Pride and Prejudice/Horatio Hornblower (PG)

[malabud.livejournal.com]

Title: Lost in the Deep by Gaby A.
Pairing: Horatio Hornblower/Georgiana Darcy
Length: 92,000 words
Author on LJ: Unknown
Author Website: The Derbyshire Writers' Guild

Why this must be read:

Yes, indeed, I do actually have a Jane Austen crossover rec this month! Austen crossovers are rare, but not unheard of. And this one is particularly good.

The story opens with Darcy and Elizabeth married for several years, with their fourth child on the way. Georgiana is at the age where she must seriously consider marriage. Being young, beautiful, and rich, her possible choices are legion. Darcy happens to take her to visit a ship of his that has come in early, and there she meets a very interesting sailor. Darcy reacts badly, and well, things progress naturally from there.

There is more to this story than just the thwarted infatuations of two young people. There are a daring sea rescue, a scheming prince, a plotting ambassador, kind friends, humor, delightful original characters, and a genuinely good story. The Austen characters are mostly in character, though Elizabeth seemed a little too complacent at times. I cannot vouch for the characterization of Horatio Hornblower, so obviously one does not have to have read the books nor seen the mini-series to understand this story. I especially enjoyed the Darcy family scenes. Their family life is not painted as perfect, but Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam are shown to be good parents to their children, which one would expect.

All in all, this is an excellent tale, one that I highly recommend.

* * *

Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam stood staring at one another until she took a few steps to close the gap between them and encircling her arms round his neck, asked softly, "So, how terrible were you?"

"Pretty terrible. Irritable, overbearing, rude! But my true crime goes much deeper. I think we have a real problem, Elizabeth," he said most seriously. Then putting his arm around her shoulder, led her upstairs where they could talk in private and lavish affection on each other.

As he removed his coat and vest, she made herself comfortable in his chair by the fire. Kicking off her shoes, she lifted her feet onto the large ottoman they shared when reading or talking together in the evenings. She grinned playfully and wiggled her toes. This was a signal to him that she desired that intimate attention that came with a foot massage. He pulled at his neck cloth and finally managing to untie it, came to sit on the ottoman before her. He placed her feet on his lap and lovingly began his skilled ministrations.

"This is all about a handsome young sailor, Elizabeth. I think she's infatuated."

"But surely you were not aboard the Regalia for very long? How could she possibly form an attachment so quickly?"

"I don't believe she has formed an attachment as yet, but I know she is curious, if not a bit bewitched. And to her mortification, her arrogant, overprotective brother swept her away before she could enjoy the flirtation. I believe this is the first time that I've denied her something that she really wanted. She is furious with me; especially because I made it clear to this young upstart that he was not to look at her."

"Fitzwilliam, you didn't!"

"Of course, I did! Did you expect me to give him my permission? He is a sailor, Elizabeth, a common sailor! What could he possibly have to offer her? Yes, he is a good-looking man; that I admit, and that is precisely what she is attracted to. But I will not allow her to risk her future over a flirtation with a handsome sailor!"

"Well, hopefully, she will never see him again and forget about him quickly enough. I think it would be best not to make a fuss about it, Fitzwilliam, so please, do not lecture her about honor and duty. It will only inflame her more. Let it pass as quietly as possible. We have the Sandford ball coming up in a few weeks and the Jamison's a week later. These parties should distract her and perhaps she will meet some wonderful young man who will erase any lingering regrets of this encounter."

Lost in the Deep

Comments

[eillinora.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for passing on the link to this story! I came across Lost in the Deep a few months ago, read the first few chapters and really liked it. But for some reason I then forgot about it, so now I'm off to read it completely ;D

[aalens.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this rec! It was great and I thorougly enjoyed it. It had an good plot, interesting new characters which were well developed, the narrative bowled along at a goood pace and never flagged and it was delightful to have Pellew in the story as he is my favourite character in Hornblower after HH himself,
Okay, I am a nasty person; now I am going to be hyper critical and this fic was so good it does not really deserve that, but the author's American habit of adding an 's' to the end of the word accommodation to make it plural was irritating - 'accommodations' sounds as odd to British ears as would making sheep plural by calling them sheeps. It was amazing too just how often 'accommodations' managed to appear in the text. It did have American spelling throughout and a few, a very few, typos too, but nothing which screamed American as much as did all those 'accommodations'.
At the end of the story the recently knighted Sir Horatio Hornblower suddenly was called 'Lord Hornblower' which was a rather surprising and fast elevation in rank but I assume that was a typo.
So now I've been mean and nasty I'd better add that despite my picky-ness I did enjoy this story, it was one of the best P&P or HH fics I've read and the only P&P/HH crossover I've ever come across. It is a crossover that works particularly well since both PP and HH are from the same era of British history and both are romances and have heart stopping heroes.

[malabud.livejournal.com]

Oh, I cringed at that Lord Hornblower stuff, too. But, like you, that didn't keep me from enjoying the story.

I did not know that the word accommodation does not merit an S in British English. As a linguist, I find that fascinating. I suppose the word could be deemed plural on its own, but to my American ears, it would sound decidedly odd without the S.

Now that I think about it, we use accommodation both with and without the S, but the uses are distinct and generally do not overlap. Without the S would be a variant of the verb accommodate, as in "Did you make accommodation for her?" That could also be said, "Did you accommodate her?" With the S is the way used in the story: "Are your accommodations satisfactory?"

There may be dialects of American English, such as Boston Brahmins, which use accommodation the British way. But I do not know for sure. Fascinating.

Anyway, sorry to get carried away. As you can see, little questions such as this about English are endlessly intriguing to me. *doffs linguist cap in slight embarrassment*

[aalens.livejournal.com]

LOL - it was not my intention to embarrass you. In any case, you did not write the story! Perhaps too, 'accommodations' is correct - it is just that having been born in southern England and having lived there for many years I have never heard anyone British using it with an 's'. (You may have noticed that I specified the *south* of England; that was my perhaps not so subtle way of being a snob, as we Southern English fondly imagine that our version of English is the correct and more upper crust version. LOL).
Perhaps 'accommodations' is similar to the word 'gotten' which although historically correct is now archaic in the UK.
Another two words that many Americans, but not all of them I hasten to add, add 's' to are 'way' and 'anyway'. However I understand from several sites on the net that that is not considered correct in American English either.
Those four; accommodations, gotten, ways and anyways - plus anyone eating pancakes or waffles for breakfast, usually scream 'American!' Which of course is fine if the fic is set in the States or the speaker is American or heavily influenced by American speech but not so fine if the characters are supposed to be British.

BTW eating pancakes (but not waffles) for *breakfast* in the UK is traditional on one day only; on Shrove Tuesday (i.e. "Pancake Day" ) However I have been away from Enland for several years so perhaps the habit of eating pancakes or waffles for breakfast on ordinary days has become popular since I left.

Even 'accommodations' and 'anyways' are better, far far better, than characters eating Black Pudding with a spoon as I came across in the story I read immediately prior to reading your recommended story. As you probably know, Black Pudding is a type of sausage, so eating it with a spoon as if it were really a pudding would be difficult if not impossible. Unfortunately too, in that story Harry Potter had it with custard. I was eating my lunch at the time and the image of that did not benefit my digestion much at all.LOL.