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Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict
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Jane Austen Addict: Book 1

Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict (2007) (edit title/settings)

by Laurie Viera Rigler (Author) (edit contributors)

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Description edit see section history

After nursing a broken engagement with Jane Austen novels and Absolut, Courtney Stone wakes up and finds herself not in her Los Angeles bedroom or even in her own body, but inside the bedchamber of a woman in Regency England. Who but an Austen addict like herself could concoct such a... read more

Summary edit see section history

After nursing a broken engagement with Jane Austen novels and Absolut, Courtney Stone wakes up and finds herself not in her Los Angeles bedroom or even in her own body, but inside the bedchamber of a woman in Regency England. Who but an Austen addict like herself could concoct such a... read more (warning: may contain spoilers)

After nursing a broken engagement with Jane Austen novels and Absolut, Courtney Stone wakes up and finds herself not in her Los Angeles bedroom or even in her own body, but inside the bedchamber of a woman in Regency England. Who but an Austen addict like herself could concoct such a fantasy?

Not only is Courtney stuck in another woman’s life, she is forced to pretend she actually is that woman; and despite knowing nothing about her, she manages to fool even the most astute observer. But not even her level of Austen mania has prepared Courtney for the chamber pots and filthy coaching inns of nineteenth-century England, let alone the realities of being a single woman who must fend off suffocating chaperones, condom-less seducers, and marriages of convenience.

This looking-glass Austen world is not without its charms, however. There are journeys to Bath and London, balls in the Assembly Rooms, and the enigmatic Mr. Edgeworth, who may not be a familiar species of philanderer after all. But when Courtney’s borrowed brain serves up memories that are not her own, the ultimate identity crisis ensues. Will she ever get her real life back, and does she even want to?

Characters/People edit see section history

  • Courtney Stone: No one, including myself, can begin to calculate how many hours I’ve fantasized myself into one of those quiet Austenian drawing rooms pretending to do needlework while a hottie in skintight trousers sent me meaningful glances from across the room. I’ve read Pride and Prejudice at least twenty times, and Austen’s other five major novels at least a dozen times. I’ve watched my two-DVD set of the BBC’s P&P so many times I could practically act it out end to end, all five hours of it. Sometimes, and especially lately, the only thing that makes sense in my world is Jane Austen.Could all those viewings, combined with all those re-readings, have resulted in my finding myself living someone else’s life, in someone else’s body, in, of all places, Jane Austen’s England?
  • Miss Jane Mansfield: Everything about her is long and lean and graceful, as opposed to my short, curvy, trip-over-the-nearest-rug self. Unlike me, she can dance without maiming her partner and embroider as if possessed by actual domestic skill. I can’t even hem a pair of pants. But this is no meek little miss. She’s thirty years old and in no rush to get married, which pisses off her marriage-mad, Mrs.-Bennet-meets-Cruella-de-Vil mother (much to Jane’s delight, I like to think). She also appears to have a talent for exasperating the most prized bachelor in the neighborhood, which brings us to…
  • Mr. Charles Edgeworth: ...…who makes my palms sweat and my mouth go dry whenever he walks into a room. Physically he’s a sort of mashup of Daniel Craig and Lost’s Josh Holloway. I’d never thought of those formal, choreographed dances from Austen’s era as sexy, but that was before I danced with Edgeworth. That was before I inhabited a body that actually knew how to dance. Mr. Darcy? Or Willoughby? Not an easy one to answer. You see, my borrowed brain is serving up memories that are not my own. Disturbing memories. And in them Edgeworth plays a starring role.
  • Miss Mary Edgeworth: Jane’s best friend, now mine. She’s the only one I can confide in, though she puts her own construction on my story. She’s also Edgeworth’s sister, and in her mind he’s anything but a hero. Between Mary’s ideas about her brother and the confusing memories that aren’t even mine, I don’t know what to think. I’m having enough of a hard time holding onto my identity. I don’t need to set myself up for another betrayal. Besides, I’m not going to stay here forever. I’ve got a real life to get back to.
  • Wes: Formerly known as best friend; that is, till I found out he provided my philandering ex-fiancé with an alibi. Nevertheless, I miss him. I miss amusing him with accounts of my boss’s random acts of clueless egotism, which always made me find the humor in them myself. I miss sipping vodka and doing the dishes with him after his dinner parties, while everyone else practically passed out in the living room from too much good food and wine. And I miss his unconscionably divine cooking, which has no apparent effect on his lanky frame. It’s as hard to stay angry at Wes here as it is to feel more than an abstract sense of heartbreak over the man I could have married.
  • Frank: The aforementioned ex-fiance. Don't get me started.
  • Mrs. Mansfield: A total nightmare (see "Miss Jane Mansfield" description above). But I have to play the role of dutiful daughter, or else.The mother of Jane Mansfield, the girl with whom Courtney trades places.
  • Mr. Mansfield: The father I always wished I had, and I don't mind at all pretending that he really is my dad.
  • The Fortune-Teller: "Those who want the truth, get truth. Those who want lies, get lies no matter what I say."
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Quotes edit see section history

