TO AUSTENLAND AND BACK TO REALITY

I have been posting about it  for a while on My Jane Austen Book Club facebook page: pictures, news, trailers, clips, interviews,  whatever I could find about it. Expectations and anticipations grew my wish to see it. Now it is time to write my review. Ready to join me to Austenland ? 

I was really curious about this movie - though I haven't read the book so far -  so I watched it as soon as I grabbed my copy of the DVD and it was an actually funny ride through Austen-fandom-fairy-land. What do

JANE AUSTEN AND THE ARCHANGEL - QUICK CHAT WITH PAMELA AARES & GIVEAWAY

“Jane Austen and the Archangel-- Jane Finds True Love!

My Jane Austen Book Club is featuring a quick chat with author Pamela Aares to remind you that Jane Austen and the Archangel is on sale for a limited time on Amazon for $.99! Grab your copy now or take your chances to win an ebook copy in the rafflecopter form below this post.

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You were working on an entirely different book in a different time period when you began work on Jane Austen and the Archangel. How’d that happen?

I was putting the finishing touches on a historical romance set in 1851 (The Lady and the Patriot coming out in Fall/Winter 2014), complete with loads of daring adventures around the globe, a hot, hunky American hero and feisty English heiress with a nose for natural history, when a flash of golden light kept appearing at the same time every day in my new home in the country.

VALENTINE'S DAY AT PEMBERLEY OR DEATH COMES TO PEMBERLEY DVD IS OUT!

Yep! I decided to spend a few hours at Pemberley today. The excitement of young Valentine's Days gone, nothing's better than a journey into romance and mystery. Dreams and old memories, do they really help on Valentine's Day? I'm not in a bad mood, not sad nor unhappy, not melancholic nor nostalgic. So the answer is, DEFINITELY YES, they helped a lot.   I played  my new DVDs  and  off I went on a very romantic Valentine voyage.   All alone,  but not truly.

I had already seen Death Comes to Pemberley when it was on BBC One during last Christmas holidays but to re-watch it has given me the chance to enjoy little details that had gone missed at a first view. 

Death Comes to Pemberley, P. D. James's sequel to Pride and Prejudice, is now available on DVD  ( check it out HERE)  and you can watch it on your TV or computer screen as many times as you wish and add it to your Austen - inpired DVD collection. 

This mini-series has  been a pleasant surprise for me, since I didn't expect to like it much. I wasn't that fond of P.D. James 's murder mystery set at Pemberley when I read it,  so I was ready to be bored and even more disappointed by its TV adaptation. Instead, in my opinion,  Juliette Towhidi's script improved the plot, enriching it with short flashbacks and giving it a fast paced rhythm it didn't have. 

MR DARCY'S PROMISE - BLOG HOP & GIVEAWAY

Hello and welcome to Mr Darcy's Promise Blog Hop! I hope you remember Jeanna Ellsworth and her P&P - inspired book. "Both" were my guests here at My Jane Austen Book Club not long ago (check out my interview HERE). Jeanna has now invited me to join the fun of a Valentine's Blog Hop to give you all,  dear readers, the chance to buy her novel at an extraordinarily cheap price or  to win and read her Mr Darcy's Promise. 

Here are your chances:

PRIDE AND PREJUDICE PREQUEL FREE FOR VALENTINE'S DAY!

200 years after the publication of Pride and Prejudice, Melanie Kerr is giving away the eBook of her new novel, whichtreats readers to the complete and dramatic history of Mr. Darcy and Mr. Wickham. Follies Past:a Prequel to Pride and Prejudice, will be available to download for free HERE  from February 10 – 14, 2014. 

To read this book is to step back into the charming world of Jane Austen’s England, to pass a few more hours with some of her beloved characters, sympathetically portrayed as they might have been before ever they came to Netherfield.

