If you're a reader of fanfiction (fan-penned stories set in the worlds of various books/movies/TV shows/etc.), you might want to check out the Yuletide Treasure Fic Exchange, a massive fanfiction archive that features anonymous stories set in a variety of worlds. It's a great source for fanfiction from really obscure sources--there are 'fics for books ranging from Fanny Burney's Evelina to Kiyohiko Azuma's Yotsuba&!.

Labels: fanfiction, Fanny Burney, Kiyohiko Azuma

Have any of you read Abigail Reynolds's Pride and Prejudice "variations"? She appears to have written several, each one featuring an alternate ending for the novel. Her previous stories are available as Sourcebooks e-books, but her most recent effort--Impulse and Initiative: What if Mr. Darcy Didn't Take No for an Answer?--is coming out as a trade paperback.

I have no idea if this will work (and I'm not thrilled about that subtitle, as it makes Mr. Darcy sound like a creep), but I have to give Ms. Reynolds props for her bravery: the world is full to overflowing with Austen-inspired continuations, prequels, and fresh-point-of-view retellings, but very few people have the guts to screw around with her actual plot structures.

Note: I hope the ampersand in the title is darker on the actual bookcover. When I first saw it, I thought the title was "IMPULSE INITIATIVE", which I found off-putting--it makes it sound like an x-rated sci-fi novel, and I'm assuming that wasn't what the author was going for.

Labels: fanfiction, Jane Austen

Sweet Georgia peaches!


Annnnnnd here's the publisher's description:

"Mr. Darcy just isn't Flip Allison's style. She prefers novels with hot sex on the bathroom sink to the mannerly, high-tension longing of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. That is, until she pays a visit to Madame K, who promises a therapeutic massage with an opportunity to "Imagine Yourself in Your Favorite Book." Somehow, on the way to a sizzling sink-top session with a Venetian Adonis, Flip lands right in the middle of Regency England -- and dangerously close to handsome Mr. Darcy. So close, in fact, that she discovers a side of him even Jane Austen couldn't have imagined.

Waking from her massage, Flip is on top of the world and ready for her upcoming book club -- that is, until she notices a new scene in which Darcy and spunky heroine Lizzy Bennet are arguing over...Flip Allison? Her rapturous liaison with Darcy has had disastrous consequences for Austen's characters -- not to mention millions of Pride and Prejudice fans! Flip has twenty-four hours to put the story back on course, and Magnus Knightley, a sexy but imperious scholar whose brooding good looks and infuriating arrogance are decidedly Darcy-like, is the only one who can help. The only problem is, Flip can't keep her hands off him, either...."

I'd think this was a joke ("When fanfic authors attack!"), but I saw it at the bookstore last night.

Labels: fanfiction, Jane Austen

The Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA) has a wonderful new section of their website—an area dedicated to works published for their Annual General Meetings (AGM). These pieces are the crème de la crème of Austen fanfiction, dear readers. The first title is His Cunning or Hers, a Persuasion fic written by June Menzies and featuring illustrations by Juliet McMaster. His Cunning or Hers was first published for the 1993 AGM on Persuasion in Lake Louise.

Note: In Menzies's world, the Eliot family motto is Semper Formosus, which I'm pretty sure translates as "Forever good-looking". Heh.

Labels: fanfiction, Jane Austen