Happy Friday, friends! I am very excited to welcome Sarah Courtney to Austenesque Reviews today! Sarah has debuted not only ONE but TWO new Pride and Prejudice inspired releases in the last 3 months!! And I had the great opportunity to meet her back in November when we both attended the Jane Austen Writer/Reader Get Together! Sarah is lovely, and I am so looking forward to reading her books! I hope you will feel the same after you read the tempting excerpts she has brought to share with you today! 📖

Beauty and Mr. Darcy is my second Pride and Prejudice variation novel, after A Good Name. This story was so much fun to write. Frustrating, at times—I had a computer crash and lost a ton of work on it, TWICE—but I really loved it nonetheless.

In some ways, Beauty and Mr. Darcy is rather like six novellas in one book. Elizabeth and Darcy’s story runs throughout, but along the way we get to watch all of Elizabeth’s sisters and her friend live their own fairy tales and find their true loves, with the tales intertwined and dependent on each other.

I absolutely loved intertwining all of these different stories. I was surprised to find that I particularly enjoyed Charlotte Lucas and Lydia Bennet’s stories. I would love to know which ones are your favorites!

The scene I’m including here is from early on in the story, when Elizabeth and Jane are at Netherfield. Mr. Collins has already arrived at Longbourn for a longer visit than in canon.

~ Excerpt from Beauty and Mr. Darcy ~

Much later in the evening, Elizabeth shut the door to Jane’s room behind her with a sigh. Jane lay dozing on the bed, peacefully unaware of the discord beyond her door.

“Oh, Jane,” she said softly as she lowered herself into a chair by the bed.

Jane started awake. “Lizzy!”

“I am so sorry to wake you,” Elizabeth said, almost penitent. But not quite, because Jane’s sweet company would be heaven compared to what she had been dealing with downstairs.

“You did not, I was already awake,” Jane said with a yawn. “Just closed my eyes for a few moments.”

“Of course,” Elizabeth said, hiding a smile. “Well, Jane who is already awake, would you like me to read to you?”

Jane made a face. “Please tell me you found a novel. Or something. Else I will accuse you of having come to Netherfield for no better reason than to escape Mr. Collins.”

Elizabeth narrowed her eyes at Jane, then shook her head. “I went to the library on the way upstairs, but Mr. Bingley was right about it being a very small collection. There is nothing new, and very little even among the older books to interest. I found Macbeth.” She gave Jane an angelic smile.

Jane threw a pillow at her, then succumbed to a coughing fit. “No. No Macbeth. I would rather stare at the ceiling.”

“Then I will tell you instead about Miss Bingley’s delightful ideas about accomplished young ladies. Did you know we must have a certain something in our air and manner of walking?”

Jane frowned. “Lizzy, you are too harsh. There is something about Miss Bingley’s air, you must admit, that is rather fine. And she walks very elegantly.”

“If that is the case, then it seems rather indelicate for her to be describing herself, does it not? As for her air, I think it is merely that she keeps her nose so very high in it.”

Jane snorted and shook her head. “No, Lizzy. You will not entertain me by making sport of my friends.”

“Mr. Darcy, then?” she asked hopefully. “There is quite a lot to make sport of in his behavior as well. Ladies must walk with their noses in the air and must also improve their minds by extensive reading. Only I think we can safely assume that The Romance of the Forest is not the type of reading he speaks of.”

Jane rolled her eyes. “Certainly not.”

“I may not make sport of him, or he does not think The Romance of the Forest improves ladies’ minds?”

Jane giggled at that. “Both!”

“No, you must not deny me my fun. Who else am I to make sport of? Mr. Bingley is too sweet and good, and Mr. Hurst does nothing at all. If you will not allow me to read you Macbeth, I must at least complain to you about Mr. Darcy’s staring.”

Jane lay back on her bed, sighing. “Very well then. He still stares?”

“Constantly. Sometimes his left eye twitches a bit, usually when I have said something particularly witty to Miss Bingley.”

“And by ‘witty,’ you mean insulting, except that you think she does not understand you,” Jane said drolly.

“Well, yes.”

“I think my left eye is starting to twitch, too.”

