The Collins Effect
by Shana Granderson, a Lady
Genres: Historical Fiction, Literary Fiction
Release Date: January 20, 2026
Pages: 485
Get from: Amazon
My Rating: ★★★⯪☆
Some events in this tale are close to canon, but most deviate significantly. This one begins by examining the history of some families, the Bennets and Collins included. It delves into what made the characters who they are and the things in their lives which drive them to act the way that they do.
The Bingleys do lease Netherfield Park and Darcy comes with them. Collins invites himself to Longbourn as in Jane Austen’s masterpiece, but that is where the similarities end.
Among others, the story answers the following questions:
- What kind of parents are Thomas and Fanny Bennet?
- How do the Bennet offspring behave?
- Is Darcy his usual insulting, arrogant self?
- Is Bingley the same easily led man?
- What are Lady Catherine’s and Wickham’s roles?
- Do Biggs and Johns make an appearance, and if so how?
- What is the Collins effect?
Please join me as we look at the tale we all adore from a new perspective.
Review
NOTE: This review is based on an eBook I borrowed from Amazon as part of the Kindle Unlimited program.
There are **SPOILERS** in this review.
I applaud Ms. Granderson for coming up with an original story and including new-to-me pairings in Louisa Bingley and Mr. Bennet and Charlotte Lucas and Mr. Phillips. I’ve read so many Pride and Prejudice variations that it’s unusual to come across something new.
However, as is often the case, I have a few issues with The Collins Effect (TCE), although mostly minor. My largest issue is how Mr. Collins’ obesity seems to be equated with negativity. Ms. Granderson’s Mr. Collins is hardly the first character to have an unhealthy relationship with food. The book contains so many references to his eating unhealthily — either large amounts, unhealthy food, or both — and they serve no purpose to the story itself. It’s not as if Mr. Collins dies of a heart attack or choking on food and the scenes are a lead-up. Instead, Ms. Granderson seems to take delight in offering Mr. Collins’ obesity and unhealthy dependence on food for comfort as items of ridicule.
This Mr. Collins is broken, cruel, unintelligent, vindictive, unwilling to learn or attempt to better himself, and so many other things that he does not also need to be an object of ridicule for his poor coping mechanisms. His weight has no actual impact on the story, so it comes across as fat shaming.
*Phew* With that out of my system, I have a much more minor gripe. There is a weak storyline about a neighboring Hertfordshire family, the Kingstons, that could — and should, in my opinion — be edited out. It also plays no part in the overall story, instead serving to distract from it. In its place, I think Ms. Granderson could have done more with Lady Catherine and Caroline Bingley getting declared insane and ending up together in Bedlam. A quick note about them falling down the stairs in the epilogue feels like a wasted opportunity.
This book has the spelling and grammar errors that I’ve come to expect from a Shana Granderson book, but less than her earlier works, so I applaud her growth.
Enough complaining, onto the good stuff. Ms. Granderson did a creditable job of creating characters you want to succeed. Lulu and Mr. Bennet, especially — understandable, since TCE focuses on them — are well fleshed out and likeable. It’s been a while since I read a story with such an engaged Mr. Bennet.
Given that Lulu and Mr. Bennet were the focus of TCE — book title notwithstanding — I appreciate just how much information Ms. Granderson fits in about other characters and their relationships without resorting to the info dumps that characterized some of Ms. Granderson’s earlier works. Instead, the information is better integrated into the narrative in TCE. I think the epilogue would have been better suited to a narrative format, as some of the communications seemed odd for letters. Why, for example would you write to tell someone about an event they had seen or been part of?
Still, the story kept me reading, wanting to know what would happen next and how the villains would get their comeuppances.
Overall, TCE was enjoyable, and I look forward to reading Ms. Granderson’s future works and seeing how her writing continues to improve.
About the Author
I have three children and after a disastrous first marriage I found my soul mate who I thought that was lost to me over 25 years ago. I recently married the love of my life. I live with my soul mate in Australasia and have three pets, two cats, Darcy and Bingley and a golden lab, Honey.
Like many high school students, Pride and Prejudice was assigned to me in an English literature class. It was not my favourite book, but I read it as I had to. I forgot about the book until in my 30’s when I saw and fell in love with the 1995 Pride and Prejudice version made for TV in England, and purchased a copy of the DVD that is now much played.
The tipping point was the 2005 big screen adaption of P&P. Not long after seeing it I found and read the complete works of Jane Austen on Amazon, starting with Pride and Prejudice. The latter book is by far my favourite. After I read it three of four times over, I wistfully said to myself: ‘it is a great pity that Miss Austen never wrote a sequel to her seminal novel.’ One day I was searching Kindle books and for the fun of it I entered “Pride and Prejudice Sequel’ into the search not expecting any results.
The rest is history. I discovered the JAFF community and books. I became a veracious reader of JAFF books and once I had devoured all of the sequels and continuations that I could find, I read my first variation. I had been resisting variations wrongly thinking that I would not enjoy them as much as the sequels. Boy, was I ever wrong! Today I am the proud owner of well over 1,000 JAFF novels that I have purchased on Amazon. ‘A Change of Fortunes’ is my first book that I wrote. There are a number of others on the way.
Author links: Goodreads | Amazon Author Page
Have you read The Collins Effect? If so, what did you think of it? Let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear from you.
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