Amanda Grange
Amanda Grange was born in Yorkshire and spent her teenage years reading Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer whilst also finding time to study music at Nottingham University. She has had twenty-five novels published including six Jane Austen retellings, which look at events from the heroes' points of view. She has also had two books published under different names: Murder at Whitegates Manor (as Eleanor Tyler; a Regency cosy crime murder mystery) and The Rake (as Amy Watson; a very light and frothy Regency romance).
Woman said of Mr Darcy's Diary: "Lots of fun, this is the tale behind the alpha male," whilst The Washington Post called Mr Knightley's Diary "affectionate". The Historical Novels Review made Captain Wentworth's Diary an Editors' Choice, remarking, "Amanda Grange has hit upon a winning formula."
Austenblog declared that Colonel Brandon's Diary was "the best book yet in her series of heroes' diaries."
Amanda Grange now lives in Cheshire. Her profile photo was taken at the Jane Austen House Museum, Chawton. The museum is well worth a visit!
You can find out more by visiting her website at http://www.amandagrange.com You can also follow her on Twitter @hromanceuk and find her on Facebook
“It is possible to compromise in certain areas when choosing a partner for life, but never on a cravat.”
“A good turnout at church today. It had nothing to do with the mild weather and a desire to gossip and everything to do with my oratory skills, I am perfectly convinced. Indeed, if not for Mrs Attwood's new bonnet, I would have had the ladies' undivided attention. The gentlemen I was more certain of. They had no interest in bonnets, new or otherwise, and listened in pleasing silence, broken only by an occasional snore.”
“No", she wanted to say. " I don't want you to care for me, I want to be with my husband." But nothing came out. She turned beseeching her eyes to Darcy and she saw him as if from a great distance, through a distorting glass, but his words were firm and clear. “She has no taste for your company,” he said.“No?” said the gentleman. “But I have a taste for her.”Hers, thought Elizabeth. He should have said hers.“Let her go,” said Darcy warningly.“Why should I?” asked the gentleman.“Because she is mine,” said Darcy.The gentleman turned his full attention toward Darcy and Elizabeth followed his eyes.And then she saw something that made her heart thump against her rib cage and her mind collapse as she witnessed something so shocking and so terrifying that the ground came up to meet her as everything went black.”
“Your children will be wild and undisciplined. Your daughters will run off with stable hands and your sons will become attorneys.”
“That I have not yet met the right woman, and that there is no use my marrying unless I find someone I like as well as Emma,' I said.He laughed, though I did not know why. There was nothing very amusing in what I had said.”
“Do we say to the wind, do you wish not to blow? Do we say to the thunder, would you rather be silent? No. We never think of these things.”
“The glory, it has passed, the great days, they have gone. There is no place in the world now for our kind, not unless we will take it, and take it with much blood. There are those who will do so, but me, I find I love my fellow man too much and I cannot end his life, not even to restore what has been lost. But without great ruthlessness, glory fades and strength is gone.”
“The living have pleasures the dead know nothing of.”
“You are very young and time, it is a great healer.”
“For the moment she was caught between the two worlds, neither one thing nor another. She would be sorry to let the former depart and yet she was longing for the latter to arrive: a new name and with it a new world and with it a new life.”
“Beneath their wary smiles, the people were warm and friendly. They had known sorrow and loss, but their spirit survived.”
“I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look, or the words which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew it had begun.”
“To a good man, yes, one who knows her in all her moods, who can laugh at her follies and rejoice in her virtues; who will not allow her to give in to her worst instincts; one who knows her, and who, knowing her, will still love her, and love her as she should be loved.”
“Of all the evenings it is possible to spend, a companionable evening with friends is the best.”
“As he talked, I watched Emma and wondered what is to become of her. She is of an age to be married but she spends her time with people who are so much older than she, that she is never likely to meet a husband. And if she does, I do not know if she will wish to marry. She is too comfortable where she is. Her father is easy to please and she can do as she likes with the household. A husband will have his own views, and Emma is not likely to take to that way of living.”
“A wolf howled sending her lonely ululations high into the air, wailing and crying like a tortured soul. Worse was the agony of expectation as she waited for the answering cry, so that it was almost relief when it came. - Mr Darcy, Vampyre”
“When you are older you will meet a man who will love you for yourself. A good-natured, charming respectable man who is liked by you family.”
“If we all spoke the truth there would be a great deal of unhappiness in the world, and particularly at such a time. Some things are better left unsaid.”