Jane Austen and Shelley in the Garden

Eccentric Fran wants a second chance. Thanks to her intimacy with Jane Austen, and Shelley, she finds one.Jane Austen is such a presence in Fran's life that she seems to share her cottage and garden, becoming an imaginary friend.Fran's conversations with Jane Austen guide and chide her - but Fran is ready for change. An encounter with a long-standing friend, and a new one, a writer, lead to something new. The three women unite in their love of books and in a quest for the idealist poet Shelley at two pivotal moments: in Wales and Venice. His yearning for utopian communities and visionary power lead them to interrogate their past relationships, literature, motherhood, death, feminism, the resurgence of childhood memory in old age, the tensions between generations. Despite the appeal of solitude, they open themselves to different ways of living outside partnership and family. Jane Austen has plenty of comments to offer.This "coming of old age" novel is a (light) meditation on age, literature, friendship, hope, and the joy of new opportunities.

“PRAISE FROM AUTHORS AND BOOKSELLERS FOR JANET TODD'S RECENT WRITING "Todd has a good ear for tone and a deep understanding" Emma Donoghue "Janet Todd's interweaving of life and literature is a good book - frank, wry and unexpectedly heartening" Hilary Mantel "A haunting, a gothic novel with a modern consciousness" Philippa Gregory "A quirky, darkly mischievous novel about love, obsession and the burden of charisma, played out against the backdrop of Venice's watery, decadent glory" Sarah Dunant "A mesmerizing story of love and obsession: dark and utterly compelling." Natasha Solomons "Intriguing and entertaining; clever, beguiling." Salley Vickers "A stunningly good, tight, intelligent truthful book and one of the most touching love letters to literature I have ever read. Ah, so that's why we write, I thought" Maggie Gee "Beautifully written, viscerally honest, horribly funny" Miriam Margolyes "A real knack for language with some jaw-droppingly luscious dialogue. I can see the author's pedigree in the story, style, and substance of the book. It seems like a wonderful sleeper: think Elegance of the Hedgehog."Geoffrey Jennings, Rainy Day Books”

"A beautiful book - a true treat and gift. Todd gives us an allusive dialogue of the living in vivid conversation with the illustrious dead. The voices of her learned, witty, aging twenty-first-century characters-like present-day Mrs. Dalloways going about their business in provocative daily routines-bring new life to the great authors of the past. This is a beautiful, moving novel of playful experimentation, gorgeous image, and brilliantly irreverent juxtaposition." Devoney Looser, Professor of English, Arizona State, author of The Making of Jane Austen.

Janet Todd (Don't You Know There's a War On?. Jane Austen's Sanditon, Radiation Diaries, Aphra Behn: A Secret Life, A Man of Genius, Mary Wollstonecraft), a founding feminist, is a former president of Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge. Born in Wales, she grew up in Britain, Bermuda and Ceylon/Sri Lanka and worked in Ghana, Puerto Rico, India, the US, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Cambridge and Norwich. She lives in Cambridge and Venice.

This item is eligible for free returns within 30 days of delivery. See our returns policy for further details.