All Roads Lead to Austen: A Year-long Journey with Jane

Amy Smith

Jun 2012 · Sourcebooks, Inc.

About this ebook

"An illuminating insight...fascinating."—Amanda Grange, bestselling author of Mr. Darcy's Diary

"A journey through both a physical landscape and the geography of the human heart and mind...delightfully entertaining and often deeply moving, this book reminds us that Austen's world—and her characters—are very much alive."—Michael Thomas Ford, author of Jane Bites Back

WHERE DO BOOKS TAKE YOU?

With a suitcase full of Jane Austen novels en español, Amy Elizabeth Smith set off on a yearlong Latin American adventure: a traveling book club with Jane. In six unique, unforgettable countries, she gathered book-loving new friends— taxi drivers and teachers, poets and politicians— to read Emma, Sense and Sensibility, and Pride and Prejudice.

Whether sharing rooster beer with Guatemalans, joining the crowd at a Mexican boxing match, feeding a horde of tame iguanas with Ecuadorean children, or tangling with argumentative booksellers in Argentina, Amy came to learn what Austen knew all along: that we're not always speaking the same language— even when we're speaking the same language.

But with true Austen instinct, she could recognize when, unexpectedly, she'd found her own Señor Darcy.

All Roads Lead to Austen celebrates the best of what we love about books and revels in the pleasure of sharing a good book— with good friends.

Ratings and reviews

Predictable, but still left me with a smile on my face. An easy read for anyone familiar with Austen (and Espanol).

About the author

Amy Elizabeth Smith has an undergraduate degree in music and a masters and PhD in English. She teaches writing and literature (including a course on Jane Austen) at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California. She loves traveling, dancing, classic cinema, and watching squirrel videos on YouTube.