The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler, is a fun little novel about a small reading group who meet frequently to discuss the works of Jane Austen; while the group--including a dog breeder, a librarian and her lesbian daughter, a French teacher (who has never been to France and endures through gritted teeth the unsophisticated existence of her sports obsessed husband and aging hippie mother); a free-spirited middle age mom; and a science fiction fan--come to explore each of the six books, their stories unfold, to reveal everything from the teacher's desire for one of her students (um...) weighed against the obligation of her station and her marriage, to the librarian's failed marriage, and her daughter's many intense relationships, to the dog breeder's need to match up everyone with everyone else, as well as the science fiction fan's confusing and somewhat vague story of being the only young male in a family of all sisters--all of which parallel Austen's six novels, if in somewhat vague senses--or maybe I just haven't read enough Austen yet to see all the parallels clearly.

One of my only criticisms of the book, however, if it is one, is that the movie seemed to flesh out the characters much better than the novel--somehow Grigg, more than the rest seemed more alive in the movie, than the novel, but then again, Ms. Fowler did only allow herself a paltry 250 pages to bring six characters' lives in line with six 200-300 page novels.

Maybe, in a case like this, Ms. Austen would like what her work inspired. I certainly did. And, no; you do not have to have read all Jane Austen's oeuvre in order to enjoy this book. My hubby had only read one of them when he read this, and he too thoroughly enjoyed Ms. Fowler's fun little novel. That said, we bid you do give The Jane Austen Book Club a try; we're sure you will be pleasantly surprised.

~Webmistress

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