Pride, Prejudice, and Poison (Jane Austen Society Mystery 1), by Elizabeth Blake

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I have had Pride, Prejudice, and Poison, by Elizabeth Blake, on my TBR list for a while, so I was very excited when I learned that it was the January 2024 pick for The Cozy Mystery Book Club. Another book club discussed the original Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen. I had already read it, so I decided to listen to the audiobook while reading Pride, Prejudice, and Poison.

Erin Coleridge owns a used bookstore in North Yorkshire, England, where the Jane Austen Society meets monthly. After one of the contentious meetings, a prominent member of the Society is presumably poisoned and dies. Erin sets out to do some amateur sleuthing to find out who the culprit is.

If you are a fan of Pride and Prejudice and you enjoy reading cozy mysteries, you will probably enjoy this book. It is told from multiple points of view that sometimes change in the middle of the chapter, which can be a challenge for some readers, but this didn't bother me. In fact, I didn't even think about it until it was pointed out to me. This surprised me because usually I prefer books that are told from the main character's point of view. I guess I was so invested in the story that it didn't matter to me this time.

The characters in this book are sometimes compared to those in Pride and Prejudice, which gave me a clear idea of their personalities. I chuckled at the names of the many cats that Farnsworth, Erin's good friend, has. They are named after characters in Pride and Prejudice and they have the same character traits. In addition to the characters from the original novel, there are also many Jane Austen quotes sprinkled throughout the book. While I enjoyed reading them, there were so many that they sometimes disrupted the flow of the story. I would have enjoyed them more if there was one quote at the beginning of each chapter.

While I enjoyed getting to know the characters, there were so many of them it was overwhelming. While reading, I highlighted each character in my Kindle as they were introduced and I jotted down brief notes about them. This is nothing new for me. I often do this, especially in cozy mysteries when I want to figure out who the culprit is. However, I don't usually need to refer to the list too often while reading the book.

For the first half of this book, I often referred back to the list of characters because I kept forgetting who they were. However, once I really got to know them, I breezed through and thoroughly enjoyed the second half of the book. There were a lot of suspects, but at about the halfway point I correctly identified the culprit. I didn't know the motive and exactly how it would all come together, but I knew who committed the crime.

The mystery-solving element was light in the first half of the book as characters and relationships were established. There is the beginning of a love triangle. This book is heavier on the romance aspect than most cozies I've read, but it wasn't too much. Even though the mystery-solving didn't really pick up until the second half of the book, I enjoyed meeting the characters before then.

Once the mystery-solving aspect picked up, it was really good. There was one thing that happened that made me briefly question my pick for the culprit, only to find out that one thing was part of this person's motive. Although I knew who the killer was, I was shocked by the way it all unfolded. 

I'm disappointed that there are only two books in this series. The second one, Death and Sensibility, was published in 2021, so at this point I'm not sure there will be a third. However, I'm intrigued enough to read the second one. I'm curious to know how relationships further develop and what the future holds for the Jane Austen Society.