Happy end of October! Below you’ll find Part III of the story I began here and continued here, in honor of this month’s theme, Which Witch: Magic and Malevolence in Austen. Many years ago, when I was posting regularly on one of the fan boards, I claimed to be the Wickham of my own life—and …
Greetings, Austen Friends! I hope October has been as lovely for you as it’s been for me. You should see the trees around my house: flaming reds, sunset oranges, lemon yellows…I find myself wanting to spend all my time taking walks and staring up at trees. However, I do occasionally have to teach…and I get …
Happy October! When I saw this month’s theme—“Which Witch: Magic and Malevolence in Austen”—I was frightened, terribly frightened! While magic and malevolence are perfect concepts for the month of Halloween, I have never once attempted a fantastical Austenesque variation. Many authors—many here at Austen Variations—have written compelling Austenesque fantasies; indeed, they have taken some of …
Greetings! I return to posting with no little embarrassment. Indeed, I’m blushing like Charles Bingley in Lucy Marin’s fabulous short story, “The Travails of Charles Bingley.” Look at me, showing up in Meryton months and months after I departed without explanation! (But Jane, I have missed you—truly!) I can make no excuses. Nonetheless, I will …
Greetings, friends! Happy 2022! I’m sorry I disappeared from Austen Variations (and from the Internet more generally) these past few months. In late July, I was asked, unexpectedly, to teach high school English. What an adventure! Though I often feel as if I don’t know what I’m doing, I’ve had a great experience so far. …
When Friday the thirteenth occurs during a summer month, it never seems quite as spooky to me as when it falls in October. Still, it is Friday the thirteenth, and while Austen was surely too rational to care much for superstitions, I am not a particularly rational person. So, here is a short scene from …
Happy July, friends! I’m offering a story I had hoped to share in June, when the theme was “Blossoming Love.” Needless to say, I proved once again my immunity to deadlines! So here I am, in July, with a short story I had not really meant to write. Some of you may know that I …
Happy June to you all! When I was thinking about this month’s theme, “Blossoming Love,” I realized that I rarely set a story in summer. Nor do I have many flowers in my novels (or, when I do, I tend to put them in seasons not meant for those flowers)! All of these thoughts brought …
Can you believe it is almost the end of May? I have had so much fun this first month after joining Austen Variations! I’ll admit, however, that I was more than a little daunted by the prospect of writing a vignette for this month’s theme, “A Mother’s Love.” Then I tried to imagine what, if …
Love and Absence Here in the U.S. it is almost Mother’s Day—a holiday that inspires a complicated mixture of love and disquiet in me. The love is easy: I have an amazing mother and a delightful stepmother. Then there is the joy of celebrating the day with my ten-year-old daughter, who has hinted that I …
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