

I enjoyed this slowly unfolding novel about Anne de Bourgh. It only briefly touched on the storyline from Pride and Prejudice but I liked the direction it took. #JaneAustenThenAndNow @Crinoline_Laphroaig
I enjoyed this slowly unfolding novel about Anne de Bourgh. It only briefly touched on the storyline from Pride and Prejudice but I liked the direction it took. #JaneAustenThenAndNow @Crinoline_Laphroaig
I enjoyed this book, and thought the idea of the Heiress of Rosing Park being drugged into oblivion was a very interesting and unique idea for how Anne is in P&P.
Anne is drugged from the time she‘s a small baby and when she claims her independence, she discovers that she has much to learn and much to live for.
4/5 this focuses on the story before and after P&P which was somewhat disappointing but is well written and engaging.
We finally have a winner for the #HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #chaoteraday readalong that I hosted for #PemberLittens
Apologies for the delay, between work, bronchitis, the holidays, etc., tabulating the entries & inputting all the entries per person took a while, but drumroll, please…
🎉The winner of an Jane Austen/Austen-ish prize pack is @IndoorDame !!🎉
We had such good & fun participation that I drew 2 more names for a few Austen-ish goodies ⬇️
#PemberLittens
In honor of our dear Jane‘s birthday today, here is a good list of Jane Austen retellings to keep for future group reads! Our latest is on the list.
Check it out: https://www.bookbub.com/blog/jane-austen-book-retellings?position=5&source=multi...
Catching up on reviews. I enjoyed The Heiress much more than anticipated. Austen adjacent regency novels really aren't my thing. But how could I turn down a chapter-a-day read along hosted by @DebinHawaii ? I knew if nothing else I would get a good laugh every day. I enjoyed the window into opioid addiction in the 1800s, loved the characters, and loved the steamy romance! Thank you #pemberlittens.
I wasn‘t too sure about this for the first few chapters but I really like where Greeley took the story. And she has such vivid writing, it was hard to stop at just one chapter each day for the #HeiressPride readalong!
Thanks for leading, @DebinHawaii !!
On one hand, I can‘t believe how long it took me to read this look at an oft forgotten Pride and Prejudice character as I‘ve had the #ARC for months before it was published, but I can‘t think of a better way to read it than with my #PemberLittens friends as a #ChapterADay as part of #HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 The discussions & daily format made it all the more special. Gorgeous writing, I rooted for Anne de Borough to get control of her destiny & find⬇️
This was a wonderful extension of Pride & Prejudice, detailing the life of Lady Anne de Bourgh. It breathes life into an otherwise forgettable foil character and describes her rich backstory growing up a 'sick' child and following her future as she learns to advocate for herself against family and society that wish to hold her back.
Loved discussing this with our #pemberlittens group each day, it really added to the experience @DebinHawaii
#HeiressPride #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 36: The End! We did it readalong friends! I doubt I need to summarize Anne‘s end of life journey along the river at Rosings revisiting the people in her life so we could learn what happened to them. Was there anyone you were expecting to see, but didn‘t or any surprises?
Let‘s discuss: Your final impressions of this chapter & of the book…
A big thank you to everyone who joined in! I enjoyed ⬇️
My #doublespin this month was such an unexpected gem! Not only is it exceedingly rare to see regency lesbian relationships portrayed well, it‘s also rare to see any book focus just as much on the psychological aspects of addiction as on the physical, and this really got that right. The reading experience was definitely enhanced by sharing it with the #pemberlittens and @DebinHawaii
Anne de Bourgh tells her story in this literary novel. I liked the cadence of the language, as Anne describes her feelings and her demons, mainly from decisions made by her mother Lady Catherine. This is a discovery of oneself story and a love story. It was delightful to see her character fleshed out and made to stand on her own, against the other P&P characters.
So glad I read this with #PemberLittens. Thanks for the posts @DebinHawaii !!
