Jane Austen Festival

Oh my dear ladies (and gentleman) how I long to attend the Jane Austen Festival in England. And, today, they posted pictures of last year's summer ball as well as last year's festival. You simply must go like "Jane Austen Festival" on Facebook and then peruse these pictures. They are high quality images chock full of divine gowns and handsome gentlemen! Definitely lifted my spirits on this cold, grey morning.

Jane Austen Social Media Game Announced

The BBC is apparently making a game for Facebook.

"The game takes Pride and Prejudice as its starting point, following the newly married Elizabeth and Mr Darcy on a hidden object adventure. The pair have escaped from the pages of Pride and Prejudice and it's the player's job to find them and convince them back into the book. Along the way you meet all of Austen's favourite characters while solving hidden object scenes, decorating your manor house, dressing up in Regency era garb and courting..."

I already decorate my virtual manor house and dress in virtual Regency garb:

However, I am sure I will soon be harassing my friends with JA Game requests on Facebook just like the most dedicated Farmvillian. Read more about the BBC game here. I just found out that Kimberly Denny-Ryder of Reflections of a Book Addict and The Austen Games is a writer on the project! Way to go Kimberly! How exciting!

What do Regency Gowns and Forearm Tattoos Have in Common?

Danielle Sherwood of Swenson Book Development interviewed me recently about Pinterest and how authors can use it to drive traffic to their blogs and and to drive sale of their books.

You can find the interview here. Be sure to go and check it out!

I was pleased to be asked because Swenson Book Development is such a great group here in the Fingerlakes Region of Upstate NY. If you're looking for help developing your non-fiction book, give them a shout. I took an historical fiction writing workshop led by Dr. Jill Swenson back in September, and it was really top notch. I wouldn't be here writing to you today if I hadn't taken that workshop, nor would I be tweeting. Here is a link to follow Swenbooks on Twitter where you will find timely, interesting and often funny tweets about writing and publishing.

I love looking for Austen-related images on Pinterest, but I also really love being able to pin something from outside Pinterest, so I don't lose it. I don't always have the time to read an article, say, on the evolution of the chemise, but I certainly would want to go back to it later, so I can pin the chemise picture to my Jane Austen Regency board, and go back to it when I have time. The picture links back to the original blog.

Another reason I like it so much, is that while I might do targeted internet searching for "regency morning gowns" or ...ahem... "Colin Firth," Pinterest allows me to browse boards of my interests that I have chosen to follow- other people's boards- and I find things I may not have been originally looking for, or that I didn't know existed. Such as this forearm tattoo of Pemberley:

You can find the pin for this image here.

I'd love to see you over on Pinterest. If you need an invitation, give me a shout in the comments.

Austenland Movie

Hello lovelies! A quick post this am as I run out to get a massage (I know- poor me right?) Stephenie Meyer has posted on her blog about the making of the movie verison of Shannon Hale's novel, Austenland. Go here to read about it and to see an image of some of the cast, and of the house cast as Pembroke Park.

*STILL* Revising and Editing

Great post this morning by Abigail Reynolds on Austenauthors.net about how our impressions of characters can change over time. Go check it out!

Joy of Books

I'm still editing and formatting my story for http://www.theaustengames.com so here's a little diversion in the meantime.

Great Post on Austenauthors.net

I am on a deadline and really have no time to post this week, but I just read this exceedingly diverting post on Austenauthors.net and had to share it. In it, Susan Mason-Milks, author of Mr. Darcy's Proposal, muses on what books the characters of Pride and Prejudice might enjoy if they were alive today. Enjoy!