Eight authors of Pride and Prejudice variations imagine Fitzwilliam Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet pushed into uncomfortably close quarters--by storms and sickrooms, by garden sheds and curses, by the cruel and convenient hand of fate. What happens when there is nowhere left to retreat? Certain Evils by Amy D'Orazio After Elizabeth Bennet hurls Darcy's letter into an old well, she curses him, wishing that 'certain evils'--the epithet he applied to her dear sister--would be rained down upon him. Alas, over the next weeks, Darcy is forced to bear one misfortune after the next while Elizabeth is left to uncomfortably wonder if it is all her fault. Forced to share a roof with the man she so misjudged, Elizabeth must reckon with the inconvenient truth that the only curse she ever truly cast was the one she placed on her own ability to see him clearly. Building Bridges by Ali Scott When Elizabeth travels to Derbyshire with her uncle and aunt, she sees Mr Darcy have a terrible riding accident. Rushing to his aid, she is given an opportunity to rebuild their acquaintance anew. With every day spent in Mr Darcy's company, Elizabeth realises that he is a man she could easily lose her heart to--but has she missed her chance? Tempest by Frances Reynolds When a violent storm traps Mr Darcy at the parsonage in the wake of Elizabeth's stinging refusal, the enforced proximity strips away the pride and prejudice that have kept them at odds, and two people who have thoroughly misread each other are at last compelled to speak plainly. Can a single afternoon of hard-won honesty lay the foundation for the love neither of them saw coming? A Tax on His Forbearance by Jan Ashton A storm and a bout of mushroom-fuelled illness strand Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet overnight in the Meryton home of her aunt and uncle Philips, where an evening of unexpectedly intimate conversation by firelight, conducted in nightclothes and candlelight, dissolves their mutual prejudices and sets them on the path to courtship.
A Just and Tender Spirit by Julie Cooper When Mr Darcy, the humble but brooding vicar who holds the entail on Longbourn, arrives at the Bennet household with the uncomfortable duty of assessing his distant cousins as potential wives, he brings with him generations of resentment rooted in a long-ago injustice between their families. What begins as a duty call shadowed by generations of family grievance becomes an unexpected love match. Seven Days in Northamptonshire by Lucy Marin When a week at a Northamptonshire country house throws Elizabeth and Darcy together in the aftermath of his disastrous proposal, a rusted garden gate and seven days of forced proximity may accomplish what months of misunderstanding could not. Clutter and Concealment by Nan Harrison After a sleepless night following his disastrous proposal at Hunsford, Darcy delivers his letter to Elizabeth and impulsively follows her into Mr Collins's dilapidated garden shed, where the two are accidentally locked in by Collins himself and forced into the first honest conversation of their acquaintance. Not in Vain by Mary Smythe When Wickham leaps half-dressed from a window and leaves Lydia Bennet to face the consequences alone, the youngest Bennet sister must navigate ruin, banishment, and an arranged marriage to a man she never met, all while watching her own careless actions destroy her sister's chance at happiness.