BACK TO NORTHANGER ABBEY: A CONVERSATION WITH NANCY BILYEAU

What happened to Catherine Morland after Northanger Abbey ended? Jane Austen left us with a young woman who had discovered that life—and people—could be rather more complicated than the Gothic novels she loved. But what might Catherine's life look like twenty-two years later?

Today, I'm delighted to welcome Nancy Bilyeau to My Jane Austen Book Club to talk about her new novel, The Heiress of Northanger Abbey, which brings Catherine back to us as Catherine Tilney, now a wife and mother facing a new generation of family challenges, mysteries, and perhaps a little Gothic danger along the way.

In our conversation, Nancy tells us what inspired her to return to Austen's beloved heroine, how she approached Catherine's character as an adult, and how she balanced the Gothic atmosphere of Northanger Abbey with her own story. She also shares her thoughts on Catherine's relationship with her daughter Phoebe, historical authenticity, and what she hopes readers will feel when they reach the final page.

So, dear readers, let's return to Northanger Abbey—and welcome Nancy Bilyeau! 📚 

Maria Grazia💕

AN EVER- FIXED MARK BY ANGELA DENISE, A FRESH TAKE ON LOVE AND DESTINY

 

There is something endlessly fascinating about returning to the world of Pride and Prejudice through new and imaginative variations, and An Ever-Fixèd Mark by Angela Denise offers readers a particularly engaging journey.

OUT TODAY! TO MARK THE OCCASION: BIRTHDAY TALES FOR JANE AUSTEN'S 250TH

Celebrate Jane Austen’s 250th with “To Mark the Occasion: Birthday Tales for Jane Austen’s 250th”

This December, literature lovers and Jane Austen fans have a very special reason to celebrate. In honor of Jane Austen’s 250th birthday, a new anthology, To Mark the Occasion: Birthday Tales for Jane Austen’s 250th, brings together ten talented Austenesque authors who reimagine the lives, loves, and festivities of some of Austen’s most beloved characters.

MR DARCY'S BOOKSHOP, A PRIDE AND PREJUDICE VARIATION BY SUMMER HANFORD. INTERVIEW & GIVEAWAY

Today, here at My Jane Austen Book Club, we have the pleaatting with Summer Hanford, the brilliant mind behind the new Pride and Prejudice Variation, Mr. Darcy's Bookshop. Welcome, Summer! Could you start by telling us what inspired you to explore the idea of Fitzwilliam Darcy as a bookseller?sure of ch

Hi Maria Grazia! First, thank you so much for hosting me today. I’m very excited to be here at My Jane Austen Book Club. Thank you for putting together such a nice gathering place for the Austenesque community.

NEW RELEASE! SPELLS AND SHADOWS BY VICTORIA KINCAID

Welcome to My Jane Austen Book Club! We're delighted to have the talented author Victoria Kincaid as our guest again! Today, we're diving into the magical world of Pride & Prejudice with her latest release, Spells and Shadows. In this captivating fantasy variation, Mr. Darcy finds himself entangled in a dangerous mission as a secret agent for the Mages' Council. Fleeing from an evil necromancer, Darcy's path crosses with Elizabeth Bennet, a skilled mage at Longbourn estate. As secrets, spells, and shadows enshroud their budding relationship, they must navigate a treacherous web of danger and deception. Scroll down for an exciting excerpt from Spells and Shadows as we discover how Elizabeth and Jane stumble upon Darcy in the most unexpected circumstances. Will they be able to protect themselves and their loved ones from the malevolent necromancer's sinister plots? Dive into this enchanting Pride & Prejudice variation, where love is entwined with magic and mystery. You won't want to miss this thrilling adventure! Spells and Shadows is now available on Amazon. Let the journey into Regency fantasy begin! MG 💕

AUTHOR GUEST POST & EXCERPT: AMANDA KAI, A FAVORABLE IMPRESSION

Hi Maria Grazia, thanks so much for having me back at My Jane Austen Book Club to help me celebrate the release of A Favorable Impression!

This is the second book in my series of Regency-era standalones, each featuring a different path to Happily Ever After for Darcy and Elizabeth. I guess you could say that each book takes place in a different “universe”, with all the same characters appearing, but with varying circumstances, which makes for a unique story in each, even though they are all patterned after Pride and Prejudice, and they all arrive at the same destination in the end. I suppose that is why we love Pride and Prejudice variations so much though, right? 

THE SAILOR'S REST, THE NAVAL ADVENTURE JANE AUSTEN MIGHT HAVE WRITTEN. GUEST POST & GIVEAWAY.

