Review: The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen Vol. III

~Review at a Glance~

Title: The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen Vol. III
My Rating: 4.5
Genre: Historical Fiction
Format: Paperback*
Publication Date: November 30, 2017
Author: Collins Hemingway

~Book Blurb~

The Stunning Finale to Jane Austen’s Saga.

In the moving conclusion to “The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen,” Jane and her husband struggle with the serious illness of their son, confront a bitter relationship with the aristocratic family who were once their friends, and face the horrific prospect of war when the British Army falters on the continent. The momentous events of the Napoleonic wars and the agonizing trials of their personal lives take Jane and Ashton to a decision that will decide their fate—and her future—once and for all.

~My Thoughts~

This book is a gut punch.

Before I read the third and final installment, I was excited and scared. I knew something major had to happen in order for the Jane Austen I knew from history to develop out of the Jane Austen that appeared at the end of Volume II.

Volume II concludes with Jane Austen being a wife and becoming a mother. However, she is known to have been an unattached, single woman novelist, an extreme rarity for her time. The premise of this series of novels is pretty simple, what if Jane Austen had actually been married with a family? Could that explain why she was able to write so captivatingly about love and courtship, even though most believed her to have never experienced either? In a short period of time, a lot of events had to take place for this theory to be possible.

Enter the gut punch.

Im going to use an analogy here and I need you to stick with me. When an extremely graphic sports injury occurs, you know it’s going to be difficult to watch, yet when the video comes up in the article you are reading, you click play. You were warned in the headline, and possibly warned before the video starts, yet you watch anyway. This is how I felt before reading this book.

I HAD to now what happened in this series even though I was certain reading was going to be emotional and heartbreaking. Things couldn’t work out the way my heart hoped, because I already knew the ending, I just didn’t know how we got there.

I call this a gut punch because there are so many moments I felt overwhelmed with emotion. I had a lot invested in these characters, but beyond that, the story was emotionally gripping. In the first 100 pages, there is a scene so shocking that I had to stop and reread the previous page sure that I had missed something. Rereading only confirmed my outrage, and there was really nothing I could do with it since I was on the elliptical. Let’s just say i had a productive workout that day.

I won’t say this is a stand-alone novel, because I don’t believe it is. You could probably get the gist of the story if you only read Vol. III, but there is no way you can understand the emotional turmoil unless you have read the entire saga. Even small things, like the letter writing between Jane and Ashton, is an important detail from book 1 that you need to know.

The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen: Vol. III is an incredible conclusion to an epic and imaginative tale. Collins Hemingway reimagines one of the world’s most famous female writers by answering one of literature’s great mysteries: how could Jane Austen have written so eloquently and truthfully about love without ever experiencing it? Be sure to bring your tissues.

*Special thanks to Collins Hemingway and HF Virtual Book Tours for a copy of The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen: Vol. III in exchange for an honest review.