Jane Austen and her sister Cassandra were the only two daughters in their family and neither of them married, resulting in a life-long close relationship between the two. “Cassandra and Jane” is told from Cassandra’s point of view, after Jane’s death as Cassandra is looking through the letters they exchanged and looking back over their lives together.

For someone who knew little to nothing about Jane Austen’s life, “Cassandra and Jane” was very informative. It imbued me with a new-found desire to go and read the rest of Austen’s books (particularly since all I have read is “Pride and Prejudice”). In this sense, it is fantastic for the casual Austen-devotee. I think, however, it is something that would be more enjoyed by Austen fantatics. As I was not already deeply invested in Jane, I did not enjoy the book as much as I might otherwise have. I had more of an “oh, that’s interesting” attitude than a desire to delve deep into the lives of Jane and Cassandra.

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If little is known about Jane Austen, even less is known about her sister Cassandra Austen, aside from the fact that she sketched the only portrait we have of Jane and never married. Jill Pitkeathley assumes Cassandra’s viewpoint in this historical novel, imagining the close relationship between the sisters from childhood until Jane’s early death. Together, the sisters experience the pain of lost loves, the struggles of unmarried daughters reliant on their brothers’ wealth, jealousy, and a variety of other trials, never losing their faith in each other.

I try to avoid “sequel” type books for most of my favorite literature. I make an exception here; I have no problem with historical fiction imagining the lives of these authors, as that’s on a different plane from ruining one of my favorite books, so I was eager to read this book. I’d never heard of the author before, but it sounded lovely and I was right, it was worth my time. I felt that this novel evoked a perfect late 17th/early 18th century England. Pitkeathley never slips, never introduces any anachronisms; I feel that she must know Austen’s novels very intimately to make this one feel like it’s drawn straight from that era.

Moreover, you can see that she’s drawn on those novels to produce Jane’s opinions and her personality, and I love that Pitkeathley gives tribute to Jane’s brilliance, when she is so frequently downgraded by people who dismiss her novels as early chick lit. Jane here is a great, multi-faceted character, frequently discontent with her lot and determined to express the problems inherent in society in her writing.

Unfortunately, there is one downside to this novel, and that is Cassandra. She is, simply, dull. It’s clear that she is just a mirror held up to Jane’s brilliance, and while the real Cassandra may have had some personality of her own, this one doesn’t. She only expresses an opinion twice, when she becomes engaged and when she is jealous of Jane. Otherwise, she is far too complacent and colorless. She could almost have been an omniscient 3rd person narrator for all I cared about her; the sisters’ relationship is nice, but it is Jane that this novel is clearly about and all the other characters fade before her.

I’d also like to mention this novel’s genesis. Ms. Pitkeathley had cancer twice, and the second time, she determined that if she lived, she would write this novel. It’s incredibly admirable of her not only to determine that and follow through on her promise to herself, but to deliver a book that is a very good read. She’s done a great job here and I will give her a lot of credit. I hope she writes another novel, as she definitely has talent.

I would recommend Cassandra and Jane to those who would like to read more about Jane Austen; who would like to, in a sense, get more of the feel of her novels without ruining them. It’s a good read, but it could have been more.

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What is the most tragic and disappointing thing you know about author Jane Austen’s life? My immediate choice would be that she died too young and wrote too few novels, and at a close second would be that after her death in 1817, her sister Cassandra destroyed many of her personal letters to protect her privacy. This act of sisterly devotion is greatly lamented by historians, biographers, scholars, and Austen enthusiasts, limiting what information that we do know to her edited letters and family recollections. The complete reason why they were destroyed will always be a mystery, but one can imagine from Austen’s surviving letters and novels that her keen sense of social observation and biting irony played a key factor in her sister’s decision to remove them forever from family and public scrutiny.

In author Jill Pitkeathley’s recently re-issued 2004 novel Cassandra & Jane, we are offered a chance to explore that chasm left by Cassandra Austen’s bonfire of humanity as Pitkeathley imagines the back story of two beloved sisters who were the best of friends, honorable confidants and devoted to each other through all the ups and downs of their heartbreaking life in rural 18th-century England. This bio fic is told from the viewpoint of Cassandra’s experience of their life together, as only she would know, and is a creative blending of historical fact with a fictional narrative that is both believable and compelling.

