A CERTAIN APPEAL

Pride and Prejudice...if the heroine wore pasties.

Elizabeth Bennet is a self-proclaimed woman of many names—Bennet to friends, Lizard to family, Liz at her day job, and Kitten when she moonlights. Bennet spends her weekdays as an executive assistant at a startup and her weekends “kittening” for a burlesque show at Meryton, a Tribeca club. Bennet’s duties involve picking up discarded undies and other scanty regalia after the performances of her co-workers, including her BFF Jane Okogu, the aerialists Ginn and Tonic, and Renaissance woman Ming DyNasty. When handsome and aloof patron Will Darcy catches Bennet’s eye, she foresees a more interesting end to her night than expected. That is, until she overhears him damningly describe her as “thoroughly tolerable.” As it turns out, Darcy’s friend Charles Bingley—Jane’s new love interest—and Meryton manager Andrea are trying to buy the property, and Bennet must move past the trauma that ended her previous career as an interior designer and follow her dreams: “Now Andrea is buying the building. And renovating....A thrill dances up my spine at the prospect....Meryton has facilitated so much good in my life; the least I can do is contribute to this new chapter of its story.” As Bennet works to overcome her insecurities, she must also contend with the arrival of the witty, if poorly dressed, George Wickham, whose questionable motives and troubled past with Darcy are slowly revealed. While King’s attempts at Austen-ian repartee feel largely superfluous to her otherwise deft and fun storytelling, this is nonetheless an original take on the source material, filled with three-dimensional characters.

A jaunty and sexy twist on a classic.