Hi friends! It is my pleasure to welcome author Jeff Bigler to Austenesque Reviews for his first visit!
I had the good fortune to meet Jeff and his wife, Nancy, at the JAFF Writer/Reader Get Together this past October and last month he celebrated his debut release – Rewinding Time (which I got to hear him read an excerpt from!) 🤗
Today, Jeff is stopping by to answer some of my questions about Jane Austen, writing, and his new book – Rewinding Time. We hope you enjoy!
Hi Jeff! It is so great to have this chance to chat with you some more and learn more about your debut release! How about we start at the very beginning? When and how did Jane Austen come into your life? And when and how did you discover Austenesque/JAFF?
My wife Nancy and I often spend quality time together reading aloud to each other. Nancy is a huge Jane Austen fan, so when she found out that I had not read any of Jane Austen’s books, she made sure to remedy that!
During the pandemic, one of our daughters told Nancy, “Hey, did you know that Jane Austen fanfiction is a thing?” Once Nancy started reading JAFF, we started reading JAFF novels aloud to each other. Now, they comprise the majority of what we read together.
I think that is so special! I love that you read together – just like we know the Austens did! How about writing? I understand this is your first published work of fiction. What prompted you to pick up your pen?
I have always loved writing and making up stories. When my children were young, I used to make up stories about Pipsqueak the Field Mouse, who was only an inch long but had nine miles of attitude!
I have written and (self-)published a couple of nonfiction books, including sets of class notes for chemistry and physics that are used by hundreds of teachers worldwide. I also (self-)published a book on teaching experimental design to middle and high school students.
I have always wanted to write fiction, and I have a partially-written (non-JAFF) fantasy novel that I might finish someday. After reading a bunch of Pride & Prejudice variations, I thought “Hey, maybe I could do that.”
From Bunsen burners to bonnets! I love it! Let’s talk about time-travel and secret potions. What
gave you the idea for this novel? Did any other works of time travel inspire you?
Shortly after I graduated from college (but was still going to events on campus), I saw a performance of the 1988 short (ten-minute) play Sure Thing, by David Ives. In the play, the two characters, Betty and Bill, meet by chance in a café. The pair strike up a conversation, and every time the conversation threatens to go awry, a bell rings and the conversation is reset to the point just before the problematic interaction. The play concludes with Betty and Bill falling in love.
Later on (in 1993), the movie Groundhog Day came out, which was based on a similar idea. I enjoyed the movie, but I preferred the immediacy and fast pace of Sure Thing. Also, there are already plenty of Groundhog Day stories out there, and I didn’t want to write another one.
The reason I chose a potion is because I wanted the vehicle for time travel to be something that could have existed in Regency England, and because I wanted Darcy and Elizabeth to have agency over when they used it. A lot of JAFF novels that involve supernatural effects give them to either Darcy or Elizabeth, but not both. I wanted both Darcy and Elizabeth to have the potion, to be able to explore the different ways that each of them might use the same ability.
It will be interesting to see if there are any similarities or differences with how they react and use the time travel potion. When you write about something like time travel, it means you can create its parameters (within reason). How did you come up with the liberties and limitations of time travel in your novel?
I enjoy stories with magic, but I like the magic to be limited. There are a lot of fantasy and paranormal stories in which characters have extremely powerful magic, and in many of those stories the magic becomes more of the focus of the story than the characters. I wanted the potion’s effects to be limited so that Darcy and Elizabeth would have to use their own cleverness and their own ordinary human abilities to figure out how to navigate their arcs and plots. Limiting the effects to within one hour of the present time prevented the potion from becoming too powerful, although Wickham certainly tried!
Oh, I bet he did! Do you think our world could handle possessing the power of turning back time? Or would it cause more harm than good?
Every technological advance in our world has created new problems that had to be solved. In a capitalist world, new technology comes into existence and its inventors immediately use it to make a profit. Once the technology has existed for long enough, its drawbacks become evident, and society (usually through the actions of governments) regulates the technology to prevent some of the problems.