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 35: the penultimate chapter, just this one & the final end tomorrow! This month has flown by! So we start this chapter in the forest which Anne has found refuge from her responsibilities (& Lady C!) echoing others (Mrs. Collins, Cousin John) who have “escaped” there before her. On this autumn day after communing with the great oak, Anne heads back to the house & spies a visitor in ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 34: (Only 2 more to go!) Anne hears back from Eliza & then spends 4 years writing letters back & forth-not the life she had envisioned & in a small village as the patroness-it‘s not easy to find someone else. Anne engages a dancing master to get ready for the opening of the harvest ball (Lady C thinks she has “entirely list her senses” so obviously it‘s a good idea!🧐🤣 Anne should take ⬇️
I'm glad I read this with the #Pemberlittens, a chapter a day. It's a really slow book, especially the first half, and the chapter-a-day pace allowed me to appreciate the prose without being annoyed with the lack of action. Later on, Anne's life gets more eventful, but even then it's more about quiet choices and revelations than big drama.
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PembeeLittens
Chapter 33: A lot happens in this chapter. Anne receives a letter from Mrs FW telling her of Eliza‘s marriage & current honeymoon in Scotland. It hurts Anne, but she has a “thank you, next” moment about their relationship & what Eliza brought her & tells Mrs. FW to give Eliza her best & that she would welcome a letter when she has time.😢Anne visits Lady C at the Dowager house & endures a few ⬇️
#HeiressPride #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Hi Friends, I am sorry AGAIN, I am in what was a one-day offsite work meeting that turned into a 3-day meeting. I read our chapters but promptly crapped out when I got home.
Anyway, let‘s discuss both Chapter 31 & 32 & double points for adding to discussion on this post & I promise to catch back up over the weekend.
So, Anne is home to Rosings Park, Lady C is moved to the Dowager House… she gives ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChaoterADay #PemberLittens
Getting a quick post up now as tomorrow is an all-day work retreat 😵💫
Chapter 30: Miss Julia is wed & Anne & Eliza steal away to the Amherst garden where Eliza tells Anne her father‘s friend, Mr. Andrews has asked to speak with her after the wedding breakfast. She will give him the answer she “must.” Anne professes her love & asks Eliza to go to Kent with her as her “companion” & without her⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
OK, hot on the heels of my late posting of the last Chapter is an early one for Chapter 29. Anne & Eliza go to a circulating library & they walk & talk Julia‘s wedding & her promise to invite her sister to the country once we‘d. Eliza is a city girl but she‘d brave the fiercest cows in Kent for Anne. Anne want‘s to tell her about Watters proposal but can‘t find the words.In her room at the FWs, ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
So sorry for the posting delay-thought I‘d be able to do it in a work break today & that was just silly! Anyway, I‘ll try to get tomorrow‘s up tonight but let‘s stop & discuss Chapter 28! It starts off with Anne begging off a park walk with Mrs. FW & Mr. Watters & Watters makes a sly comment about Miss A not calling at this hour & feminine secrets! Clang-clang⛔️🔔!!! Anne approaches Cousin John ⬇️
Eliza in this chapter (27) made me think of Ariel (she‘s even a redhead!) - but who cares? No big deal! I want more!
#PemberLittens @DebinHawaii #HeiressPride
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 27: Things continue to get steamy & although they can‘t see each other privately every day, notes are fast & furious between Anne & Eliza & they are getting some time behind chamber doors & stealing touches in public (is no one noticing this?!) There‘s lots of pillow talk comparing Eliza‘s body parts to bark & petals (Anne) & Eliza thinking Anne would make a perfect hermit in a moss gown ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 26: Do Not Disturb. That kiss from the last chapter escalated quickly as visiting the Misses A a few days later, Anne is congratulating Miss Julia on her engagement when Miss A (ok, we are probably at the Eliza stage by now as Anne is)😉pulls Anne upstairs to show her “my new gown.” Inside her chamber, let the kissing & more begin! A little later, both are a bit “disarranged” & it‘s time ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 25: Oh my! Short chapter, big step! 🤭 Anne is in the garden contemplating life & the inner thoughts of spiders & bugs when Miss A shows up to visit. Anne tells her about going to see Baby Darcy—Darcy is all gregarious showing off his son & Lizzy is “all surprise” at Anne‘s glow up (I might have felt even more satisfaction than Anne at that!) 🤣 Her aunt comments that Anne looks natural ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Happy Turkey Day or Thursday depending on where you are & what you celebrate! I am thankful for all of you & your contributions to our daily discussions. 🤗
Chapter 24 starts with a shopping trip from hell to find the perfect gift for Baby Darcy. Mrs FW seems a tad obsessed but at least the Miss As are along & Anne gets to hang back & awkwardly flirt with Miss A. It seems that Anne‘s body had ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADqy #PemberLittens
Sorry team! I read Chapter 23 last night & picked out some pics but then crashed & had a long workday today. So I‘ll try to keep this one brief too & be better tomorrow because I have 4 days off!
