Jane Austen

As a romance reader who also loves a wide variety of other genres, I expected to love Jane Austen. She's touted as the genius to invent the romance, so what's not to love?

I dove into Sense & Sensibility and was instantly making cracks about Fanny living up to her name. :-) Unfortunately, as time passed I found myself become bored in a sense with the writing. Jane Austen and her heroines did not rush to do anything. I can understand it perfectly, but it is not in my lifestyle to slow down sadly. I always run from deadline to school function to errands to appointments in a frenzy of activity. Toss in normal every day things and I don't see how single working mom's ever find the time to breathe! I'm happily married with older kids, working from home, and I still struggle to handle everything on my plate.

Does this mean Austen isn't worth reading? No, I don't think so. I thoroughly enjoyed Lady Susan and her disconcern about polite society's rules. It's a dog eat dog world out there and Lady Susan seemed to be a woman with whom I'd enjoy gossiping!

I do think that what has happened is that in my world of having no time to myself, I want that tidbit of time to be fast paced and entertaining. Jane Austen can entertain, of that there is no doubt, but her pacing was just a little too slow for me to be able to connect with it.