A good example is the inventor Thomas Midgley Jr., who invented both freon and leaded gasoline in the 1920s. Those inventions were revolutionary and highly useful. Leaded gasoline enabled engines to run more efficiently without “knocking” (pre-combustion). Freon was a safe refrigerant—previous refrigerators used ammonia, which was toxic. It took fifty years to find out that both of these inventions were harmful to the environment.
I think being able to go back an hour in time would be a novelty, and would quickly be used by nefarious people, such as gamblers, who would discover outcomes and then go back and bet on them, or blackguards such as Wickham, who would use the potion the way Wickham uses it in Rewinding Time. (No spoilers here!) After a while, society would eventually figure out how to regulate the activity or mitigate the problems.
Very well said. It would definitely be a challenge to regulate or control those who would use this power for nefarious reasons. What is next for you, Jeff? Any projects in the works?
Like most authors, I have several “plot bunnies” that are in various stages of development. Two of them are far enough along that I think they might turn into finished novels. One is a story about Darcy’s and Elizabeth’s guardian angels. It’s intended to be a humorous double love story—both Darcy & Elizabeth and the two angels. The story is inspired as much by Terry Pratchett as it is by Jane Austen. However, humor is incredibly hard to do well, and I’m not sure if I’m up to the task.
The other is a compromise story. I don’t like most compromise stories because so many of them feel unrealistic—in JAFF it always seems like a gentleman saw a lady’s bare left elbow, and suddenly they have to get married. My WIP is intended to be a satire of compromise stories. My intent is to have a string of fortune-hunters who are all attempting to compromise Darcy. Once Elizabeth has decided in her mind that she wants to marry him, she teasingly suggests that if he compromised her, it would make the fortune hunters stop bothering him. Of course Darcy thinks this is a great idea…
Oooh! I love the sound of both of these! How about we switch it up with some Quick-Fire Questions?
- Which Jane Austen character do you identify with the most?
I would have to say Darcy, because he is kind, generous, and well-meaning, but also awkward and self-conscious. (Unfortunately, I’m not nearly as tall or handsome as he is…)
- If you had a potion in your possession that allows you to travel back in time one hour, when would you use it?
I would try to find some way to use it to make people’s lives better or ease their suffering. If I were lucky enough to be near enough to some calamity to be able to go back and prevent it, I would use the potion to do so. This thought is what inspired me to give Darcy an opportunity to do the same in Rewinding Time.
- If Jane Austen had a potion in HER possession that allowed her to travel back in time one hour, when do you think she would’ve used it?
I don’t know enough of the details of Jane Austen’s life to know of a situation when going back one hour with foreknowledge of what was about to happen would have made a difference. I know that Austen initially accepted a proposal from Harris Bigg-Wither and then changed her mind the next day, but I do not think one hour would have made any difference.
- What is one of your favorite scenes from Pride and Prejudice?
I love the scenes when Elizabeth does a takedown of someone who deserves it. The scene when Lady Catherine visits her at Longbourn is perhaps my favorite example.
- What is one of your favorite scenes from Rewinding Time?
I don’t want to give any spoilers, but I had a lot of fun with Elizabeth realizing that she could use the potion to get away with much more impertinence even than usual—her responses to Collins’s proposal and Lady Catherine’s visit were a lot of fun to write.
I also love how the climax came out, but for obvious reasons I won’t describe it here. And I really like my epilogue.
- If you could give two more time travel potions to two OTHER Jane Austen characters, who would you choose?
I would love to give one to Catherine Morland in Northanger Abbey, because there are so many ways in which she could use it foolishly, resulting in some great plot twists. I might give the other to Anne Elliot in Persuasion, because there are so many possibilities for how she might use it.
- What is your truth universally acknowledged?
The easiest way to spend time among happy people is to make them happy.
- If you were to meet Jane Austen, what would you like to hear her say?
I love her snarkiness, so I would enjoy hearing her talk about her opinions on just about anything.
Wonderful answers! I think both Catherine and Anne are excellent choices for using the potion! And I cannot wait to see the impertinent things Elizabeth does with it!
Thank you so much for answering my questions, Jeff! I wish you all the best with your release of Rewinding Time!
