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Review: My Plain Jane by Hand, Ashton, and Meadows

Title: My Plain Jane
Author: Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Medows
Year Published: 2018


Genre: YA fiction
Pages: 447
Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Location (my 2018 Google Reading map)UK

FTC Disclosure: I borrowed this book from my school library

Summary (from the inside flap of the book): Jane: has endured years of hardship and misery, and is ready to embark on a new life as a governess at Thornfield Hall. She's rather poor. She's rather plain. Also, she has terrible taste in men.

Charlotte: is an aspiring novelist. (Yes, she's that Charlotte) And she's determined to capture her friend Jane's story even if it means worming her way into the most epic ghost hunt this side of Wuthering Heights.

Alexander: is an agent of the Society for the Relocation of Wayward Spirits. He's about to discover something very disturbing going on at a little place called Thornfield.

Reader: there will be murder. Mayhem. Conspiracy. And, of course, romance. Prepare for an adventure of Gothic proportions, in which all is not as it seems, and a certain gentlemen, Mr. Rochester, is hiding more than the clothes in his closet.

Review: I enjoyed the first novel by this threesome of authors, My Lady Jane, so was looking forward to this one. I was not disappointed. This novel is fun and has an interesting mystery throughout while not being a typical "mystery."

As with their previous novel, this one centers on characters familiar to many of us: Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë, and Mr. Rochester, to name a few. While I know the names, I have not read Jane Eyre nor any Brnotë works so I am sure that I missed many literary references. Even without the background knowledge, I enjoyed the characters and the story.

There are also many other cultural references throughout the book without being overdone in this sarcastic and flip book. "Nevertheless she persisted" was a great line as was the description of the tasks to get to the Sorcerer's Stone from the first Harry Potter book.

Ghosts. There are many ghosts in this book and I am not a ghost story person. But the ghosts serve a purpose and aren't scary, they are more pivotal characters so that you don't necessarily think of them as ghosts. But you do. And that made it ok. 

If you want a fun and fast read that has many literary references, you'll enjoy this book.

Update: Here is a link to the Lady Janies website with all the fun information about their books.

Challenges for which this counts: none

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