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Cover of The Shocking Experiments of Miss Mary Bennet

The Shocking Experiments of Miss Mary Bennet

by Melinda Taub

🌶️🌶️mild·spoiler

Why Read This?

Pride and Prejudice meets Frankenstein in the best possible way — Mary Bennet finally gets her story, building a monster and falling for Georgiana Darcy in a Gothic epistolary that is equal parts brilliant and heartbreaking.

Synopsis

An utterly fantastical and undeniably queer melding of Pride and Prejudice and Frankenstein that recasts Mary Bennet as an insatiable scientist, one who creates a monster in an attempt to save herself from spinsterdom Mary Bennet is the middlest middle child of all time. Awkward, plain, and overlooked, she’s long been out of favor not only with her own family but with generations of readers of Pride and Prejudice. But what was Mary really doing while her sisters were falling in love? Well, what does any bright, hardworking girl do in an age when brains and hard work are only valued if they come with a pretty face? Take to the attic and teach herself to reanimate the dead of course. The world refuses to make a place for peculiar Mary, but no Bennet sister ever gives up on happiness that easily. If it won’t give this fierce, lonely girl a place, she’ll carve one out herself. And if finding acceptance requires a husband, she’ll get one. Even if she has to make him herself, too. However, Mary’s genius and determination aren’t enough to control what she unwittingly unleashes. Her desperate attempts to rein in the destruction wreaked by her creations leads her to forge a perhaps unlikely friendship with another brilliant young woman unlike any she’s ever known. As that friendship blossoms into something passionate and all-consuming, Mary begins to realize that she may have to choose between the acceptance she’s always fought for and true happiness.

At a Glance

4.01 ★ Goodreads
Spice Level🌶️🌶️mild
Endingspoiler
PairingF/F
Romance Pacingslow burn

Top Tropes

slow burnforbidden lovefound family

Mood

darkatmosphericmysteriousbittersweetmagical

Book Details

Goodreads Rating

4.01 ★

Page Count

320 pages

Published

2025

Primary Genre

Gothic Romance

Pairing

F/F

POV

Epistolary / Mixed Media

Romance Pacing

Slow Burn

Cliffhanger

spoiler

Audiobook

Available

Yes

Format

Single Narrator

Narrator

Amy Hoggert

Narrator Count

1

Tropes

RomanceMagicActionAngstWorld
Theme Constellation

sign in to see all 5 tropes

Mood & Vibe

Mood

sign in to see writing style, pacing & more

Characters

FMC: bookworm/scholar sign in to unlock

Spice Details 🌶️

restrained Regency-era sapphic romance — passion is intellectual and emotional with brief physical intimacy, more longing than explicit sign in to unlock

self-harmgraphic violencemurderdeathbody horrormisogynyhomophobiascientific experimentationgriefemotional manipulation

World & Setting

historical sign in to unlock

Reading Context

the angst delivered sign in to unlock

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