~~~
~ GIVEAWAY TIME! ~
Jeff is generously giving away ONE ebook of Rewinding Time for every 10 readers that leave a comment. (If up to 10 people comment = 1 ebook will be given away, if up to 20 people comment = 2 ebooks will be given away, etc.) 🎉 Woot woot! 🙌🏼
To enter this giveaway, leave a comment, a question, or some love for Jeff!!
- Only one comment entry per person.
- This giveaway is open worldwide. Thank you, Jeff!
- This giveaway ends March 26th
I do lover time travel and it seems the author has solved one of my problems with it by limiting it realistically.
Can hardly wait to read this enticing novel.
Thank you.
I’m glad you appreciate the idea that magic of any sort needs to be limited—I’m in complete agreement there. I enjoy fantasy & paranormal novels, so I read a lot of books that take place in worlds with magic. But if the magic is too powerful and unchecked, it makes me wonder how the world remains in balance—”What is keeping the people/creatures with magic from running amok?”
I hope you enjoy my take on the trope!
Oh my! I do like this idea. (Although I’m not sure I approve of Wickham having the potion – but it sounds like he doesn’t benefit from it?) I’m depending on the potion to bring Darcy and Elizabeth together sooner? Thank you for this great interview and the giveaway.
It wouldn’t be a proper P&P variation if there weren’t some sort of villain creating mischief, and Wickham is a great villain. But of course a P&P variation that qualifies as a romance novel (such as mine) needs to have a happy ending in which Darcy & Elizabeth end up together and the villain(s) get their comeuppance.
The potion does move the timeline forward, but of course there are still challenges. After all, if everything were easy for our characters, there would be no story!
This is a new and interesting concept and one I am anxious to explore by reading the book. It will be fun the see how both Darcy and Elizabeth use their magic. Congratulations on publishing a JAFF story. It is already on my wish list.
Thanks. I hope you enjoy it!
Such an interesting interview! Jeff is so open to letting us into his lufe & thoughts, especially his insights on battling unexpected problems. We could all use some of his rewinding magic potions.
I love how he & his wife read to each other, and their daughter picked up on their passion and directed them to fan fiction.
I cannot wait to read his new release!
I marvel at the serendipity that brought me to where I am now. I have been writing stories or sections of what might become novels for a long time, but it was my daughter’s chance discovery of JAFF that led me to a genre that has enough a passionate following of readers who are ready to devour as much as its authors can supply. That, plus the fact that readers already know the characters and their situations from canon gave me the structure and impetus that was needed for me to be able to write a complete novel.
Thank you for sharing in my serendipity!
I absolutely loved this book…a mash up of two of my all-time favorite genres, P&P Fan Fic and time travel. I thought it was genius to give bad-boy Wickham the potion and to see him attempt a nefarious act with going back in time. Bravo on your first book and I sincerely hope you bring those plot bunnies waiting in the wings to life! Great interview too!
Thanks! I’m glad you enjoyed it! I certainly enjoyed writing it.
Great interview and such an interesting twist on time travel. Definitely looking forward to reading more!
I also thought it was an interesting twist on time travel. I didn’t know for sure where the story was going until I was well into it, but I’m really happy with how it turned out.
I hope you enjoy it!
Thank you for the interesting interview. I love that you and your wife read to each other. Rewind sounds great – love novels with a twist. Thank you for the giveaway.
It’s nice. It gives us a way to spend quality time together at our own pace. Unlike a movie or TV show, we can read as much or as little as we have time for, and we can pause the story to talk about things that happen, compare it with other JAFF that we have read together, and relate it to things in our own lives.
One of the great things about reading together is that it gives us a chance to talk about situations that we might never find ourselves in. This gives us a context to discuss them, and in so doing to learn more about each other and become closer. I did the same with my older daughter (the one who introduced us to JAFF) when she was in high school, and it had the same effect.
I hope you enjoy the book!
Lovely premise! So nice to hear your wife and you read P&P together!
