Elizabeth and Caroline by Valerie Lennox

What if Elizabeth’s best friend was Caroline Bingley?

When Elizabeth Bennet was only eighteen, Mr. Charles Bingley took up residence in Netherfield, and he had eyes only for Elizabeth’s sister, Jane.

Perhaps that first match, the one between Jane and Bingley, it’s not fair to claim it as the work of Elizabeth and Caroline, but certainly the others are. It is down to them that Caroline’s sister Louisa is married to Mr. Hurst, and down to them that no less than three servants from Netherfield are happily settled.

So, when Caroline returns from London, in the fall of Elizabeth’s twentieth year, more concerned with social standing and attracting a wealthy and well-connected man than ever, she draws Elizabeth into another matchmaking scheme. Caroline has her sights set on a man named Mr. Darcy, and together, the friends forge handwriting and send off an invitation to get him there.

But he arrives and seems smitten with Elizabeth.

Caroline lets go of the scheme easily enough. Elizabeth can marry Mr. Darcy herself. Then, together in London, the girls will find Caroline another match, one even better.

Elizabeth has heard awful things about Mr. Darcy from a certain Mr. Wickham and she has always wished to marry for love. But there is the specter of Mr. Collins, whose attentions she cannot bear. And there is the fact that Caroline is her dearest friend. Is it a hardship to marry a handsome, wealthy man who adores her? Even if she isn’t sure she loves him back?

Dear reader, I suppose this is a good-Caroline variation, but I think that much of Caroline’s scheming, conniving, and shallowness is intact, with the only difference being she is not interested in competing with Elizabeth. They are a best-frenemy dynamo. This book also contains love scenes of the open-door variety and some upsetting and traumatic backstory for various characters. Mr. Wickham is, as Jane Austen wrote him, a very bad man.