 

The Naval Adventure Jane Austen Might Have Written

 The Sailor’s Rest, the latest Austenesque novel by Don Jacobson, has been released worldwide on March 28, 2023. Published independently, this is the author’s twelfth variation using Austen’s Canon as a basis for the story. The book is a cross-over (not a mash-up) of Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion. For plot purposes, the novel (approx. 117,000 words) is set on the Persuasion timeline in 1815. However, the age and plot constructs from Pride and Prejudice have been maintained to establish context.

NEW! THE BARRISTER'S BRIDE BLOG TOUR: EXCERPT AND GIVEAWAY

  

I'm so very happy to welcome Suzan Lauder back to My Jane Austen Book Club and to kick off  a new Blog Tour for her just released  Austen-inspired novel, The Barrister's Bride. Ready to discover more? Just scroll down and enjoy. Oh! And good luck in the giveaway contest! MG

BLOG TOUR, A PROMISE OF FOREVER BY CHRISTINE COMBE

 

Thank you for having me, Maria Grazia — I am so very happy to be stopping by today.

 

Greetings fellow Austenians, and welcome to the first day of my blog tour! I am very excited to be visiting My Jane Austen Book Club once again to talk about a new book. Available on Amazon starting today is A Promise of Forever, my second standalone Austen variation. This book is the fourth JAFF novel I’ve published since I began in the genre in 2018, and I really hope you’ll like it as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it.

BLOG TOUR - ANN GALVIA, SIDE BY SIDE WITH SENSE AND SENSIBILITY + GIVEAWAY

I uploaded my very first Pride and Prejudice fanfic to the internet on April 23, 2014. Barely over two years later, I’m here at My Jane Austen Book Club, embarking on a blog tour celebrating the release of my first Austen-based novel. This seems to me to be a very large distance covered in only two years. For most of that time, Side by Side, Apart has been occupying a huge chunk of my mind. Since I am sort of a clingy person and not quite ready to let go, I want to use my blog tour as an opportunity to talk about all the things that went into building the world of the novel and how, even though this is a Pride and Prejudice story, Jane Austen’s other completed works were never far from my mind as I wrote it. Today, I want to talk about world enough and time and Sense and Sensibility.

Side by Side, Apart picks up eleven years after the marriage of Fitzwilliam Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet. One of the first things I had to consider was how eleven years had changed the characters since last we saw them. And that went for everyone, not just Lizzy and Darcy. Where is Kitty? Where is Georgiana? Has Mr. Collins inherited Longbourn, or is Mr. Bennet still around? If Mr. Bennet is alive, how is he managing living at Longbourn with just the missus and no daughters acting as a buffer?

SUDDENLY MRS DARCY BLOG TOUR - JENETTA JAMES, THE BIRTHING OF A JAFF FAN GIRL. WIN AN EBOOK COPY (INTERNATIONAL)

2 years ago I hadn’t even heard of fan fiction, let alone Jane Austen fan fiction. If I had seen the acronym JAFF written down, I might have thought it was one of those error messages I don’t understand that pop up on my computer screen from time to time. I had always been a voracious reader, but somehow this was a landscape that had passed me by, a path that I didn’t even know was there.

Then I found myself pregnant with our second child when our first was only 7 months old and somehow, as well as making me feel pretty sick, it stirred up the old romantic in me. Up went the feet and out came the self-pity chocolates. On a whim, I dusted off my DVD of the old 1995 Pride & Prejudice mini-series. It wasn’t long before I was as hooked as I had been when it was first broadcast, aged 14. It occurred to me that it wouldn’t hurt to re-read the novel, and so I did that as well.

Before I knew where I was, I was living with Lizzy and Darcy. I just couldn’t get them out of my head. What happened next? What became of them? The possibilities danced around my mind. Jane Austen is famous for having written perfectly of “two inches of ivory”, so what about the rest of the fabric? What about the character’s lives behind closed doors? What about the world below stairs? What about the male friendships which go unexamined in the original? The permutations seemed endless.

SO FAR AWAY BY P.O. DIXON - READ AN EXCERPT AND WIN A COPY!

From the Author

I am happy for the chance to visit My Jane Austen Book Club once again to share an excerpt from my newest release, So Far Away. Thank you so much, Maria Grazia!

In Lady Elizabeth: Everything Will Change Book One, Darcy made an astonishing discovery that set him on a course destined to change Elizabeth’s life forever. So Far Away: Everything Will Change Book Two centers upon the aftermath of Darcy’s discovery.

The Book

So Far Away: Everything Will Change Book Two

Now that Elizabeth knows the truth about her past, she has returned to Longbourn. Wanting to reclaim her rightful place in the lives of her Bennet relations, she needs time before considering a life far away in Derbyshire with Mr. Darcy.