As I mentioned in another comment, I love how reading together gives us a way to spend quality time together at our own pace. Having opportunities to talk about situations that we might never find ourselves in gives us a context to discuss them, and in so doing to learn more about each other and become closer. I wonder whether Darcy and Elizabeth read to each other in their married lives, and if it has the same effect.
Wonderful interview! This book sounds so interesting. I’m heading to Amazon to add it to my wish list right now! Thanks for the chance to win a copy!
I had a lot of fun writing it, and I hope you have as much fun reading it!
Hi Jeff!
Time-travel is a cup of tea for me so if you mix time travel with P&P, WOW, the combination is fantastic!
I wish you the very best with your debut novel and I hope to see more of your works.
Thanks for the chance to win a copy 😉
Thanks Meredith, for bringing us new authors!
I also love time travel, or really books with just about any type of magic. I had a lot of fun thinking about how Darcy and Elizabeth would try to change events from P&P if they could go back and have a “do-over”.
The story starts out pretty much exactly as in canon. (I used a lot of quotes from P&P in the early chapters—some readers think too much.) Then, as Darcy & Elizabeth begin to understand the possibilities for how they could use the potion, the storyline diverges more and more, sometimes with comical results.
I hope the book lives up to your expectations!
Meredith, I am so glad you posted this blog. I had nearly passed on this book as I am not crazy about time travel or time slip stories. Although, I can tolerate Groundhog Day themes. This blog interview was so much fun. I will have to read this story now. Look what you did.
Jeff, I think it is so cool that your wife introduced you to Jane Austen and then y’all discovered fan fiction and read to each other. That is amazing. I look forward to reading this story. I wish you all manner of success with the launch of this book. Thanks for the generous giveaway and good luck to all in the drawing.
Truth be told, I’m not crazy about the more common time loop stories (like Groundhog Day) either. I find it frustrating when the characters (and usually also the reader) have no idea why they’re in the time loop or what they have to do to get out of it. It comes across more like a story about someone trying to escape from some sort of magical imprisonment.
As I mentioned in the interview, I liked the play Sure Thing better because of the immediacy, but that still wasn’t quite the story I wanted to write. I didn’t want the story to be about Darcy & Elizabeth having to figure out what was happening to them; I wanted the story to be about the two of them navigating their fledgling relationship, but with a chance to say, “Oops. I wish I had done that differently,” and to actually be able to do so. For example, what if Darcy had a chance to take back his horrid proposal in Kent? What if it was Elizabeth who had a chance to take it back?
Ooh, a time travel story! I love twists on the original story like this! Count me in!
I hope you enjoy it!
I am intrigued by time travel stories but I especially like the limitation you described in the interview — only an hour! I can think of numerous times I would do it in Jane Austen novels and manny, many more in my life! I look forward to reading your book and I hope you can finish the WIP projects too.
Thanks. I agree that the limitation makes it a more compelling story. As I said in the interview, I didn’t want the potion to be a substitute for Darcy and Elizabeth using their own cleverness to get over themselves and find their way to each other. And yes, there are definitely plenty of ways the same trope could be applied to variations of other Austen novels.
I hope you enjoy the book! Because I’m still a high school teacher, most of my writing happens during the summer. I expect that I’ll finish one of my WIPs this summer, and have it edited and ready for release by winter or next spring.
I hope you enjoy the book!
I love time travel and I have never read anything like this. Congrats and thank you for the giveaway!
I hope you enjoy it! A lot of the appeal for me in writing it is that I had never read anything like it either. The story evolved as I wrote it, and I’m happy with the result.
Loved this interview, so interesting. Hadn’t heard of this author before but he has gone to top of my list now when I heard of his WIP being inspired by Terry Pratchett! Wow! What an imagination!?
Thanks for the draw, hope I’m lucky
Thanks! You hadn’t heard of me because this is the first work of fiction that I’ve published. The style of Rewinding Time is typical of a lot of fantasy/paranormal novels, and not at all like Pratchett. The guardian angels WIP is a completely new direction, and nothing like anything I’ve written before. As I mentioned in the interview, writing effective humor is especially challenging. Jane Austen and Terry Pratchett both have big shoes to fill. I’m hopeful that I can do both of them justice, but I’m also feeling rather daunted by the task…
I love this idea of only being able to turn back time by one hour. This might be quite difficult for both Darcy and Elizabeth, as they are sometimes slow to see their mistakes, so they would have to make up their mind to use it very quickly. Does this result in a more decisive Darcy and Elizabeth? I will have to read this book and find out. And congratulations on your debut novel, Jeff. One day, I will have the nerve to do the same.
