Elizabeth of East Hampton by Audrey Bellezza, Emily Harding #AudreyBellezza #EmilyHarding @GalleryBooks @sophiarose1816

Review copy was received from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

It’s a truth universally acknowledged—well, by Elizabeth Bennet anyway—that there’s nothing worse than summer in the Hamptons. She should know: she’s lived out there her whole life. Every June, her hometown on the edge of Long Island is inundated with rich Manhattanites who party until dawn and then disappear by September. And after twenty-five years, Lizzy wants to leave, too.

But after putting her own dreams on hold to help save her family’s failing bakery, she’s still surfing the same beach every morning and waiting for something, anything, to change. She’s not holding her breath though, not even when her sister starts flirting with the hot new bachelor in town, Charlie Pierce, and he introduces Lizzy to his even hotter friend.

Will Darcy is everything Lizzy Bennet is not. Aloof, arrogant…and rich. Of course, he’s never cared about money. In fact, it’s number one on his long list of things that irk him. Number two? His friend Charlie’s insistence on setting him up with his new girlfriend’s sharp-tongued sister. Lizzy Bennet is all wrong for him, from her money-hungry family to her uncanny ability to speak to him as bluntly as he does everyone else. But then maybe that’s why he can’t stop thinking about her.

Lizzy is sure Will hates everybody. He thinks she willfully misunderstands them. Yet, just as they strike an uneasy truce, mistakes threaten Charlie and Jane’s romance, with Will and Lizzy caught in the undertow. Between a hurricane and a hypocritical aunt, a drunken voicemail and a deceptive party promoter, the two must sift through the gossip and lies to protect the happiness of everyone they love—even if it means sacrificing their own. But when the truth also forces them to see each other in an entirely new light, they must swallow their pride to learn that love is a lot like surfing: sometimes the only way to survive is to let yourself fall.

A rich Manhattanite vacationer makes a bad first impression and the local gal has a sassy way of catching his attention at the beach.  Audrey Bellezza and Emily Harding’s Emma of 83^rd Street  was an amazing first book and in my top reads last year so I couldn’t pass up the chance to pick up the latest book in their series of sparkling Jane Austen modern retellings.

Elizabeth of East Hampton is mildly connected to the first For the Love of Austen book with the male lead briefly introduced in a scene so is flexible as a standalone or follow up read.

Lizzy is a local and has mixed feelings about the wealthy vacationers that come to her town for the season.  She gets that the tourist economy is what sustains the area, but personally, she’s tired of being a local and wants to be gone pursuing her journalism dream.  Unfortunately, family obligation of working the bakery because of her dad’s heart has kept her stuck.

I enjoyed seeing the Bennets updated so Lizzy’s a surfer working in the family bakery and has a dream of journalism while her mom wants one of the five sisters to snag a rich vacationer and is so obvious.  Her oldest sister is a looker and sweet, middle sister is an activist, and younger vivacious sisters are influencers and bloggers.

Meanwhile, a class difference romance is up to the minute with a wealth Manhattanite, Will Darcy, accompanying his friend Charlie to the shore and keeping an eye out so Charlie doesn’t fall for a local gold-digger.  Eventually, he realizes Lizzy and her sister aren’t that way, but not until after he sets off everyone and doesn’t get help from an enemy in his past.

I love how Elizabeth of East Hampton strikes the right beat of honoring the classic, but is also a wholly new and sparkling contemporary romance fully developed in characters and relationship connections.  There is a steady pacing and a slow burn romance that comes with character growth.

So, another hit from this writing pair and making me more than eager for the third book hinted at with the intro of a familiar face at the end.  Sunny summer beach town setting makes Elizabeth of East Hampton a fab edition to the beach bag reading stack.

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Sophia

Reviewer at Books of My Heart

Sophia is a quiet though curious gal who dabbles in cooking, book reviewing, piano-playing, and gardening.Road trips and campouts, museums and monuments, restaurants and theaters are her jam. Encouraged and supported by an incredible man and loving family. A Northern Californian transplant to the Great Lakes Region of the US. Lover of Jane Austen, Baseball, Cats, Scooby Doo, and Chocolate.

As a lifelong reader, it was inevitable that Sophia would discover book blogs and the joy of blog reviewing.Sophia is a prolific reader and audiobook listener which allows her to experience so many wonderful books, authors, and narrators.Few genres are outside her reading tastes, but her true love is fiction particularly history, mystery, sci-fi, and romance.Though, sorry, no horror or she will run like Shaggy and Scooby.

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