Growing Older with Jane Austen is actually an interesting read, reviewing (as the title might suggest) all of Austen’s novels through the lens of age. The first chapter, “Loss of Youth & Beauty”, indicates that point when age would turn against a woman in Georgian England, that is, when she might be considered as a spinster, a dependent relative, on the shelf insofar as marriage might be concerned and therefore without a bright future. What makes the book particularly interesting is all the attention granted to those secondary characters from Austen’s novels who might not otherwise be given much time in the spotlight. There’s a certain stimulation in considering the older Mrs. Ferrars (Edward’s mother in Sense and Sensibility) in the context of chapters like “Parent and Child” and “Four Dowager Despots”. Mrs Clay, the gold-digging companion to Sir Walter Elliot in Persuasion appears in a chapter entitled “Not the Only Widow in Bath”. Lady Susan -- that scandalous female who manipulates the marital prospects of her daughter -- shows up in the chapter “Merry Widows”.

This book isn’t just about the fictional characters. It’s about the cultural behaviors and attitudes in place that Austen’s novels present as ordinary, or as Miss Bingley might phrase it “not out of the common way”. Different chapters touch on how the aging process might impact one’s social status and thus one’s circumstances in terms of residence or income. (For example, the chapter on Bath discusses how the population of Bath shifted over time from being a fashionable city full of attractions to members of the Court to being a less upscale environment, overpopulated with widows suddenly forced to relocate.) There are plenty of references to real places and individuals but less than might actually justify an index given over *solely* to real persons and historical sites.

If you read Jane Austen and Food by this author, and enjoyed it, I can recommend this one as well to you. It's very much in the same vein. ( )