"Jane Austen's heir apparent" (Kirkus Reviews)--her great-great-grandniece Joan Austen-Leigh--follows her sparkling first novel, A Visit to Highbury, with another delightful sojourn to the village immortalized in Emma--a society in which the guest list for a ball or the unfortunate manners of a young lady are the things that truly matter.
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Joan Austen-Leigh is the great-great-grandniece of Jane Austen, and in this novel she attempts to recreate the world of Highbury, the village in Austen's novel Emma. Emma herself and Mr. Knightly (now happily married and ensconced in Donwell Abbey; Mr. Woodhouse is dead) are not, however, the main characters. Instead Ms. Austen-Leigh fleshes out the first novel's minor characters, chiefly Mrs. Goddard the schoolmistress, who had a non-speaking role in Emma. The world she describes is nonetheless undeniably Austenesque: matchmaking and breathless hopes of ensnaring eligible bachelors figure prominently, and there is much anticipation and maneuvering at dancing parties.
From Publishers Weekly
Jane Austen fans whose appetites haven't been satiated by the current adaptations of her work in film and TV productions may take some pleasure in this epistolary novel by Austen's great-great-grandniece. As in her earlier novel, A Visit to Highbury, Austen-Leigh attempts to enlarge on the story Austen constructed with such precision in Emma. Set in the Sussex village of Highbury, this extended version is told through the correspondence between Mrs. Goddard, mistress of the local school for girls, and her lonely sister, Mrs. Pinkney, now living in London. We learn that the Knightlys, the despicable Vicar Elton and his wife Augusta, Harriet and Robert Martin, the kind and beautiful Miss Elizabeth Martin and poor, chattering old Miss Bates are still thriving and carrying on about such matters as the importance of a new ball gown. Yet, there are big changes. Emma's family home, Hartfield, is now let to strangers. Mrs. Goddard rejects the sewing and crocheting that Emma did so brilliantly as "a most thorough-going waste of time." Even more unexpected in this world is Mrs. Goddard's praise for the bold way in which Mrs. Pinkney's niece runs away to Barbadoes with an Irish footman. Chiding her sister, Mrs. Goddard proclaims: "it is a new world, my dear Charlotte. We must all be prepared for change." Austen might have enjoyed such upheavals, but she would have rendered them with an exquisite, caustic irony that is missing from this bit of nostalgic fluff.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent dip into Jane Austen's world.,
By jillmwo "jillmwo" (Northeast Corridor) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Later Days at Highbury (Hardcover)
Most excellent. Correspondence flies between schoolmistress Goddard of Highbury and her married sister in London; between the insufferable Mrs. Elton and her sister of the renowned Maple Grove residence, between Captain Gordon and his married daughter. Familiar characters as well as new acquaintances mingle in this sequel to Jane Austen's Emma.A depth of knowledge relating to daily existence during the Regency period provides a solid background to this light fiction which also acts as a sequel to Austen-Leigh's previous novel, A Visit to Highbury (now out of print). Dialogue is exactly what one might expect of an Austen descendent. For example, Mrs. Goddard at a ball observes "...alas, there are always too many pretty girls and not enough men at a ball. I do not know why that should be. But it is quite an immutable law." Do not hesitate to give this to a young reader just discovering Jane Austen. Neither plot nor vocabulary should be cause for concern.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Emma continues!,
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This review is from: Later Days at Highbury (Hardcover)
This book is a follow up to "Later Days at Highbury," which is the story of Jane Austen's "Emma" told through the eyes of Mrs Goddard. She tells the story in a very interesting way: through letters.
Mrs. Goddard is a very minor character in Jane Austen's novel "Emma," but she is aware of everything that goes on in Highbury. She tells all the news and gossip to her sister. The book is made up entirely of their correspondence and a few letters from other characters. Warning: this book does not focus on Emma or Mr. Knightly or other major characters from Emma! Mrs. Goddard's life at the school and her students the main story here. One sub-plot is about Mrs. Pinkney (Mrs. Goddard's sister and her marriage to her husband) They live in London and run into the John Knightly's and the Eltons! Her husband has a niece who causes some trouble, as well as a scandal. What could the scandal be? Another subplot is about Miss Bates, who left town quite mysteriously and lives with the Churchill's. Is she happy there? You will have to read to find out. Since Mr. Elton has left town, there is a new vicar. He is young and eligable! He brings a friend from school. So new romances are included in the book. There are plenty of unwed females for them to choose from. Whom will be engaged by the end of this book? This book is such a delight. It is an easy read and you will enjoy the story through a lovely correspondence. It will make you want to practice the are of letter writing more often!
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good spin-off from Emma,
By Linda S. Myers (TN) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Later Days at Highbury (Hardcover)
Joan Austen-Leigh's Later Days at Highbury is a continuation of her A Visit to Highbury, which retells Emma from the viewpoint of Mrs. Goddard, head of the girls' school at Highbury. Later Days opens two years after the events in Emma. When the new spin-off opens, Mr. Woodhouse has just died, followed quickly by Mrs. Bates, the old vicar's widow. The Knighleys move back to Donwell Abbey, Hartfield is let to a wealthy young man, Mr. Pringle, and Miss Bates goes to live with Jane and Frank Churchill at Encombe. Later Days continues the exchange of letters format of A Visit, but it introduces letters from others in addition to Mrs. Goddard and her sister Mrs. Pinkney: the obnoxious Mrs. Elton and her sister Mrs. Suckling; Charlotte Gordon Marlowe and her father; Mrs. Pringle, mother of the young man who rents Hartfield; Mr. Pinkney's brother-in-law in Barbadoes. Other new characters include the new Highbury vicar, Charles Rutherford, who replaced Mr. Elton; Sophia Adams, Mr. Pinkney's niece, placed at the same dubious school as Charlotte Gordon in A Visit; and Elizabeth Martin, Robert Martin's sister, among others. While the introduction of these new characters and their various communications is necessary, overall it dilutes the impact of the familiar characters. The multiple storylines of Sophia Adams's unhappiness and running away from school, Captain Gordon's pension difficulties with the Royal Navy, the new twin parlor boarders at Mrs. Goddard's and their romantic ideas, the serious burns suffered at the Hartfield ball by Louisa Ludgrove, Miss Bates's strange silence after removing to Encombe, whether Mrs. Suckling will come to London to be shown off by Mrs. Elton, serve to give a sense of real life, when things are happening to different people simultaneously, but they are not as well developed as would be possible with fewer plotlines or with a longer novel (206 pages of well-spaced text).
That being said, Later Days at Highbury is one of the best sequel/spin-offs of Jane Austen that I have encountered. It features excellent characterization. The language and the tone are faithful to the original Austen work. I recommend it highly (but it would be better to read A Visit to Highbury first).
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