Title: The Darcys and the Bingleys: a tale of two gentlemen’s marriages to two most devoted sisters  

Author: Marsha Altman

                                                                                                     Sarah’s Pick

It is a truth universally acknowledged that Pride and Prejudice is one of the most popular books written in English. If you loved the original and want more this is one author’s interpretation of what may have happened after Darcy and Bingley married Elizabeth and Jane.  

I found it a humorous book, not quite in Jane Austen’s style. I found the ending a little distracting however overall it was fun to read. It contains most of the characters in the original and shows us a new side to Mr Darcy. It adds some flashbacks to Darcy’s earlier days, a new generation Bingleys and Darcys, another marriage thwarted and ends as it begins, with marriage.

If you like the idea of a sequel to Pride and Prejudice you may also want to try the following:- 

Darcy & Elizabeth: nights and days at Pemberley: Pride and Prejudice continues- Linda Berdoll

Darcy’s temptation: a sequel to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice- Regina Jeffers 

Impulse and initiative: what if Mr Darcy didn’t take no for an answer? – Abigail Reynolds 

The Pemberley chronicles (series)- Rebecca Ann Collins

Mr Darcy takes a wife: Pride and Prejudice continues- Linda Berdoll

Mr Darcy’s decision: a sequel to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice – Juliette Shapiro

Pemberley- Emma Tennant 

An unequal marriage: Pride and Prejudice continued- Emma Tennant

A private performance: continuing Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice- Helen halstead 

Or for a twist try:-

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: dawn of the dreadfuls- Steve Hockett 

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: the classic regency romance: now with ultraviolent zombie mayhem- Seth Grahame- Smith

Other books based on Jane Austen’s works:- 

Austenland: a novel- Shannon Hale

Becoming Elizabeth Bennet: create your own Jane Austen adventure – Emma Campbell Walker 

The Jane Austen book club – Karen Joy Fowler            

Sense and sensibility and sea monsters – Ben H. Winters 

So you think you know Jane Austen? A literary quizbook – John Sutherland and Deirdre La Faye

I was Jane Austen’s best friend – Cora Harrison 

Me and Mr Darcy: a novel- Alexandra Potter

Mr Darcy’s diary – Maya Slater  

Well, I wanted to be able to tell you at the first instance, but it’s not. Still hopefully it’s not too late to let you know that this years Miles Franklin Literary award goes to Peter Temple for his novel ‘Truth‘. It’s the first time, since 1957, the award started, that the nation’s most prestigious literary award goes to a crime writer.

Congratulations to the author. Truth is a story about murder, corruption, family, friends, honour, honesty, deceit, love, betrayal - and truth. A stunning story about contemporary Australian life, Truth is written with great moral sophistication.

Parramatta City Library has copies available for loans. Enjoy reading it. 

http://www.orangeprize.co.uk/show/feature/orange-2010-winner

This year Orange Prize for Fiction goes to Barbara Kingsolver for her new novel ‘The Lacuna’. Chair of judges, Daisy Goodwin, praises that "We choose The Lucuna, because it is a book of breathtaking scale and shattering moments of poignancy. "

Parramatta City Library has this title available for loan.

Author: Abdellah Taia

Title: Salvation Army

It is an autobiographical novel and translated from French. The story starts in a poverty stricken town in Morocco where Taia spent his childhood, bound by family order and latent sexual tensions. As a young adult, he falls for an older man who introduces him to Europe, the possibility of leaving home and leaving its repressive social mores behind.

• The group members thought the book was about Taia at a moment of transition between being a nice Moroccan boy and that of an adult. He was one of nine children in the family.
• This book is also about poverty and sexual tourism and its benign and cruel side. Money is an obsession in a poor country such as Morocco where the average wage is minuscule and a man feels like a man only when he can bring home a basket full of vegetables and meat.
• It was interesting read, allowing the reader to travel through places such as Morocco, Geneva, Switzerland.

Title: Summertime

Author: J. M. Coetzee

The Nobel Laureate J M Coetzee presents another master piece – ‘Summertime’, to his readers, and again, you will not be disappointed.

A young writer is to write a biography of John Coetzee. Off he goes on a journey that takes him from South Africa to Brazil to England in getting some personal testimony from people, whom had personal relationship with J Coetzee, in South Africa in 1970s.

In addition, the young writer also gathers some fragmental pieces of diaries from Coetzee that was written in the same periods. From those personal stories and diaries, a young Coetzee gradually appears in front of readers. He is awkward, shy, bookish and often emotional isolated. It is a time when South Africa is deeply divided by Apathies and the Western world is divided by anti war protests. Coetzee, as well as many white people from colonies, face personal crisis of cultural and social identity. Wherever he goes, Coetzee does not fit in- a long haired and beared man with some writings that no one seems to know what about. He teaches some students English as a teacher not on permanent basis. He teaches English poetry, which raises suspicious from some parents. He does manual works and lives in a run-down house, which also is very much disapproved by the extended Coetzee family. He places himself on the peripheral of the society. 

It is a fictional biography written by J. M. Coetzee himself presented in the third person. The stories are often sad, but sometimes funny. The structure of the book is well knitted together by setting his personal diaries at the start and the end of the book that links all chapters.  The main body of the book is formed by some first person narratives which are not only Coetzee’s relationships and love affairs with those who were around him at the time, but it pictures a wider and gloomier ambience of South African society in 1970s.

It’s a very enjoyable reading Summertime has won the 2010 NSW Premier’s Literary Award.