He promised he would wait for her for as long as it takes. With so much distance between the two of them the question soon became how long is too long.

SPOTLIGHT ON ... GOODNIGHT, MR DARCY ( A BABY LIT PARODY ) - HOW TO INTRODUCE VERY YOUNG READERS TO JANE AUSTEN'S WORLD

About the Book  

The adored children’s classic Goodnight Moon gets a classic lit makeover in this charming parody of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice novel. In the opening of Goodnight Mr. Darcy ($16.99, Jacketless Hardcover, 10 x 8-1/2 in, 32 pages, 978-1-4236-3670-0), all of Austen’s much-loved characters are at the Netherfield Ball: In the great ballroom, there was a country dance, and a well-played tune, and Elizabeth Bennett; and Mr. Darcy surprised, by a pair of fine eyes . . . And don’t forget Jane with a blush and Mr. Bingley turned to mush, and a gossiping mother and father saying hush.

Parents and toddlers alike will enjoy this new take on Austen’s timeless work à la Goodnight Moon.

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. 

SPOTLIGHT ON ..." HAPPY BIRTHDAY MR DARCY" BY VICTORIA CONNELLY + E-BOOK GIVEAWAY

Happy Birthday Mr. Darcy" is the fifth installment in the Austen Addicts series by Victoria Connelly. I've read and loved them all, could I miss this new one? 
A delightful novella set in the magnificent Purley Hall,  where two of the lovely characters we met first time in "A Weekend with Mr Darcy" are going to get married: Katherine Roberts and Warwick Lawton. 

It's been great to join all the familiar characters again and follow them while preparing themselves to take part in the wedding celebrations. Dame Pamela, Robyn and Dan, Higgins, Doris Noris, Mrs Soames, Mia Castle, Shelley Quantock, Gabe and Pie are excited to take part in a real Regency-style celebration. 

It is not only a great moment for Katherine and Warwick, but also Mr Darcy's birthday! And can the 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice not influence the cheerful atmosphere at the Hall and the festive plans of such enthusiastic Austen fans? 

This is a fast paced, light-hearted novella you can plan to read on a rainy autumn day, in order to lit it up with romance, comedy and a lot of Austen quotes and references. 

MY OWN MR DARCY: BOOK REVIEW, BLOG TOUR AND GIVEAWAY

My review

Can going to the cinema with your mum and best friend change your outlook on life and, especially, on  men? Can a  fictional  character wreck your love life? Elizabeth Barrett, the protagonist  of  My Own Mr Darcy, would answer YES to both questions, of course.

She unwillingly follows her mother to the cinema to see  Pride and Prejudice  only because,  probably, that will help her avoid reading Jane Austen’s book for a project. So she asks her best mate to go with her. Unexpectedly, seeing Matthew MacFadyen as brooding, fascinating Darcy on the huge screen brings her to quite surprising outcomes.

 Pride and Prejudice  becomes her favourite book, she reads it on and on dreaming of Mr Darcy and looking forward to meeting her own dashing gentleman one day.

But, as we well know, reality can very rarely be  compared to the world of perfection we create in our minds while reading, so what expects Elizabeth is a love life of disappointment and disillusionment: there is not one man who is Mr Darcy enough.

TALKING JANE AUSTEN WITH ... JEANNA ELLSWORTH + GIVEAWAY OF MR DARCY'S PROMISE

Hello,  Jeanna, and welcome at My Jane Austen Book Club. My first question for you is: When and How did your lucky encounter with Jane Austen take place?

My very first encounter was at a garage sale at least 10 years ago where I picked up my first copy of Pride and Prejudice (couldn’t tell you where that copy went since then). My reintroduction was with the 2005 movie, of which I loved and bought a copy immediately. But it wasn’t until my sister, KaraLynne Mackrory, started writing JAFF books and sending me the chapters as she wrote them that I went from liking the book, to loving the story, to obsessing over it and becoming a badge-wearing-fully-fledged-hopeless addict.  That was January 2012. I remember it well because my divorce had been final for just over a year and I hadn’t ventured into the dating world yet. Darcy looked pretty darn good to a romance-starved single mother of three daughters.

How did it change your life?

