It’s safe to say that after someone shoved the words ‘and Zombies’ underneath the title of Pride and Prejudice, that the subgenre of Regency Era romance became fair-game for geeks of all stripes. The latest attempt to take this most po-faced of genres and make it more fun is My Lady’s Choosing – An Interactive Romance novel.
Though it begins as a simple parody of Austen, it goes much, much farther. Fans of monster romance, exotic highland warriors and archaeological adventuring are all included in this very wide swipe at one of the wildest genres out there.
Curran and Zageris clearly have a lot of love for the world they’re mocking, and the book is happily littered with all sorts of jokes at the expense of Regency cliché. Those who are a fan of Austen will find the opportunity to do the things they’ve always wanted to do to various characters (it’s worth noting that none of Austen’s characters or text is here, rather these are thinly veiled mockeries). Still, anyone with an even passing familiarity with Pride and Prejudice will recognise how well aimed the humour is here.
For those with broader tastes in the world of romance, they are plenty of other paths to take, from the more heated sort of affair to a really dull path, which is actually another giggle at how some of these book’s end.
The writing is funny and strong, and the writers have gone for an ‘everything they can’ approach to humour. They ape to voice of your typical romance novel quite well, but only to then slip in multiple gags, innuendos or vicious observation. We’d like to think that Austen herself would have enjoyed the book, though now we think of it, we suspect she’d have also liked Deathtrap Dungeon.
Since we brought up Fighting Fantasy, this is not the sort of multiple path novel that requires dice. There’s no ‘roll to seduce’ or ‘save against misogyny’ mechanic here, and that’s a good thing, it would have distracted from the pace. Excellent fun for lovers of romance and silliness.
MY LADY’S CHOOSING / AUTHOR: LARISSA ZAGERIS, KITTY CURRAN / PUBLISHER: QUIRK BOOKS / RELEASE DATE: APRIL 3RD
