Recently Read: Persuasion

Author: Jane Austen
Genre: Classic/Romance
Publication Date: 1817
Page Count: 250
Rating: 5/5

Also by Jane Austen: Pride and Prejudice

I finished another book off of my Classics and Rereads of 2014 List Persuasion by Jane Austen. This is is my second Austen novel I have read and it's safe to say I am an Austen fan.

Anne is twenty-eight years old, the middle sister, and unmarried. She was persuaded at the age of nineteen by her friend and motherly figure Lady Russell to break off her engagement to the man she loved. But now Captain Wentworth, the man whom she loved all those years ago, is back and Anne doesn't quite know how she feels about it.  

I loved this book. Austen's characters are always great, and her female heroines are always so smart and independent. They always seem to find a way to think for themselves even though they live in a time which didn't encourage them to do so. While Austen can create characters that you love, she is also brilliant at creating characters that you hate. She is the queen of the 19th century D-bag!

Jane Austen's works always seem so modern to me. The situations faced by the characters, the idea of a good guy turning into a bad guy, and the idea of miscommunication are seen in real life and romance fiction still today. One of my biggest pet peeves is when someone declares classics as old and outdated. No! Read Austen and compare her stories to the rom-coms of today. Austen is not outdated people!!

This novel, as well as Pride and Prejudice explores the idea of communication in the 1800's. In a time where one always has to be polite and proper, communication, especially among the two sexes, was difficult and misunderstandings were frequent. I loved Captain Wentworth's scene where he declared his love for Anne. Keeping in mind the time setting of Austen's novels makes these declaration scenes all the more romantic. Austen's men always seem to speak so beautifully.(let's campaign to bring that lovely language back, shall we ladies?) 

This novel has great humor and suspense. Thank goodness this was a short novel because I don't think I could take another one hundred pages of waiting for the two to swallow their pride and tell each other how they feel! Suspense is not a word I would normally consider to describe a book with a romance-plot based book, but Austen has made it so.  

Reading this novel made me want to immediately reread and rewatch Pride and Prejudice! 

The Next Austen book I hope to read is Emma. I'm also on the look out for any mini-series or film adaptations of Persuasion so let me know if you have seen any that you like. What's your favorite Austen novel?

Oh! and now I can read For Darkness Shows the Stars by Diana Peterfreund which is a Young Adult Sci-Fi retelling of Austen's Persuasion, which sounds very intriguing, does it not?