Award-winning novel Susan: A Jane Austen Prequel by Alice McVeigh, available now as audiobook
Hello again, dear audiobooks friends! Today I want to draw your attention to an award-winning novel that has been released in audiobook format recently. Susan: A Jane Austen Prequel by Alice McVeigh is the first in a series of six books planned by this award-winning author.
The audiobook version of Susan is performed by respected and talented narrator Heather Tracy, it’s 11 hours and a half in duration and it has been published by Warleigh Hall Press.
In order to help you make an impression about the story, I’ll hopefully entertain you with a quote before continuing this article.
“She possesses an uncommon union of symmetry, brilliancy, and grace. One is apt to expect that an impudent address will naturally attend an impudent mind – but her countenance is absolutely sweet. I am sorry it is so, for what is this but deceit?“ (from Jane Austen’s Lady Susan)
Now, let’s take a look at the Publisher’s Summary and after that, I promise to tell you a few things about the author and the narrator.
Susan is a Jane Austen prequel (or Pride and Prejudice variation) brilliantly capturing Austen’s own Lady Susan as a young girl. As the BookLife review put it for Publishers Weekly: “McVeigh’s prose and plotting are pitch-perfect. Emma mingles with Pride and Prejudice in a delightful confrontation between the two books’ worlds… This Austen-inspired novel echoes the master herself.”
Familiar characters abound – Frank Churchill, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, Darcy himself – but Susan – mischievous and manipulative – is the star. This is Austen that even Austen might have loved, with a touch of Georgette Heyer in the romantic sections. Fans of Bridgerton will also relish this classic regency romance, the first in a six-book series.
Sixteen-year-old Susan Smithson – pretty but poor, clever but capricious – has just been expelled from a school for young ladies in London. At the mansion of the formidable Lady Catherine de Bourgh, she attracts a raffish young nobleman. But, at the first hint of scandal, her guardian dispatches her to her uncle Collins’ rectory in Kent, where her sensible cousin Alicia lives and “where nothing ever happens.”
Here Susan mischievously inspires the local squire to put on a play, with consequences no one could possibly have foreseen.
What with the unexpected arrival of Frank Churchill, Alicia’s falling in love and a tumultuous elopement, rural Kent will surely never seem safe again….
Alice McVeigh was born in South Korea, of American diplomatic parents, and lived in Asia until she was 13, when the family returned to Washington D.C. … She then fell in love with the cello.
After achieving a B.Mus. with distinction at the internationally acclaimed Jacobs School of Music, she came to London to study with Jacqueline du Pré. Since then, she has performed with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the Royal Philharmonic throughout Europe, America, and Asia.
Her first two contemporary novels – While the Music Lasts and Ghost Music – were published by Orion Publishing/Hachette.
After spending some years working as a ghost writer, her Last Star Standing was published by Unbound Publishing under her pen name (Spaulding Taylor) in February 2021. Kirkus-starred, and currently longlisted for the Cygnus Prize for science fiction, it was tenth on Amazon’s hot new releases in science fiction in March.
On June 30, 2021, the first in her series of six Jane Austenesque novels was released, achieving #1 in three Amazon categories. It’s also a (very, very) early frontrunner for the international BookLife Prize, having been rated 10 out of 10 on Publishers Weekly. In September it won the gold medal (historical) in the Global Book Awards, and has just been longlisted for Chanticleer’s Goethe Award.
Alice is married to Professor Simon McVeigh, and lives in London. They have one daughter, who recently graduated from the University of Oxford in Chinese studies.
Apart from music and fiction, Alice is a powerful but notably inaccurate tennis player, with the dubious distinction of being the perpetual ladies’ singles runner-up at her – very, very – local tennis club.
Heather Tracy is a classically trained British actress who has worked in theatre, TV, and film. Having recorded audio drama for the BBC and Big Finish, she naturally progressed into the marathon storytelling world of Audiobooks, channeling her legion of character voices (including kids, the elderly, and exploding demons) into the marathon world of storytelling.
She was nominated for Best Audiobook Performance (fiction) at the One Voice Awards UK 2021. When not sitting in a cupboard talking to herself, she loves electronic music, psycho-geography, ballet, and dogs.
I will return in the upcoming weeks with a full review for Susan, but until then, take care, stay safe, and don’t forget, always listen with your heart!
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Victor Dima
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