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Zuri Benitez has pride. Brooklyn pride, family pride, and pride in her Afro-Latino roots. But pride might not be enough to save her rapidly gentrifying neighborhood from becoming unrecognizable. When the wealthy Darcy family moves in across the street, Zuri wants nothing to do with their two teenage sons, even as her older sister, Janae, starts to fall for the charming Ainsley. She especially can't stand the judgmental and arrogant Darius. Yet as Zuri and Darius are forced to find common ground, their initial dislike shifts into an unexpected understanding. But with four wild sisters pulling her in different directions, cute boy Warren vying for her attention, and college applications hovering on the horizon, Zuri fights to find her place in Bushwick's changing landscape, or lose it all. In a timely update of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, critically acclaimed author Ibi Zoboi skillfully balances cultural identity, class, and gentrification against the heady magic of first love in her vibrant reimagining of this beloved classic.… (more)
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This is billed as "A Pride and Prejudice Remix," and it does a great job of interpreting the original in a new context. Some of the humor of the original is lost, as is a little of the drama. On the other hand, it addresses plenty of timely issues regarding race, and it still has a satisfying romantic plot. It's a fast, enjoyable read, both for fans of the original, and for those encountering it for the first time. Recommended.
I loved
I listened to this book (thank you Libro.fm for the free ALC!). Definitely recommend listening to this one. There is a lot of slang and narrator Elizabeth Acevedo did a phenomenal job in her performance of this book with accents and different voices for the cast. Highly recommended!
With that in mind, I was a little nervous when Zoboi’s Pride came my way.
The nerves were all for
If you’ve read the original, you know the basic storyline. A family of teenaged women with their own hopes, dreams, and baggage have a couple of cute young men “of class” thrust upon their quiet little life. In this case, that little life is not the English countryside but quickly gentrifying Brooklyn but the sentiment is largely the same.
Honestly, the newer version took my heart, perhaps because it was more relatable, perhaps because the young women were more interested in school and art and music than social status. Perhaps because I have a weird affinity for Brooklyn, I don’t know. Honestly, it’s probably just because Zoboi is clearly a gifted writer.
Regardless of the reason for my preference, the book was fantastic. Zuri, the somewhat guarded, academically inclined, second oldest, is the driving voice of the story (she stands in as the new Elizabeth Bennett if memory serves) and returns some much-needed sparkle to a drab old tale. Like the original, the boys were somewhat tedious but they did have their endearing qualities.
I don’t know if I just overlooked this nuance in the original but the commentary on the changing landscape of a city neighborhood was written so well it was almost a complete character of the book. It could have been written about Atlanta or Boston or L.A. and held up to the struggle many neighborhoods are facing (and have been facing) as rich, mostly white, homebuyers move in.
I haven’t read Zoboi’s first book but I’m off to go find that before I leave for vacation because if it’s anything like this one, I’ll fall in love.
The book starts with Zuri and her sisters as they watch the wealthy Darcy family move in across the street from them. Right away you can tell that this is a book where the sisters will fall in love with the charming Darcy brothers. However, the “twist” is that this book is set in Brooklyn and there are ramifications for Benitez’s welcoming the wealthy Darcy’s.
Overall this was just not my thing. The writing style is okay but I found it hard to engage with the story or the characters.
Zuri Benitez has lived in a run down apartment building in Bushwick for her whole life. Her family is everything to her and she's excited for her sister Janae to come home from college for the summer. When a wealthy family purchases the dumpy old house across the street and renovate it into a modern new house Zuri despises the changes she sees on her street. She doesn't warm up very much to the Darcy family that owns that house either.
Here's the rundown
Zuri - Elizabeth Bennet
Darius - Mr. Darcy
Ainsley - Mr. Bingley
Janae - Jane Bennet
Warren - Wickam
Marisol - Mary Bennet
Layla - Lydia Bennet
Kayla - Kitty Bennet
Carrie - Caroline Bingley
Georgia - Georgiana Darcy
Collin - Mr. Collins
Charlize - Charlotte
Catherine Darcy - Lady Catherine de Bourgh
Some personalities were altered to make them a little more likeable and others were kind of one-offs just for the nod towards the original material. In the end I still liked where the story went and even though the romance was lame I did like Zuri by the end.
