An Update ... and an Austen Festival

Hello all! It's been far too long. I just felt the need to check in and share how things have been proceeding. I have finished the third draft of Second Glances (yeah!) and after a bit more tinkering, I'll be ready to publish. I should also be able to reclaim my ability to do some blogging, which I really miss. I look forward to rejoining our happy online Janeite community.

My other motivation for posting today is that I just returned form the 5th Annual Jane Austen Festival of Louisville, which takes place quite close to my in-laws' house. I have been to this festival before and always enjoy myself. In the past few years since my last attendance, the festival has grown in size. In particular, they now have an abundance of Regency costumes for sale, including some incredible bonnets. I really can't complain about this development, except that it seems to have taken place at the expense of the historic demonstrations they formerly provided. I was particularly sorry to see neither the naval surgeon or the cobbler who used to be there (the latter made the most gorgeous portmanteaus).

However, the used book seller who has been there in the past was once again in attendance, and I blew an obscene amount of money with him, as I did before. I am so excited about some of these new treasures, particularly a 1927 volume on painted and printed fabrics manufactured in France, England, and the US during the 18th and 19th centuries, a gorgeous book on Coleridge's time in the Lake District, a book entitled The Trade in Lunacy: A Study of Private Madhouses in England in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (so excited to read it!), and a book all about snuff, which I know almost nothing about. If I am very good, I will be sharing my thoughts on these and more whenever I finally get the chance to read them. New books are always a source of great excitement, and the purchase of these was the crowning highlight of a fabulous day full of muslin and tea. Life cannot get much better than this.