It does ultimately make them more decisive. In the original P&P, both Darcy’s and Elizabeth’s character arcs involve them learning about themselves, and as they understand themselves better, they stop sabotaging their relationship and their choices start to bring them closer together. With the potion, they realize that they can go back an hour in time. Of course, the potion doesn’t solve everything, otherwise there would be no story! For example, Darcy dallies too long when he uses the potion at the Meryton assembly. (Yes, that’s a minor spoiler, but that part of the story is in the excerpt that you can read on Amazon, so I don’t think it’s too horrible of me to mention it here.)
Thanks for the comment. I hope you do find the nerve to write and publish your novel. I have to admit that impostor syndrome followed me all the way through the process from the first chapters right through release day and even afterwards. To some extent I still feel like an imposter—my brain weasels keep telling me things like “You’re not a real AUTHOR. You’re just some guy who wrote a book and self-published it.” But the truth is that I have written a book and published it, and that makes me an author. And I enjoyed the process, and quite a few people enjoyed the book, which means I will do it again, and the next time will be easier!
Love the premise and can’t wait to read it!
Thanks! I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
CONGRATULATIONS on your book!!! What a wonderful time that you & your wife read these stories together. Your story looks very interesting & I have added it to my wishlist.
Thanks! I think reading to each other is one of the things that has brought my wife and me closer together, and I recommend it to any couples who think they might enjoy it.
I hope you enjoy the book!
It’s always exciting to read P&P with SciFi thrown in. Would love to see more in the future.
It would be fun to write more. Another plot bunny in my rabbit warren is about magical ink that has an effect on either the person who writes with it or the person who reads anything written with it. (I haven’t decided which, or whether it might be a combination of both.) That one hasn’t really turned into a WIP yet—I’m letting that one sit on a back burner for a while to see what kinds of ideas come bubbling up.
This was a fun interview. How lovely is it that Jeff and his wife read to each other. I really enjoyed his talking about his writing and ideas for this book and future stories. Thank you for hosting Jeff.
I read this interesting, very well written story and it was just great. I highly recommend it. Just listening to the discussion I want to reread it.
Especially as a new author, I always get a thrill when someone tells me that they read my book and enjoyed it. I am sure that feeling will never go away, even after I have (hopefully) written many more books.
Of course, in the process of writing the book I have had to read it through several times. One of the reasons I felt confident that it was a good story was that I continue to enjoy rereading it, even knowing exactly what happens.
Thanks for the kind words!
This sounds wonderful. I also think a compromise story where a bare elbow plays a role would be a lot of fun to read.
One of my WIPs is a compromise story, although I haven’t yet decided whether or not a bare elbow will figure into the plot.
This premise sounds fascinating – I look forward to reading it!
Thanks. I hope you enjoy it!
I enjoyed the excerpt when you read it in October at the Get Together. Thank you for the giveaway. Congrats and best wishes on your first Austenesque release!
Thanks. The positive reaction from people at the get-together was a large part of what made me think, “I can do this!” It’s a wonderful community and one I’ll continue to be grateful for as I write future books.
Hi Jeff, Congratulations on your new book. The premise sounds intriguing with a time travel potion. I too love the scene in Pride and Prejudice when Lizzy gives Lady Catherine a set down. It’s so refreshing to have another male author who loves Jane Austen and writes JAFF. Well done!! –Leslie
Thanks. It feels a little bit like being one of those scarce gentlemen at the Meryton assembly. I do think that being male, slightly awkward and a little self-conscious makes it easier for me to get inside Darcy’s head. I suspect that Darcy (or Wentworth, Knightly, etc.) will always be a somewhat sympathetic character in future JAFF novels that I write.