It’s a truth universally acknowledged that when rich people move into the hood, where it’s a little bit broken and a little bit forgotten, the first thing they want to do is clean it up. But it’s not just the junky stuff they’ll get rid of. People can be thrown away too, like last night’s trash left out on sidewalks or pushed to the edge of wherever all broken things go. What those rich people don’t always know is that broken and forgotten neighborhoods were first built out of love.
Pride twists the events of Pride and Prejudice fit Zuri’s context, rather than the other way round. This allows the story explore cultural identity and class and dealing with change, and to be not so predictable for someone who knows Pride and Prejudice backwards; it means Zuri’s relationship with Darius makes sense for two 21st century teenagers.
Pride is a cute teen romance, but it’s most powerful as a love-letter to Zuri’s hood, to this world she’s grown up in. I listened to the audiobook, which helped bring Zuri’s hood to life even more vividly -- I got to hear the accents and the proper pronunciations and Zuri’s spoken-word poetry.
Zuri's
Poetry is interspersed throughout the narrative.
Elizabeth Acevado's narration is powerful in the audiobook.
Zuri is so angry all the time.
And not in a fun way.
There's a lot going on.
Darius was a great character. Although stuck-up at the start, the more Zuri and the reader got to know him, it became obvious that there was a vulnerable side to him. It was enjoyable watching his friendship with Zuri grow and deepen into something deeper.
I also loved the rick Haitian-Dominican culture that the author wove throughout the story. The food, sights and smells of the community were brought to life and the neighbourhood was like one large supportive family who cared and looked after each other. They celebrated and mourned together.
There were a couple of things I didn't enjoy about this book. One was the ending, I felt it was unsatisfactory, and the other was the romance. The chemistry between Zuri and Darius was missing making it unbelievable. The romance between Zuri's sister and Darius' brother was better portrayed.
Even though most teenage girls probably haven't read "Pride and Prejudice", I think they will enjoy "Pride" for its focus on strong characters, race and class distinctions, gentrification of suburbs, family and friendship, and prejudice. Overall, this novel was great entertainment with some beautiful poetry at the end of many chapters.
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So, something off. But it's definitely got some excellent passages and scenes. Just found myself wanting to read other things instead.
I enjoyed this story. It was a quick read. There are all the elements from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice but there are changes that fit today and the community that Zuri lives in as well as the teen characters. This was very well done and I am so glad I read it. Love the story line! Loved the writing!
This YA romance is set in the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn, and features a Dominican/Haitian family. The Benitez sisters are F I N E and everyone in the neighborhood knows it. Then a new family moves in. The Darcys are wealthy and have totally renovated
It's a pretty good retelling of Austen's classic Pride and Prejudice. No, these girls are not going to immediately wed the Darcy boys, but they do have the all-important sparks of interest. I could easily identify some of the situations and characters from the original.
I really liked Zuri (Elizabeth). She’s feisty, intelligent, true to herself, loyal to her family, and not about to take shade off Darius’s nose-in-the-air grandmother (think Lady Catherine de Bourgh). Ainsley (Bingley) and Janae (Jane) will start off like gangbusters, only to break off contact. The Charlotte/Mrs Collins relationship is here (though there is no hasty marriage), as is the Wickham/Lydia debacle (again no hasty marriage). One of my favorite scenes has no clear relationship to the original, and that is when Zuri performs one of her original poems.
All told, a totally satisfying retelling of a beloved classic.
Elizabeth Acevedo is quickly becoming a favorite narrator for me. She does a great job of the audio.
Sometimes I enjoyed the ways in which Pride and Prejudice was "remixed" by setting it in Brooklyn and addressing gentrification and neighborhood pride, but other times I thought it hewed so closely to the original material that I would have liked to see how these characters developed apart from a retelling. Zuri is a great character with even more attitude than the original Elizabeth, and she's a poet who dreams of going to Howard. The audiobook, read by author-poet Elizabeth Acevedo, makes for a fun way to experience Zuri's words, both prose and poem.