Elizabeth of Longbourn: A Pride and Prejudice Picture Book - Katelyn Rae - ★★★.¾

AUTHOR & ILLUSTRATOR: Katelyn Rae

GENRE: Children's Picture Book, Retelling

PUBLICATION DATE: November 9, 2022

RATING: 3.75 stars.

In a Nutshell: A picture book focussing on the emotions felt by Elizabeth and the other characters of Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice.’ Not sure how much kids will understand of the story, but the P&P fan in me is mighty amused!

Plot Preview:

The same story as ‘Pride and Prejudice’, but in a 40-pages-long picture book - Whoa!

Pride and Prejudice is one of my all-time favourite books, so much so that I have never ever (willingly) read a P&P retelling because I don’t want to sully my memories of the original characters. But when I saw this cute picture book with Elizabeth’s name in the title, I HAD to give it a go!

Honestly, I still can’t believe that P&P can be shrunk to this size. Imagine a 450-page novel has been condensed to a 40-page picture book without losing much of the plot! 🤭 The author does a fabulous job, given the immense difficulty of this task.

The storyline is still going to be tricky for little ones to keep track of as there is a plethora of characters. Every character is here including Collins, Wickham, the Gardiners, and of course, the formidable lady Catherine In fact, if adults don’t know the original, even they might struggle to keep all characters straight. But this is where the book deviates from the intent and shifts the focus of the classic: the aim of this picture book is to focus on the feelings of the characters, not on the characters themselves or on the social or cultural atmosphere.

Thus, for every major event, whether it is the Bingley’s first appearance in town or Darcy’s proposal or Collin’s marriage to Charlotte Lucas or even Elizabeth’s trip to Pemberley, the stress is always on how Elizabeth (and at times, the other characters) felt. Confusion, anger, happiness, sadness, fear, uncertainty – all sorts of emotions are explored through this little book.

The story is written in an easy-to-understand language, with plenty of hints about the identity of the characters and the relationship between them. All the scenes are simplified to the bare essentials, which convey the events without the accompanying complications. The proposal scene is hilarious – I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. To see those beautiful lines beginning with “In vain have I struggled…” reduced to this! 😂😭

There are also a few easy “Locate the character” activities in between the story.

The illustrations are quaintly adorable. All the human characters, with their round heads and armless bodies, look like cute Matryoshka dolls (but with legs). The graphics are in bright blocks of colour with no shading, which works well for an early readers book.

To be fair, I don’t know how the book will fare with those who don’t know the story. (In other words, every single target reader!) I was at an advantage in being familiar with the entire classic, having read it multiple times over. But this also put me at a disadvantage: I couldn’t view this book with the eyes of a newbie to the story. I do hope it creates some curiosity in little hearts to learn more about Elizabeth’s story in more detail once they are older.

I don’t know what age group to recommend this unusual indie book to. Do try if you find the concept interesting and want a simple picture book that explores various feelings through a beloved story.

I purchased this book when it was available as a freebie on Amazon. The digital version of this book is currently available on Kindle Unlimited.