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6.0 stars.  Confession...this book gave me an earth-shattering Janeaustegasm and I am feeling a bit spent and vulnerable at the moment, so please bear with me.  You see, I decided I wanted to get more literated by reading the "classicals" in between my steady flow of science fiction, mystery and horror.  The question was where to begin. 

After sherlocking through my Easton Press collection, I started by pulling out my Dickens and reading A Tale of Two Cities which I thought was jaw-dropping AMAZO and left me feeling warm, satisfied and content.  It also made me made retrospectively pleased that I named my youngest daughter Sydney. 

After Two City “Tale”ing, I decided to give this book a whirl as I kept seeing it on GR lists of "goodest books ever."  However, I must admit I was hesitant going in to this for two big reasons.  One, I thought it might be a bit too romantical for me.  The second, and much more distressing, reason was that Twilight was on many of the same lists as this book.  Austen fans should pull a nutty over that one. 

So needless to say I went into this thinking I might hate it.  Well, for the 999,987th time in my life (at least according to my wife’s records)...I was wrong!!!  I absolutely loved this book and had a mammoth, raging heart-on for it from the opening scene at the breakfast table when Father Witty (Mr. Bennet) is giving sly sarcasm to Mrs. Mommie Put Upon.  I literaphorically could not get enough of this story.  I was instantly captivated by the characters and Elizabeth Bennet, the main protagonist, immediately became one of my all time favorite characters.  Mr. Darcy joined that party as soon as he showed up in the narrative as I thought he was terrific as well. 

Overall, the writing could not have been better.  It was descriptive, lush and brilliant.  The story could not have been more engaging or intelligent and the characters could not have been more magnificentastic.  Elizabeth and Fitz are both smart, witty, self-confident and good.  Austen could not have written them better.  Oh, and I am sorry if this is a bit of a minor spoiler but I need to add that George Wickham is a cock-blocking braggadouche of startling proportions.  I needed to say that and now I feel better. 

This one has made it onto my list of All Time Favorite novels and is truly one of the classics that lives up to its billing.  A FINAL WORD TO THE GUYS: ...Guys, do not fear the Austen...embrace the Austen...HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!! 

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Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics. 

Austen lived her entire life as part of a close-knit family located on the lower fringes of the English landed gentry.  She was educated primarily by her father and older brothers as well as through her own reading.  The steadfast support of her family was critical to her development as a professional writer.  Her artistic apprenticeship lasted from her teenage years until she was about 35 years old.  During this period, she experimented with various literary forms, including the epistolary novel which she tried then abandoned, and wrote and extensively revised three major novels and began a fourth.  From 1811 until 1816, with the release of Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814) and Emma (1815), she achieved success as a published writer.  She wrote two additional novels, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, both published posthumously in 1818, and began a third, which was eventually titled Sanditon, but died before completing it. 

Austen's works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century realism.  Her plots, though fundamentally comic, highlight the dependence of women on marriage to secure social standing and economic security.  Her work brought her little personal fame and only a few positive reviews during her lifetime, but the publication in 1869 of her nephew's A Memoir of Jane Austen introduced her to a wider public, and by the 1940s she had become widely accepted in academia as a great English writer.  The second half of the 20th century saw a proliferation of Austen scholarship and the emergence of a Janeite fan culture.