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 …
Category: General
To Cambridge We Will Go…
Or is it to Oxford? Or Eton? Or to Mrs Goddards’? “No governess!” How was that possible?” Five daughters brought up at home without a governess! I never heard of such a thing! Your mother must have been quite a slave to your education.” ~Lady Catherine de Bourgh With the ‘dog days’ of summer …
Elizabeth Takes a Walk
Good day! The monthly theme for August is ‘Up the Garden Path’. My vignette is loosely based on it, and I drew inspiration from my nifty little Nancy Drew book once again. This time the quote I choose is “The best way to clear one’s mind is to commune with nature” from The Hidden Staircase. …
JAV Author Spotlight with Shannon Winslow
Happy Friday, everyone! I’m excited to announce a brand new feature here at Austen Variations: a series of interviews with our very own JAV authors! Today, I will be interviewing Shannon Winslow, who, coincidentally, celebrated the 10th anniversary of her first book The Darcy’s of Pemberley just this week! Since then, Shannon has published a …
Happy Birthday to The Darcys of Pemberley – Celebration and Giveaway!
When your firstborn turns 10, it’s only fitting that you should throw a party, right? That’s what’s happening today. My very first novel – The Darcys of Pemberley – was published exactly ten years ago today, and what a difference that decade has made in my life! You should know that when I started writing …
A Sneak Peek: Entangled, A Short Pride and Prejudice Variation
Hi everyone, I hope the summer is treating you well. Here in London we’ve had a heatwave lasting around ten days followed by torrential rain and flooding yesterday. At least the plums in our garden are ripe. We picked the first batch this afternoon. I wonder whether Elizabeth and Darcy liked plums? If they did, …
That Which We Call a Rose…
“That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” ~Romeo and Juliet To love and appreciate something, you really have to understand it; understand the layers, choices, and in-depth intricacies of the whole package. Whether it’s why someone uses cayenne pepper in hot chocolate, or ranch dressing instead of ketchup …
Avoiding ‘Busy Nothings’
Hello, fellow Janeites! My name is Anngela Schroeder, and I am the newest member of Austen Variations. I’ve been writing in the lovely world of JAFF for five years with six novels and four short stories published and more on the way. My journey here began before I even realized it. Having three brothers, and …
Elinor Seeks Solace in a Maze
Hello everyone! This month’s theme is “Caught in a Maze”, and I decided to use it as inspiration and see what I could come up with for a vignette. Having no real ideas, I thought I’d finally do something I’ve been considering for months and use a prompt from this amusing little book that was …
A Persuasion Short Story
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 …
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