A review by soniapage
Jane Austen, the Secret Radical by Helena Kelly

1.0

At the beginning, the author warns that some Austen fans may not like this book. I'm one of them. It sounded good - an attempt to explore Austen's writings against the backdrop of her times and customs. But, the author goes beyond that with things that she reads into the books. Everyone does this but I prefer to "read into" the books on my own without someone else's (sometimes bizarre) ideas. So, I only got about a third of the way and put it down because I didn't want it to ruin the books which have been my friends since I was a child. I have always known that Austen's books were social commentary and not just romance novels and don't need it explained to me. Every time I read one I see something new and I decided I didn't want to "see" what this author was seeing. In fact, I get the impression that the author does not like Austen's books and is just trashing them.