So, I loved this chapter! Our Anne has discovered books & reading in a big way! She finished Waverley & found The Mysteries of Udolpho on Cousin John‘s shelf & chooses to stay home & read rather than⬇️
Anne discovers contentment in the joys of reading. #pemberlittens #chapteraday #readalong
Painting by American Portrait painter & Artist Louise Williams Jackson(1872-1939).
…each time I turned a page in a book and felt the words printed upon it leaving dimples upon my mind, some subtle as a sparrow‘s claw prints, others deep as a horse‘s tracks…
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 22: A little late today (work again) so I‘ll keep it brief (briefer?) 😆 Mrs. Darcy had another healthy son & an witnesses a private exchange between the FWs who seem to not be successful at having one of their own. Then it‘s time to get ready & Anne has a new purple dress (no flounces) & has a sweet moment with Spinner about how how‘s she‘s changed for the better before her maid makes a ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 21: Let‘s Dance! Miss A comes over for the promised dancing lesson but first a fashion consult. She practices frankness & let‘s Anne know that while we‘ll made, her Lady C. selected gowns are not helping her. (Because really, can anyone besides Belle get away with piles of yellow flounces?!🤢) Anne takes the advice & offer of shopping with embarrassed appreciation (& probably internally ⬇️
#Bookmail day! I‘m not usually a huge fan of the Austen adaptations, so when I do join in I borrow them from the library, but I‘m absolutely adoring this one! So I ordered my very own new (used) copy for my myself and it‘s here! The public library will be thrilled as the copy I was borrowing is overdue 😂. #pemberlittens
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 20: Well, if we didn‘t think we liked Miss Amherst, we certainly must now as they start their shopping trip at the best place ever…a bookstore! And not just any store but the Temple of the Muses (see link below) the largest & cheapest bookstore in the world (be still my ❤️). This is Anne‘s first bookstore given sermons & the borrowed book of poetry are all she got to read. Miss A gives a ⬇️
Spending the long weekend at a cabin with good friends I've known since high school. Reading, relaxing, and reminiscing 🥰
#bookreport
Finished the top 2 books.
In various stages of reading the 3 books in the bottom row. #pemberlittens #chapteraday #readalong #sundaybuddyread #nonfiction #janeandtheexcellentreadalong
#HeiressPride #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 19: Anne is finally out & about in London escorted by Mr. Watters & one or both of the FWs as chaperones. We start at the Royal Menagerie when Anne is dismayed by the tiger who appears to her to have lost hope in his cage. Anne‘s social meter is draining a bit with all the jaunts & crowds (I feel you, Anne) but lives exploring the city—always searching crowds for a glimpse of Miss Hall. Her tour⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
So sorry group! Worst host EVER!🤦🏻♀️It‘s 7 PM here. Spent the ENTIRE day at the mall with a barely charged phone that I needed because my car wouldn‘t start at Costco yesterday. Much time & $ for a new starter later, here we are. Let‘s talk Chapter 18 & once fed/recovered I‘ll try & get up the next chapter soon.
So Anne has avoided going out, but Mrs. FW‘s friends the Amherst ladies arrive ⬇️
“A gorgeously written historical novel based on Pride and Prejudice.” “An extraordinary tale of one woman‘s liberation, The Heiress reveals both the darkness and light in Austen‘s world, with wit, sensuality, and a deeply compassionate understanding of the human heart.”
This was supposed to be a chapter-a-day read, but once I really got into it, I had to finish it. I have no self-control. I will still take part in the daily #PemberLittens Q&A.
