Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict

This is one interesting book. I was apprehensive at first but since I borrowed it, I was obliged to finish it (Yes. I am one of those weird ones). I'm glad I did though. I like the underlying message about how the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

Basically, the story is about Courtney Stone who, after breaking off her engagement thanks to her cheating fiancee, finds herself waking up in the body of a woman from Regency England. Being the Jane Austen fanatic that she is, she managed to convince everyone around her that she fits in. But of course, being a fanatic doesn't mean that she is prepared to face problems from Regency England ( READ : marriage of convenience during the 19th century). Eventually, her borrowed brain starts showing her memories that isn't hers and she starts having an identity crisis issue. Which brings the question of whether she wanted to stay in the 19th century or go back to her own time.

What's interesting is that both Courtney and the English woman whose body she's borrowing have parallel lives. That is to say, that whatever problems Courtney was facing before she ended up in the 19th century, the same thing happened in her own time. In a way, it's almost like looking behind a mirror and being able to see more clearly from a more objective point of view. Also, there's also this slight undertone that problems related to matters of the heart are always the same no matter when and where you are.

Here's some excerpt poem stanza from the book that I think captured the essence of the some parts of the story.

By William Cowper

"Mutual Forbearance, Necessary to the Happiness of the Married State"

The kindest and the happiest pair

Will find occasion to forbear;

And something, every day they live,

To pity, and perhaps forgive.

"The Progress of Error"

Remorse, the final egg by pleasure laid

In every bosom where her nest is made,

Hatched by beams of truth, denies him rest,

And proves a raging scorpion in his breast.

And by Scott

"Lay of the Last Minstrel"

True love's the gift which God has given

To man alone beneath the heaven.

It is not Fantasy's hot fire,

Whose wishes, soon as granted, fly;

It liveth not in fierce desire,

With dead desire it doth not die;

It is the secret sympathy,

The silver cord, the silken tie,

Which heart to heart, mind to mind,

In body and in soul can bind.

And from the woman herself,

" Till this moment, I never knew myself"

--- Jane Austen