If you're going to mess with the classics, do it in a way like Jasper Fforde did in The Eyre Affair, by using the story as a minor plot point to the main storyline.

But then you wouldn't have Wide Sargasso Sea.

I'm not saying every book that uses some kind of classic lit hook is going to be *good*. I'm not saying it's not a cheap way to guarantee a sale, either. But I also don't believe that every book that does is automatically *bad*.

I do agree that it's a little discouraging to see people selling books based on someone else's work (and great work, at that). But publishing absolutely *is* a business, and they need to sell books as much as individual authors do. Probably moreso.

And honestly, I'd rather see someone playing in Jane Austen's sandbox than see another book by or about Larry the Cable Guy, or The Big Book of Bathroom Humor.

I've noticed a number of books that follow up on Pride and Prejudice, or play off it. Most seem to be either what happens when Darcy and Elizabeth marry, one was about their daughter, one was about Lydia Bennett, and so on. I understand the appeal of playing off a known - and loved - book, but a lot of these don't appeal to me ... and there just seem to be a lot of them.

one was about Lydia Bennett

Really? Man, you could not pay me to read an entire novel about Lydia. She's a great, delicious trainwreck of a secondary character in Elizabeth's and Jane's stories, and P&P would be a markedly lesser novel without her sheer thoughtless awfulness, but I literally cannot imagine an entire novel about her being anything but agony. She hasn't even got the cleverness and animal cunning to make a great antiheroine like Lizzie Eustace or Becky Sharp.

JZ - yup. I remember it actually getting pretty good reviews ... but if you really disliked her, then I'd say avoid it.

Good goddamn, I had no idea there were so many P&P sequels/riffs.

I've read one of those called Pemberly by (I think) Andrea Barrett. She also wrote a follow-up on Sense and Sensibility called The Third Sister, about the youngest daughter whose name I can't remember offhand.

Margaret.

I just waded into the pool of reviewing books by reviewing Beyond Heaving Bosoms- The Smart Bitches' Guide to Romance Novels. [link]

Aside from the fact that I consider Sarah and Candy to be friends, this is a really wonderful book that talks about the good, the bad, and the mullet-y within romance and the romance community.

I can't wait to read that, Barb.

Book recommendations! I had a Sherman Alexie weekend: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian and Flight. The first book is fantastic and lovable, and the second is very good.