I cannot wait to see which fairy tales are paired with each Bennet sister (and Charlotte)! I wonder if Jane’s sleepiness in this excerpt is a clue… 🛏👸🏼

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Beauty and Mr. Darcy is available on Amazon in both ebook and paperback!

My first book, A Good Name is a clean modern variation that is centered largely on George Wickham. Don’t let that turn you off, though! It’s not a villain book, but a book about an opportunity to be something other than what others might expect of you. Despite the significance of Wickham, this is a Darcy and Elizabeth love story with a happy ending.

It does deal with some of the difficulties George experienced as a child: homelessness, neglect, hunger, poverty, and loneliness. Despite the heavy topics, it’s not a depressing book. Lizzy Bennet is the light of George’s life, and the hope she provides for his future changes everything.

In this excerpt, George and Lizzy have been friends for some time. They both have difficult home situations that they don’t talk about, and they meet at the park almost every day to read and to play, especially to reenact favorite scenes from books.

~ Excerpt from A Good Name ~

In the late winter and early spring, a drainage ditch that ran through the woods near the pond would sometimes fill with water from melting snow. Usually it was fairly unremarkable, little more than a trickle of collected rain headed towards the pond. The combination of melting snow and heavy rains, though, could make the little ditch look almost like a creek. A rather small, pathetic kind of a creek, but a creek all the same.

“It’s perfect!” Lizzy said, eyeing it.

George knew by now what “perfect” meant. He was about to get roped into something. He didn’t know what, but given the state of the creek, he was guessing it was going to be messy.

“What,” he asked cautiously, “are we playing today?”

“Bridge to Terabithia!” she exclaimed joyfully.

That . . . actually didn’t sound too bad.

“We’re going to fix the ending!” she added with glee.

He should have known there was a catch. “Fix it how?”

“I’m going to be Leslie and fall in the creek, and you’re going to be Jesse and come back just in time to save me! Then they’ll both get to go on to play forever in Terabithia. Well, until they grow up and all.”

“So you’re going to jump in that? It’s all mud, Lizzy! Your mom will be so mad.”

Lizzy shrugged. “She’s always mad at me anyway. What’s one more thing?”

He sighed. He never had any good arguments against her crazy schemes. Besides, it actually sounded kinda fun. “Okay, fine, but I’m not getting wet.”

She threw herself into the creek. Or tried to, anyway. She could only really get part of her body in the water at one time. She made up for this by splashing around like a crazy person, pretending to drown. “Help, Jesse, help!”

George sighed again and reached out a hand. “Here, Leslie, reach!”

She reached out and grabbed his hand with both of her wet, muddy ones. She pulled, hard.

“Aaaah!” he cried as he lost his balance and landed on his knees in the creek. The water was cold! He could feel it seep through his holey jeans in a moment.

“Oops. Sorry.” She gave him a shamefaced look. “Really.”

He dragged himself out of the creek and stood, looking ruefully down at his jeans. They were soaking wet from mid-thigh to halfway down his calves. He looked at Lizzy.

Lizzy bit her lip, then shrugged and smiled. “Wanna try again?”

I can already feel myself becoming more sympathetic towards George Wickham with this excerpt! I wonder if I will still feel that way when he is older… 🤔

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A Good Name is available now on Amazon in both ebook and paperback!

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About Sarah

Sarah is a homeschooling mom of six kids, ages thirteen to two. Her first introduction to Jane Austen was the BBC mini-series of Pride and Prejudice, which aired when she was fifteen. The first scene she ever saw was Mr. Wickham telling his story to Elizabeth Bennet, and Sarah asked her mother if he was meant to be the hero. She didn’t like him and didn’t plan to continue watching if he was. Assured by her mother that he was not the hero, she kept watching and fell in love with Jane Austen’s most beloved work. The first time she read the novel, she read the final page and immediately flipped back to the first to start again, unwilling to let it go.

GIVEAWAY TIME!!!

Today, Sarah brings with her ONE ebook copy of either of her new releases – A Good Name or Beauty and Mr. Darcy (Winner’s Choice!) for me to give away to TWO lucky readers! 

To enter this giveaway, leave a comment, a question, or some love for Sarah!!

• This giveaway is open worldwide.  Thank you, Sarah!
• This giveaway ends February 14th!