"The most perfect artist among women, the writer whose books are immortal."  —Virginia Woolf Fanny Price's rich relatives offer her a place in their home so that she can be properly brought up. However, Fanny's childhood is a lonely one as she is never allowed to forget her place. Her only ally is her cousin Edmund. When her cousins befriend two glamorous new young people who have arrived in the area, Henry and Mary Crawford, Edmund starts to grow close to Mary and Fanny finds herself dealing with feelings she has never experienced before.  • "Full of the energies of discord -- sibling rivalry, greed, ambition, illicit sexual passion, and vanity." --Margaret Drabble  • "Jane Austen is the pinnacle to which all other authors aspire." --J.K. Rowling  • "Austen looks at her world with a cool, undressing gaze... she is a formidable opponent of hypocrisy and sentimentality." -- Observer Jane Austen  (1775-1817) is the author of  Emma , Mansfield Park , Northanger Abbey , Persuasion ,  Pride and Prejudice , and  Sense and Sensibility .