Leenie Brown fell in love with Jane Austen's works when she first read Sense and Sensibility followed immediately by Pride and Prejudice in her early teens. As the second of five daughters and an avid reader, she has always loved to see where her imagination takes her and to play with and write about the characters she meets along the way. In 2013, these two loves collided when she stumbled upon the world of Jane Austen Fan Fiction. A year later, in 2014, she began writing her own Austen-inspired stories and began publishing them in 2015. Leenie lives in Nova Scotia, Canada with her two teenage boys and her very own Mr. Brown (a wonderful mix of all the best of Darcy, Bingley and Edmund with healthy dose of the teasing Mr. Tillney and just a dash of the scolding Mr. Knightley).
Fashion Plate (Promenade Dress). England, London, October 1, 1824. Rudolph Ackermann. Los Angeles County Museum of Art [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons
~*~*~
“Oh, do skip over the people I know, Reginald.” She huffed. “Why must you insist on being such a trial?”
“Because I am much like you?”
“Reginald Arthur Fitzwilliam, do your duty as you should,” Lady Matlock retorted.
Westonbury chuckled. “My full name and not even five minutes have passed. That must be a record.”
“Indeed,” his mother replied dryly but with a smile for her eldest son. “Now, get on with it. And do it properly.”
[from Loving Lydia, book 3 in the Marrying Elizabeth Series]
Thomas Prescott heard the small child’s squeal of delight before he rounded the bend in the path and saw her, a small bundle of excitement, dancing with her hands in the air attempting to catch the white petals falling from the apple tree above.
Thomas stopped where he was. He would eventually have to continue on his way, but he did not wish to disturb the child’s fun just yet. He would let her twirl and giggle for a few moments longer before intruding on her play.
“More, Mama!” the child pleaded when the shower of petals slowed.
“One last shake,” the lady, who must be the child’s mother, said from her perch on a bench beneath the apple tree. “But we must save some flowers so that we can make apple pies for Christmas.” Rising up on her toes, she grasped a branch and gave it a gentle shake. The flurry of white petals caused by the action was met with clapping hands, bouncing curls, and happy laughter.
[From Apple Blossoms, an original sweet Regency romance short story, and the Sweet Tuesdays story for the next four weeks]
Provided to YouTube by CDBaby, October 19, 2015.
The excerpt above is how the new Sweet Tuesdays story, Apple Blossoms, begins — with Mr. Prescott, a bachelor, meeting his new neighbours, Miss Abigail Watson and her mother the widow Watson. This short story will be shared in four parts, starting tomorrow.
Apple Blossoms is a short story of about six thousand words. It has a complete story arc (beginning, middle, end sort of thing). It has characters that are developed, and the main character does grow (learns something new to him). There is a desire that the main character has, as well as obstacles (of his own creation) to overcome. In other words, it is a complete story.
However, because of the short length, the plot of a short story has to be kept tight so there are no side plots, and the number of characters is limited as is the time frame and the number of problems. It should be a sweet little tidbit which will (hopefully) leave you with a smile and a sigh. I hope you will join me for this story starting tomorrow.
Apple Blossoms will be one of the stories eventually included in my next Nature’s Fury and Delights collection whenever I get the rest of the stories written. 😀 I have really fallen down on that goal for this year. I have an inspirational image selected for the next story for the collection, but that is as far as I have gotten with that project. There have just been so many other things needing attention.
Back in September, I took part in an Instagram challenge to post various things daily. Day 10 was to share our writing nook — this is still how it looks for the most part.
In today’s episode of the LLS Society Papers*, Rose, Zoe, and I are going to let you take a peek at our writing spaces, which means I should probably tidy up a bit. 😀 I mean, one always does some cleaning before company comes, right? (Even if that company is only visiting virtually.)
I hope you can join us live, but if you can’t, you can always watch later.
The live stream will begin at 3 PM EST or 4 PM Atlantic.
*Longbourn Literary Society (LLS) is a Facebook group founded by three friends, who share a love of writing and Jane Austen for the purpose of promoting those loves and our work.
~*~*~
You can find Rose and Zoe’s websites at these links:
A doctor placing his hand on the head of a sick boy, outside a country cottage. Photogravure after R. Hedley, 1898. Iconographic Collections Keywords: Ralph Hedley. Wellcome Images (public domain) via Wikimedia Commons.
A/N: We are not going to meet Lady M this week. The residents of Netherfield and Longbourn are just preparing for her arrival, and this image made me think of her.
~*~*~
“It is good to see you in the drawing room,” Darcy looked up from the book he was reading as Richard entered the room with his brother standing watchfully at his side.
“I hear Mother is to arrive. I thought it best to look as fit as possible so that she would not send for every doctor in London.”
“And a few from other locales,” Westonbury quipped.
Lady Matlock had never been one to just allow her children to recuperate as the good Lord deemed, as her husband said it. As certain as her husband was about the fact that medication and doctors were not needed for every ailment, she was equally as certain that if doctors and medication were not needed then the good Lord would not have allowed them to exist. Therefore, if her children did not regain their health and vigour within a specified window of time – more or less mutually agreed upon between Lord and Lady Matlock – a physician would be sought.
[from Loving Lydia, book 3 in the Marrying Elizabeth Series]
“Diana,” he called to his sister before he followed the Uptons into the library.
She turned toward him.
“I’m sorry.”
She stood looking expectantly at him.
“For making a mess of things.”
She smiled at him.
“You will tell Victoria that?
[from His Darling Friend, A Touches of Austen Novella, and the current Sweet Tuesdays story]
Published to YouTube by xxnumber27xx on February 10, 2013.
Tomorrow’s chapter of His Darling Friend is the final chapter. The book will be going on pre-order tomorrow, and so, ahead of that, I have password protected most of the chapter posts so that Amazon will hopefully not flag the story as being available elsewhere and refuse to list it until the story is removed. The password for all protected chapters of His Darling Friend is ROGER2019.