The story begins with a prologue to their story. It is 1843, and Cassandra Austen now seventy years old is still residing at Chawton cottage in Hampshire, the house where she and her sister Jane lived together until her untimely death at age forty-one in 1817. She has kept everyone of the letters that her sister ever wrote to her safely stored in her sister’s rosewood trunk after her death. Her family has known of their existence, but she has safeguarded them for twenty-six years from their perusal. She fears that when she is gone, that they will pour over them examine and discuss every detail and then publish them for posterity, and profit. She has now re-read them and sorted them into two piles. She must not forget her responsibility to her sister, and to her memory, as Jane had previously warned her “No private correspondence could bear the eye of others.”

As we are transported into Jane Austen’s world, Cassandra shares their story together in an honest and open manner, dropping her protective older sister mantle for glimpses of the influences that shaped Jane’s personality through her family, social sphere, environment and 18th-century social stricture that bound her financially and emotionally. Their remarkable friendship is the highlight of this novel as they suffer and survive together through romantic aspirations and disappointments, frustration on their financial dependence on their relations, and rejoice in Jane Austen’s early success as a writer.

Austen enthusiasts will recognize many historical facts known of their lives that permeate through the novel, and in turn revel in the allusions from their real lives that are transported into Austen’s novel’s. Life imitating art, or art imitating life? Without overt sentimentality, author Jill Pitkeathley has skillfully blended the tragic and joyful lives of two remarkable 18th-century women who chose different avenues to leave their footprint on posterity; - one who would become a literary legend by remarkably revealing social foibles through wit and guile in her novels, and the other renowned for what extreme measures she took not to reveal them in her own sister. This moving and enjoyable rendering of biography and fiction tops my list of favorite Austen inspired novels for this year, and I highly recommend it. ( )

Cassandra and Jane, by Jill Pitkeathley is a charming book of the adult life of Jane Austen and her relationship with her older sister Cassandra. It is a historical fiction account of their lives told in the voice of Cassandra. This is the story of what "might have been." It chronicles the day to day life, friends and family of the famous author and her sister. In this book you will get to "meet" Jane's family in an intimate setting. It is not unlike the Bennett family life that is portrayed in Pride and Prejudice. We get a glimpse of how Jane's writing were indeed affected by her own family and social life.

It is a wonderful little morsel for Jane Austen enthusiasts. In this story we see the bond between the two sisters through the trials and tribulations of women in the early 1800's. In Cassandra and Jane we get to see the production and time line of the writings for Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park, Emma, Persuasion, and Northhanger Abbey.

I recommend reading this book to all who love "Jane stuff" and anyone who has ever had a sister. The ending of the book is so heartwarming and moving and it portrays both women to have strong hearts and a fierce, loyal love for one another.

I was pleased to review this book for Harper Collins.

Note: I want to note there is a lovely little section from the author at the end of the book along with historical facts of Jane Austen. I wanted to say that this would be a great book to introduce someone to the world of Jane Austen. ( )

I tend to be wary of Jane Austen fiction not actually written by Jane Austen. Fan fiction is usually outright disappointing, and I'd prefer to reread Sense and Sensibility or Persuasion instead. Still, when I found Cassandra and Jane, I decided to give it a go, as I'm a big fan of sister relationships.

I enjoyed it, in a sort of historical novel way. Thankfully Pitkeathley does not overdramatize the romantic relationship both sisters were involved in, though I believe she did imagine one courtship of Jane's that I am not familar with. Though at times Jane's sharp wit and slight bitterness are underscored more than I'd like, it's not really out of harmony with what small information we do have about Jane Austen.

Though obviously the main character of the story is Jane Austen, it is narrated from Cassandra's point of view (who history knows even less about though she outlived Jane by decades). Cassandra seems to hold Jane in awe, though tempering this with some jealousy from time to time. This makes her seem more human, I think,than the docile patient sister whose only known life drama of her own was the death of a fiancee.

As a massive Jane Austen fan and (almost) scholar of her life and work, I'd put this work higher up than the fan fiction and "sequels" and almost on a par with my favorite biographies of her. I loved feeling like I was sitting in the room with the Austen family as Jane read scenes of her latest writings to the happy audience, and felt the pain of an intelligent woman frustrated at the lack of financial independence in the late 18th, early 19th century England. The sister's conversations seem realistic enough to me (I have two close sisters of my own) while corresponding to the time period as Jane Austen described it, which is no mean feat considering the author owns to not having sisters. ( )