In Pride and Prejudice, everything hinges on a letter which Mr. Darcy gives Elizabeth - a letter setting forth all his dealings with Mr. Wickham. These facts, supplied by Austen herself, are at the heart ofFollies Past. The drama begins almost a year before the opening of Pride and Prejudice itself, at Pemberley, at Christmas. We follow young Georgiana Darcy to London, to Ramsgate and to the brink of a perilous elopement. Along the way, readers will discover a host of new characters, with compelling histories of their own.Authentic in its use of language andmeticulously researched, Follies Past is a truly diverting entertainment.

MEET AUTHOR SAMANTHA JAYNE ADKINS & WIN HER AUSTEN-INSPIRED BOOKS

My relationship with Jane Austen began on T.V.  In fact, when I finally read Pride and Prejudice and university, I wrote a paper complaining how the 1995 BBC version got it better.  How embarrassing.  However, I still hear people bemoan the language of Jane Austen, and Shakespeare for that matter.  For those of us who read either writer for pleasure, this can be difficult to understand, but as a teacher and fan, I often encourage struggling students to start with the movies. 

                My own foray into Jane Austen fan-fiction was inspired by a PBS marathon of Jane Austen adaptations.  Every Sunday night for several months, once my babies were tucked into bed, I settled into the couch in the middle of a long Canadian winter to indulge in the fantasy of a flower-speckled English countryside filled with lively characters and plot twists.  At some point, I thought to myself “What if there were a sequel to Pride and Prejudice?”  I had no idea at the time that hundreds of Jane Austen-themed books already existed, or I probably would have just bought one, but I was between novel projects and thought I’d write a sequel as a short story for my sister’s upcoming birthday.

                Shortly into my “short story”, I realized I would need a lot more space that a short story offered.  I wrote furiously, daydreaming about the book when I wasn’t writing.  I could only offer my sister the first volume by her birthday, which I printed off my computer with a cover featuring photos I copied and pasted from the internet.  I was able to give her the second and third volume within a year, but I was already thinking others might like to read the book I was calling “Expectations.” 

ELIZABETH'S BENNET FORGOTTEN SISTER - INTERVIEW WITH PAMELA MINGLE

The anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice has recently had Jane Austen fans around the world celebrating Elizabeth, Darcy, and the entire Bennet clan--well, perhaps not the entire clan. Mary Bennet, the bookish and often forgotten middle sister, gets a well-deserved fleshing out in author Pamela Mingle’s sequel to Austen’s works: The Pursuit of Mary Bennet. 

Read Kelly Gallucci's  interview with Pamela Mingle from Bookish Blog  

(thanks to Bookish Blog for wanting to share at My Jane Austen Book Club) 

GUEST POST & GIVEAWAY : THE COMPANION OF HIS FUTURE LIFE BY JACK CALDWELL

Hello, everybody, Jack Caldwell here. It’s been a while since I’ve been here. Last time I talked about my grand sequel to Pride & Prejudice and Sense & Sensibility, THE THREE COLONELS – Jane Austen’s Fighting Men.

Today, I’m going to introduce my latest book, a comic re-imagining of Pride & Prejudice called THE COMPANION OF HIS FUTURE LIFE.

Some of you may recognize this title. It was on the fan fiction boards several year ago, and was warmly received. For those unfamiliar with the book, I’ll give you a short synopsis.

One of the great "what-ifs" among Pride & Prejudice aficionados is: If Mr. Collins married Mary Bennet instead of Charlotte Lucas, how would that influence Mr. Darcy's dogged pursuit of the elusive Elizabeth?

I take that thought and run with it. In my story, Mr. Collins decides that a pretty and pious Mary would make him a better wife than a lovely and lively Lizzy. Because Mary is now living in Hunsford as Mrs. Collins, Jane joins Elizabeth visiting Rosings Park at Easter. Yep, Jane’s in Hunsford, too, right when Mr. Darcy and Colonel Fitzwilliam visit. Does that mean Jane is there when Colonel Big-Mouth spills the beans about Mr. Bingley? What do you think?