case the traditional story sets off as usual but in a slightly different universe and after... Read more
Published 16 months ago by Celestial Elf
Glorious Fun for Austen and Monster Fans
Have you ever read Jane Austen and thought that what could really liven it up was some brain munching zombies or one of the Dashwood sisters falling for a Davey Jones-esque monster... Read more
Published 17 months ago by Scriber_scouse
OK but really, only ok!
OK so as previous reviewers have stated, it is Jane Austens original idea with the addition of sea monsters and hilarity. Read more
Published on 26 April 2010 by Miss C. L. Cole
Yeah, but the "joke" is starting to wear very thin now...
The problem with this book (and others in this new literature/horror mash-up genre, which seems to be growing at an exponential rate) is that they can never be as good as the idea... Read more
Published on 15 April 2010 by Paul Fillery
Would make an excellent short story
I love Jane Austen, and I love creatures-of-the-deep science fiction (John Wyndham's 'The Kraken Wakes'! Read more
Published on 15 Mar 2010 by Laura T
...in theory
I like this book... in theory. I like that someone would take something as temperate as a Jane Austen novel and add some sea monsters into the mix... again, in theory. Read more
Published on 27 Feb 2010 by P. McCauley
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