  • “And I resent it being a truth universally acknowledged, no matter what era I find myself in, that a single woman of thirty must be in want of a husband.”
    Jane Mansfield
  • “I have a rush of kindred feeling for Mr. M, whose shamefaced attachment to his painting and his studio remind me of my own ungovernable addiction to Jane Austen novels. Like Mr. M, I indulge alone.”
    Courtney Stone/Jane Mansfield
  • “If there's anything I've learned as a single woman in search of that holy grail, a decent relationship, it's that I have no right to assume anything. I have no right to assume I am in a relationship with a man, even if that man is someone I'm regularly sleeping with. I have no right to assume fidelity, no even from my fiance. And if I were to sleep with someone new, I have no right to assume I'll get so much as a hey-I-had-a-good-time-last-night phone call. If I'm lucky, he might spend five minutes with me two weeks later when I run into him at a party.”
    Courtney Stone
  • “What an accomplishment, to get me alone with prime marriage material. If she only knew how many men I've been alone with. And what I've done with them. Ah yes, Mrs. M. I can just see you reaching for your smelling salts. I smile at the thought.”
    Courtney Stone/Jane Mansfield
  • “It is now day five of the hostage-in-another-body crisis, and this particular body is starting to smell ripe.”
    Courtney Stone/Jane Mansfield
  • “I can't believe I've become a stalker. Of Jane Austen.”
    Courtney Stone
  • “"What do you say to a man you are supposed to know but don't but he proposes to you anyway and he lives in a different time period?'”
    Courtney Stone
  • Popular Highlights from Kindle Customers
  • “Just be where you are. That is the only way to get where you’re supposed to go.”
    Highlighted by 7 Kindle customers

Setting & Locations edit see section history

This is the story of a woman from L.A., California, who wakes up in the body and life of a gentleman's daughter in Regency England.

Organizations edit see section history

  • The Jane Austen Society of North America: The Jane Austen Society of North America is dedicated to the enjoyment and appreciation of Jane Austen and her writing. JASNA is a nonprofit organization staffed by volunteers, with approximately 4,000 members and over 60 regional groups in the United States and Canada. Its members, who are of all ages and from diverse walks of life, share an enjoyment of Austen’s fiction and the company of like-minded readers.

First Sentence edit see section history

Why is it so dark in here?

Series & Lists edit see section history

This is book 1 of 2 in Jane Austen Addict. (standard series)

Followed by Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

  1. Laurie Viera Rigler (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Original Language: English
Publisher: Dutton
Country: USA
Publication Date: 2007
ISBN: 0525950400
Page Count: 304

Classification edit see section history

Notes for Parents edit see section history

Reading Level: Young Adults

There is *one* 'almost sex' scene in this book that leads to a positive moral lesson.

Links to Supplemental Material edit see section history

  • Jane Austen Addict: Diversons for Austen fans who dearly love a laugh, by the author of CONFESSIONS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT and RUDE AWAKENINGS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT. More about the books, plus videos, quizzes, games, a blog, and more.

Movie Connections edit see section history

  • Sex and the Austen Girl (IMDb): Two women who have inexplicably switched bodies, time periods, and lives - one from Regency England, the other from 21st-century Los Angeles - debate the pros and cons of life and love in today's world vs. Jane Austen's world. Inspired by the novels CONFESSIONS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT and RUDE AWAKENINGS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT. Created by Laurie Viera Rigler and starring Arabella Field and Fay Masterson. Directed by Brian Gerber and Thomas Rigler.

More Books Like This edit see section history

   
  • Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict
  • According To Jane

Books Cited by This Book edit see section history

   
  • Pride and Prejudice (A Norton Critical Edition)
  • Sense and Sensibility (Norton Critical Editions)
  • Emma
  • Mansfield Park
  • Northanger Abbey
  • Persuasion (Norton Critical Editions)
  • The Lay of the Last Minstrel
  • Much Ado About Nothing
  • The complete poetical works of William Cowper, esq., including the hymns and translations from Madame Guion, Milton, etc., and Adam; a sacred drama; from ... of the author, by the Rev. H. Stebbing.

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