Category: book excerpt
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Song of Pemberley
In 2021 I started a novel called ‘Song of Pemberley’ but never finished it. Between selling my house in Texas, packing up everything and moving to Illinois, a number of things fell to the wayside until lately. Now, I’m working on playing catchup, and you know how much fun that is. However, since I am…
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The Horses
Darcy stood silently, admiring the fearless way in which she approached the large, spirited animal. Many women were afraid of him, and indeed he seemed to tower over Miss Bennet. “Miss Bennet, I am glad we met this morning,” he began. Last May, I introduced you to two couples of deerhounds, one pair at Pemberley,…
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Vertigo in the Regency
In January of this year, after having 4 barometric migraines in 5 days, I found myself on the floor in my library, vomiting into the trash bin. For the next two weeks, I was told I had positional vertigo, but they didn’t want to treat it beyond medications to control the dizziness and nausea until…
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Hearts Unspoken and the Promise of a Love Meant to Be
It’s that time of year — autumn. Why the end of summer always feels like the promise of a new beginning for me is anybody’s guess. I love the season the most, especially when I have a new release. When I shared an early cover mock-up on my YouTube channel, I asked my community what…
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All The World’s A Stage
We just returned home from our second visit of the summer to the Stratford Festival here in Ontario to end the summer with a celebration of theatre. This time, it was all Shakespeare! The festival—being in a place called Stratford, which is most conveniently on the River Avon—concentrates on The Bard’s works, and has a…
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Blackbirds in Austen’s World
The war widow: sentimental depiction of a grieving woman whose husband has gone to fight in the South African War. Photograph of The Boer War, a painting by John Byam Shaw. &&&& These reflections upon military widowhood in Austen’s time found root in the first and seventh volumes of the Bennet Wardrobe Series, where Lydia…
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Your opinion on which next story
Yes, it is that time once again. Time for the ramblings of Melanie. This time is one of my favorites and least favorites in the year. Why? Because of all the delicious produce. I grew up in a farming community in central Illinois. When the produce came on, you were busy. Green beans, peas, and…
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Excerpt from “Reputation, An Easy Thing to Lose”
Please enjoy this excerpt from my first novel, Reputation An Easy Thing to Lose.
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All the World’s A Stage – Sense and Sensibility, the theatre, and a new novel
I am most fortunate to live within an easy drive of one of North America’s best summer theatre festivals, the Stratford Festival in Stratford, Ontario, Canada. We are great theatre fans in this family, and make a point of going to several performances each summer. Sometimes we spend the night, other times we drive there…
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Setting the Stage
For a JAFF author, the plot is queen. A simple statement, I think, revealing a fundamental truth about our genre. An author can comfortably use the geography supplied by Austen to offer stories to readers thoroughly familiar with the lay of the land or building. Hundreds of stories have spoken of Pemberley glowing in the…