The Austens: A Novel

With no money of her own and little hope of selling any of her unfinished manuscripts, Jane Austen accepts a marriage proposal from the heir to an estate in her beloved Hampshire, only to break her engagement the following day because she does not love him. She chooses to devote herself to writing fiction, even though she may always have to depend on her parents or brothers for money. When Fanny Palmer falls in love with Jane’s brother Charles Austen, a handsome captain in the Royal Navy, she sees herself as the heroine of a romantic story and chooses to accept his proposal of marriage even though he has very little money. She shares her husband’s desire for children and his confidence that he will soon increase his income by capturing naval prize ships, and she insists on travelling with him when the squadron sails to Nova Scotia, instead of staying at home in Bermuda.

Exchanging letters across the Atlantic during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, Jane and Fanny become close friends. They share in each other’s sorrows as Jane struggles to publish her novels and Fanny confronts her fears about pregnancy, childbirth and the dangers Charles faces at sea. But the friendship begins to fracture after Charles brings his family to England, as Jane and Fanny discover disagreements over issues they haven’t talked about in their letters, including how best to care for children. When Jane starts to find success as a writer, Fanny admires her novels about romance and courtship, yet her anger at her sister-in-law’s refusal to write about the challenges of marriage and motherhood and the risks of childbirth threatens their friendship.

Like Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet and Colm Tóibín’s The Master, The Austens explores tensions and rivalries between a great writer and the people closest to them. From the lush gardens of Bermuda to the rocky shores of Nova Scotia, the peaceful Hampshire countryside, and the hellish conditions of a prison ship anchored off Sheerness, the novel follows Jane and Fanny through the twists and turns of the choices they make about writing and family in a world that is hostile to art and love, and even the idea of a woman making a choice.

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The Austens: A Novel

With no money of her own and little hope of selling any of her unfinished manuscripts, Jane Austen accepts a marriage proposal from the heir to an estate in her beloved Hampshire, only to break her engagement the following day because she does not love him. She chooses to devote herself to writing fiction, even though she may always have to depend on her parents or brothers for money. When Fanny Palmer falls in love with Jane’s brother Charles Austen, a handsome captain in the Royal Navy, she sees herself as the heroine of a romantic story and chooses to accept his proposal of marriage even though he has very little money. She shares her husband’s desire for children and his confidence that he will soon increase his income by capturing naval prize ships, and she insists on travelling with him when the squadron sails to Nova Scotia, instead of staying at home in Bermuda.

Exchanging letters across the Atlantic during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, Jane and Fanny become close friends. They share in each other’s sorrows as Jane struggles to publish her novels and Fanny confronts her fears about pregnancy, childbirth and the dangers Charles faces at sea. But the friendship begins to fracture after Charles brings his family to England, as Jane and Fanny discover disagreements over issues they haven’t talked about in their letters, including how best to care for children. When Jane starts to find success as a writer, Fanny admires her novels about romance and courtship, yet her anger at her sister-in-law’s refusal to write about the challenges of marriage and motherhood and the risks of childbirth threatens their friendship.

Like Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet and Colm Tóibín’s The Master, The Austens explores tensions and rivalries between a great writer and the people closest to them. From the lush gardens of Bermuda to the rocky shores of Nova Scotia, the peaceful Hampshire countryside, and the hellish conditions of a prison ship anchored off Sheerness, the novel follows Jane and Fanny through the twists and turns of the choices they make about writing and family in a world that is hostile to art and love, and even the idea of a woman making a choice.

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The Austens: A Novel

The Austens: A Novel

by Sarah Emsley
The Austens: A Novel
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The Austens: A Novel

The Austens: A Novel

by Sarah Emsley

Overview

With no money of her own and little hope of selling any of her unfinished manuscripts, Jane Austen accepts a marriage proposal from the heir to an estate in her beloved Hampshire, only to break her engagement the following day because she does not love him. She chooses to devote herself to writing fiction, even though she may always have to depend on her parents or brothers for money. When Fanny Palmer falls in love with Jane’s brother Charles Austen, a handsome captain in the Royal Navy, she sees herself as the heroine of a romantic story and chooses to accept his proposal of marriage even though he has very little money. She shares her husband’s desire for children and his confidence that he will soon increase his income by capturing naval prize ships, and she insists on travelling with him when the squadron sails to Nova Scotia, instead of staying at home in Bermuda.

Exchanging letters across the Atlantic during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, Jane and Fanny become close friends. They share in each other’s sorrows as Jane struggles to publish her novels and Fanny confronts her fears about pregnancy, childbirth and the dangers Charles faces at sea. But the friendship begins to fracture after Charles brings his family to England, as Jane and Fanny discover disagreements over issues they haven’t talked about in their letters, including how best to care for children. When Jane starts to find success as a writer, Fanny admires her novels about romance and courtship, yet her anger at her sister-in-law’s refusal to write about the challenges of marriage and motherhood and the risks of childbirth threatens their friendship.

Like Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet and Colm Tóibín’s The Master, The Austens explores tensions and rivalries between a great writer and the people closest to them. From the lush gardens of Bermuda to the rocky shores of Nova Scotia, the peaceful Hampshire countryside, and the hellish conditions of a prison ship anchored off Sheerness, the novel follows Jane and Fanny through the twists and turns of the choices they make about writing and family in a world that is hostile to art and love, and even the idea of a woman making a choice.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781990770883
Publisher: Pottersfield Press
Publication date: 09/15/2025
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 286
File size: 1 MB

About the Author

Sarah Emsley is the author of Jane Austen’s Philosophy of the Virtues and a history of St. Paul’s in the Grand Parade, the church in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where Jane Austen’s niece Cassy was baptized in 1809. She received her PhD from Dalhousie University, held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford, taught classes on Austen in the Writing Program at Harvard University, and now lives in Halifax with her family. She has hosted several blog series celebrations of Austen’s work at www.sarahemsley.com, and she edited a collection of essays on Jane Austen and the North Atlantic for the Jane Austen Society. The Austens is her first novel.

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