Hi friends! Not too long ago I interviewed the lovely Riana Everly as she was celebrating her debut release, Teaching Eliza! Today Riana has kindly stopped by again for a visit as she is yet again celebrating another book release – The Assistant. I’m so excited to learn more about this tale as it centers upon the Gardiners!! I hope you enjoy this lovely post Riana put together!
Edward Gardiner – who is he, and how did he become the man he is?
Thank you, Meredith, for hosting me today. I am particularly thrilled to stop by 
Austenesque Reviews today, because this is the release day for my new novel, The Assistant: Before Pride and Prejudice. (Insert huge grin here!)
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I love all the Lizzy and Darcy stories —who doesn’t, after all—but I also love the stories that feature other members of the extended Bennet family and their friends. I have read some lovely continuations, or variations that focus on Lizzy’s sisters or her friend Charlotte. There are also stories that recount life in the Darcy household after the couple marry, and I’ve read some wonderful tales that propose some alternate histories for Mr. Bennet and his two eldest daughters. What there is not a lot of, however, is JAFF about Lizzy’s favourite aunt and uncle. I can only think of one other such offering: The Courtship of Edward Gardiner, by the amazingly talented Nicole Clarkston. (As a disclaimer, I first wrote The Assistant before she published her novel, so any similarities between these tales are purely coincidental!)
Well, as the saying goes, Edward Gardiner needs some love! In Pride and Prejudice, although Caroline Bingley disparages the Bennets’ London relations as “such low connections, when Mr. Darcy sees them at Pemberley, Elizabeth notes that “he takes them now for people of fashion,” and is relieved that “she had some relations for whom there was no need to blush.” She goes on to listen to her uncle, whose every sentence “marked his intelligence, his taste, or his good manners.” Continue reading »
