My Year in Austen

Here it is - at the 2023 JASNA Annual General Meeting

If you read my book, you’ll know that for me, December represents the saddest parts of life and a time of personal reinvention. My father’s sudden passing at Christmas was the jolt I needed to take another look at forgotten intentions and aspirations. For years, I pushed them aside to make room for just about everything and everyone else.

Since that awful Christmas season, I’ve begun setting boundaries and saying no. More importantly, I have also started saying yes.

I’ve learned new things and met incredible people. I’ve traveled to bucket-list locations. I’ve earned a mid-life PhD and written a book. Over the past year, I leveraged both to access diverse communities of women who come together in celebration of six novels written by a long-dead spinster from the middle-of-nowhere in England.

I’m not a regular blogger. I’ve started any number in the past, but never keep them up for very long. This one isn’t mine - I’m working out the mechanics behind SquareSpace to share my adventures with fellow members of the Jane Austen Society of North America’s Virtual Region. Check us out at https://www.jasnavirtualregion.org/