Wendy Zomparelli
A Life of Her Own: The Story of Margaret Dashwood.
Self-Published, 2021. Author-signed second printing of second edition. 9780578297408 392 pages.
Softcover volume, measuring approximately 6" x 9", is in fine condition. Binding is sound. Pages are clean and bright.
Author's signature appears on title page over date of December, 2022.
"A Sequel to Jane Austen’s "Sense and Sensibility."
Margaret Dashwood, an English child of the early nineteenth century, loves to sit beside her father, poring over Piranesi’s engravings of the ancient ruins of Pompeii. The drama and pathos of the city’s destruction by the volcano Vesuvius kindles in her a passion for what we now call archaeology, and the pair’s ambition is to travel to Italy together. Her father’s untimely death deprives her not only of a parent and their plans, but also of the income that would have made it possible for her to be formally educated and to travel.
Margaret refuses to let a lack of money ruin her dreams of visiting Pompeii and making discoveries of her own. To her family’s dismay she begins earning her own living as a companion to an elderly lady in London. Some years later, an unexpected inheritance gives her enough money to travel -- despite her family’s insistence that she keep it as a marriage portion.
What she lacks are male relatives to escort her, so she recruits a small party of ladies to go on their own – a daring project for an Englishwoman in the 1820s. When her ambition to join an archeological expedition leads her into danger, she discovers that lofty goals and scientific advancements cannot thwart evil – but that courage and determination can.
Margaret is the youngest of the three sisters in Jane Austen’s "Sense and Sensibility," in which she makes only minor appearances. Austen’s book concludes when Margaret is about 13 years old. My novel continues the story of her life and adventures – but it is more than a sequel.
It is a meticulously researched historical novel about one woman’s attempt to overcome the constraints limiting the choices of pre-Victorian ladies – constraints upon the books they were permitted to read, the places they could go unescorted, and the people with whom they could associate. Margaret attempts to work within and around society’s norms to construct a life that brings her meaning and joy – the task with which we all contend."