It has changed my life in so many ways. First, I started reading every JAFF book I could find on Amazon.com, at the library, loaned from my fellow JAFF addict sister, and those I researched online. I currently have about 6 JAFF books on my kindle waiting for me to read, a few more on my wish list on Amazon, and I just ordered another that will be coming in the mail.  I get a little jittery when I don’t have a “to be read next” list. But it is more than that. It changed the way I look at life. I wish I could be more like Elizabeth Bennet. My bad marriage and good divorce (let’s face it, a good divorce is better than any bad marriage) left me with a lack of faith in men in general and a sense of I-can-do-it-on-my-own-I-don’t-need-a-man attitude. I also went from repressing my inner Lizzy due to shell shock, to being a little impertinent at times, more so than before I fell in love with Elizabeth Bennet. It changed my vocabulary which now has affected my daughters’ vocabulary as well, whose affirmative answer to me when I ask them a question is now “Indeed”. It made me push myself outside of my very comfortable (and single) life into one where I risk loving and being loved, all because now I believe there are real Mr. Darcys out there, and let’s face it, I kind of would like to find a Mr. Darcy. And of course, it changed the fact that now I am an author, a title I never thought I wanted for myself.

SUSAN ADRIANI, DARKNESS FALLS UPON PEMBERLEY - AUTHOR GUEST POST + GIVEAWAY OF A SIGNED PAPERBACK

When I wrote Darkness Falls Upon Pemberley I was hard at work on what will soon be my second full-length novel, In Doubt of Mr. Darcy. I was pretty much buried beneath a massive amount of regency-period research, the lot of which was starting to overwhelm me at the time, especially with my daughter starting third grade and having a mountain of homework each night. In short, I needed a breather before I made myself go mad and ended up needing a vacation!

At the time, it was early autumn here in the United States, which meant that one of my favorite holidays was fast approaching in October: Halloween. As it so happened, the group blog I belong to, Austen Authors, where I’ve been a member since its inception in 2010, was preparing to celebrate the spookiest month of the year as well. Several fellow authors who’d written books with a supernatural twist to them—Regina Jeffers, Mary Lydon-Simonsen, and Colette Saucier to name a few—were planning to include excerpts of their stories throughout the month, but there were a lot of slots to be filled. I started to think about how much fun it would be to contribute something in honor of the upcoming holiday. Unfortunately, the supernatural wasn’t something I’d so much as dipped my big toe into back then, but it was something I enjoyed reading, especially if there was a love story to be told.

Talking Jane Austen with ... Ulrike Böhm from Germany - Author of "Ein Engel für Mr. Darcy" (An Angel for Mr Darcy)

Hello Ulrike and welcome to our little Austen club online. First of all thanks for accepting my invitation to talk Jane Austen with me and here’s my first question: You & Jane.  When was your first encounter with Austen and her work? What was it like?

Hi Maria Grazia! First and foremost, let me thank you for your warm welcome and for giving me the opportunity to introduce my first novel to your blog readers.

My first encounter with a book by our Jane was in a library. I was 16 or 17 and an avid reader of all sorts of books. At that time I lived in a small village and the village library was literally my second home. One day I borrowed “Pride and Prejudice” and simply couldn’t put it down until I’d read it through. And then I started anew...Since then I read all of Jane Austen’s novels but none is as dear to me as “Pride and Prejudice”. I regularly read it all over again and again, it never tires me.

How came you started writing an  Austen-inspired book instead?

Not instead. Rather as well. I love to read not only the original by Jane Austen’s pen but I’m also a great fan of the so-called Fan Fiction. I started with reading them online, there are zillions of according websites as you and your readers must know. Then I discovered Amazon making it easy for me to order books from abroad and therefore “real” printed Fan Fiction  – prequels and sequels and parallels. I must have bought up to 160 different titles until now, I lost count as I started to buy ebooks. It won’t be long and they’ll outweigh the paper books.

BOOK BLAST & GIVEAWAY - MY OWN MR DARCY BY KAREY WHITE

My Own Mr. Darcy 

After being dragged to the 2005 movie Pride and Prejudice by her mother, sixteen-year-old Elizabeth’s life changes when Matthew Macfadyen’s Mr. Darcy appears on the screen. Lizzie falls hard and makes a promise to herself that she will settle for nothing less than her own Mr. Darcy. This ill-advised pledge threatens to ruin any chance of finding true love. During the six intervening years, she has refused to give any interested suitors a chance. They weren’t Mr. Darcy enough. Coerced by her roommate, Elizabeth agrees to give the next interested guy ten dates before she dumps him. That guy is Chad, a kind and thoughtful science teacher and swim coach. While she’s dating Chad, her dream comes true in the form of a wealthy bookstore owner named Matt Dawson, who looks and acts like her Mr. Darcy. Of course she has to follow her dream. But as Elizabeth simultaneously dates a regular guy and the dazzling Mr. Dawson, she’s forced to re-evaluate what it was she loved about Mr. Darcy in the first place.

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