Austenland by Shannon Hale

I just finished reading "Austenland" by Shannon Hale, and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you enjoy a contemporary romance with Regency overtones, this book is for you. The heroine is obsessed with Colin Firth's Darcy and is given an opportunity to experience the Regency lifestyle at a Regency theme-park style resort. The real and make-believe worlds collide and for a while it's anyone's guess which will triumph.

The heroine's confusion became my confusion for a while--I can't decide if that was good writing or bad writing--or just my problem . The heroine was definitely conflicted about what she was experiencing and her tussles with truth and fiction became bewildering. Eventually however the heroine and this reader settled down. For a while toward the end, I thought the writer might be going to sermonize on the ills of expecting real life to imitate fiction, but she avoided that trap. A happy ending was believably achieved, and there were some good insights along the way.
An enjoyable read that I have no hesitation in recommending.

Now back to work; Carolina's Walking Tour will be released on Friday by Uncial Press, and this afternoon is dedicated to work on The Education of Portia.

A new contest on my website

It's that time again; a new bi-monthly contest has gone up on my website. The John Lennon poster was won by Anne from Alaska! The new prize is a book -- "Panoramas of England" -- and it's a great book if you love England. It has double page spread pictures of wonderful English views that give you a feeling of seeing the vista in person. If you sign the guest book during March or April you are automatically entered to win the book. You also get added to my mailing list, but you'll never be spammed--I only send one email every two months! And I never share my mailing list.

I've been busy with contest work, and website updates, and preparing for my release on March 14. "Carolina's Walking Tour" used to be available free on my stories page, but I always loved the story and when Uncial Press gave me the opportunity to turn it into a 'Novel Byte' I jumped at the chance. It's been expanded, and carefully edited, and given a wonderful cover by Shakoriel. This might be my favourite of all Shakoriel's covers, but it would be hard to choose which I like best.

Go to my website to read an excerpt of Carolina's Walking Tour.