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 17: We‘ll call this one “All the Cheese & All the Feels!” Spring is springing & so is Anne. Off her “magic drops” she is a hungry Anne & a cheese fiend! 🧀 🎉 She also is feeling things in her body that she hasn‘t or rarely has felt before. “Going” regularly without struggle & a “purgative” 😱 (Kind of a wonder with all that cheese, but literally “ you GO girl!!! 😆 Everything feels ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 16: Apologies for a quick & later post today. Work is insane but I should be more timely after today as I took some PTO.🎉 But I digress. Let‘s discuss Anne finally being ravenous & getting to eat “real” food-butter, gravy, desserts…it wasn‘t enough to drug her senseless, Lady C & Mrs. J also controlled her diet making it free from heavy sauces & anything too “stimulating” (so anything ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 15: Oh my! What a chapter! Of course, that awkward dinner deserves the most conversation but I have to say how much I adore Cousin John & his support & ownership of guilt & regret of “the family” not doing more to rescue Anne. But let‘s get to the good stuff. Of course Lady C. sweeps in during dinner, the first course half-eaten & Mrs. Jenkinson scuttling in behind her. The atmosphere is ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 14: Another powerful little chapter as we find out that Anne POURED OUT HER MAGIC DROPS into a flower bed right after Lady C‘s carriage left!😱 Up in her room at Cousin John‘s, she feels the withdrawal begin. John gets a doctor against Ann‘s wishes according to Spinner & thankfully he seems a good one & a few days later Anne is awake & thinking about “the full greatness and horror” of ⬇️
…when you spill tea and feel horribly guilty because you‘re reading a library book, but then the book is so filled with foggy meandering thoughts that you get lost in the quiet patterns of the stain and it all seems rather apt…
#pemberlittens
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 13: Anne‘s in (very rainy) London with all it‘s sounds & smells!! I can‘t believe Lady C. brought her…oh, wait…she didn‘t! Anne hightailed it out of Rosings Park within a couple hours of Lady C‘s departure to visit her brother. You go girl! The only place she could think to go was to CousinJohn who said she was welcome any time she wished. Unfortunately his wife didn‘t get the memo & is ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 12: Oh my, what a chapter! “It was the letter that truly changed everything.” Anne wakes early & heads for her old school room after 9 YEARS & finds the hatbox mailbox & there‘s a letter inside! Miss Hall reminds her of her fortunate position; she has land & status & therefore can retain control of her life. Miss Hall shares her regret at not doing more to help push Anne with her health ⬇️
#HeiressPride #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 11 starts out with “The next few years blur messily together in my mind.” In that spirit, I‘m blending messily a pic of my office lunch (& dinner tonight) of Tonkotsu Ramen Combo with the calm & boring toast Mrs. Jenkinson urges Anne to eat great quantities of at breakfast. It‘s no surprise Anne misses Miss Hall more than Sir Lewis & she finds Mrs. J very boring (the “five-and-forty forever” ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
So sorry for the late post—the whole work kicking my butt is still happening.I‘ll try to get the next chapter up earlier, but WOW, Chapter 10 was interesting!
Anne‘s to weak & fragile for reading herself so Miss Hall reads from Fordyce‘s Sermons. Fordyce is an “interesting guy” see article link below. Zane‘s failure to control her reactions (maybe a snort-laugh?) gets her called out by Lady C. ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Sorry everyone. I read Chapter 9 last night but fell asleep before I could post. Work be kicking my butt this week. 🤦🏻♀️
So Anne is now 20, Sir Lewis dies (we find out it was a fall from his horse in London) & Lady C. doesn‘t seem all that broken up about it.🧐 But Anne‘s pretty normal reaction gets her MORE MAGIC DROPS from the doctor.😡 Apparently she gets night “visitors” with the drops & ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 8: 5 years have passed, Anne is 17 & it seems like Miss Hall has done what she could to broaden Anne‘s world under the confines of Lady C‘s rules. In the rose garden (which Sir Lewis has adorned with scantily-clad classic sculpture, Miss Hall is the first to address laudanum being addicting to Anne having seen it in her injured brother—although Anne‘s not ready to think of the process of⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
Chapter 7: Sir Lewis is acting a little odd-what do we make of that? He also called Miss Hall pretty which Anne knows is not true because Lady C. has declared it impossible!🙄 Apparently still, the only thing Anne is good at is figures in math & her handwriting is atrocious so Miss Hall has her writing letters to practice penmanship & with no one else for her to write to, she will be Anne‘s ⬇️
#HeiressPride 🏳️🌈 #ChapterADay #PemberLittens
OK, still need to get back to previous discussion questions but let‘s unpack Chapter 6:
Returned from Brighton, Anne has that post-vacation depression that is so common, but in her becomes a craving for more & more “magic drops to calm her. Sir Lewis is worried & keeps 👀 her before finally deciding she needs education & a governess. Dr. Opioid says OK, if Anne‘s “considerable limitations” are ⬇️