Book Review: Jane Austen Ruined My Life by Beth Pattillo

Book Description:

English professor Emma Grant has always done everything just the way her minister father told her she should -- a respectable marriage, a teaching job at a good college, and plans for the requisite two children. Life was prodigiously good, as her favorite author Jane Austen might say, until the day Emma finds her husband in bed with another woman. Suddenly, all her romantic notions a la Austen are exposed for the foolish dreams they are.
Denied tenure in the wake of the scandal and left penniless by the ensuing divorce, Emma packs up what few worldly possessions she has left and heads to England on a quest to find the missing letters of Jane Austen. Locating the elusive letters, however, isn't as straightforward as Emma hoped. The owner of the letters proves coy about her prize possessions, sending Emma on a series of Austen-related tasks that bring her closer and closer to the truth, but the sudden reappearance of Emma's first love makes everything more complicated.

In the end, Emma learns that doing the right thing has very little to do with other people's expectations and everything to do with her own beliefs. Laced with fictional excerpts from the missing letters, Jane Austen Ruined My Life is the story of a woman betrayed who uncovers the deeper meaning of loyalty.

I have had Jane Austen Ruined my Life by Beth Pattillo on hold for awhile at the library. Finally it arrived and I started reading right away. I was immediately caught up in the story of Emma and her conflict within herself to do the right thing. I was holding my breath to see what would happen and how it ended. The author does a great job of making the Jane Austen "letters" and the "Formidables" (you have to read the story to find out) believable. A great read!