Let’s look at the blurb, and then I’ll hand over to Don.
“You must throw away notions of what you
want.
Only then will you be free to accept what you need.”
—The Brown Guide to
Fitzwilliam Darcy, 1840
Long has the amazing Bennet Wardrobe involved itself in the affairs of Longbourn. Where before its actions have been cloaked in mystery, its purpose now becomes clear. The fey cabinet has molded the universes to strike a balance that can be achieved only by saving the greatest love story ever told.
Follow the paths taken by Pemberley’s master and mistress after their children are grown. See Elizabeth Darcy struggle to rekindle the love glow that has dimmed after a quarter century. Grasp the unaccountable pain her departure levels upon the entire Derbyshire family. Watch Fitzwilliam Darcy learn that which he must in order to become the best version of himself: worthy of his Elizabeth.
The Grail: The Saving of Elizabeth Darcy closes
out the Bennet Wardrobe series. The
disparate threads spun by the remarkable women born to a Hertfordshire couple
of insignificant fortune are woven together. These lives have become the
tapestry that records the destiny of Jane Austen’s lovers, immortal in any here/now
or where/when.
* * *
Guest Post from Don Jacobson, Author of The Grail: The Saving of Elizabeth Darcy
Being
asked to sit on a panel—as I was in 2021—to discuss writing a series is an
exciting thing. The honor was grounded in the assumption that you have something
important to impart. Heady stuff! Easy to accept and exciting to imagine. But
saying that you have written a series and explaining why you wrote a series are
two entirely different conversations. The latter demands reflection, a
complicated process when you are in the later stages of world-building.
I
stepped back to the beginning of the Wardrobe. In the earliest moments of
Wardrobe writing (2015), I was looking at a literary genre dominated by nothing
but ODC portrayals in hundreds of JAFF novels. Variations of Persuasion,
Sense and Sensibility, and Emma
were non-existent.
While P&P
was a story for the ages, it was essentially a tale told within tight
confines. Lest you think I decry Austen’s close-up style, allow me to note that
the Mona Lisa is only 30 by 21 inches. However, I was more of A Sunday
Afternoon on the Island of la Grande Jette sort. That masterpiece is composed of millions
of dots and is a heady 81 by 121 inches. I wanted to visit a grouping beyond
our two favorites: sisters and friends.
I felt
that the three younger sisters were plot devices in P&P inserted for
context or plot development. Of course, the classic plot device was Colonel
Fitzwilliam whose sole purpose was to be an unwitting messenger of Darcy’s
perfidy against Jane and Bingley.
Could
these young women ever be anything more, or were they condemned to never change
no matter how much they aged? Were they fully formed and unable to grow?
I
wanted to discover a path for them to become the best versions of themselves.
That,
friends, led to the Wardrobe: a device which would allow those of the Bennet
bloodline to move to a frame of reference where they could learn that which
they needed.
The
universe within which the Bennet Wardrobe exists is an analog to the one
fashioned by Jane Austen when she composed Pride and Prejudice in the
early nineteenth century. Note that I accord Austen the rights to the act of
creation. For me, though, this is a far more powerful idea than simply her
composition of a fictional environment through which her characters moved—living
and breathing persons interacting with each other and their world.
Solipsism—for
that is the name of this—avers that the act of writing fiction creates the
universe within which the fiction exists as reality. That gave me the license
to expand all the characters in Austen’s magisterial novel into three
dimensional persons. This also allowed me to insert new characters to add depth
to the lives of Mary, Kitty, and Lydia.
Somewhere
during the writing of the third volume—The Exile: Kitty Bennet and the Belle
Époque—I found lacking that my earliest formulation of the cabinet. It was
not just a bus which Bennets could use to move to the future and back. Rather,
it had its own objectives for transporting Bennets. In a moment, I no longer
was writing three standalone books tied together only by a common theme. Now, I
could see the logic behind the characters and why they acted as they did in a
series of punctuated episodes across decades and centuries.
Mary
becoming the Great Keeper and a zealous defender of the Wardrobe was a logical
extension of the iron-jawed woman into whom she had grown. Kitty blossomed into
a deeply thoughtful woman who returned to her past to build the support system
that served to foster the great design. Lydia was the catalyst for the final
denouement, but like Moses, she could never cross into the promised land. Even
Thomas and Fanny Bennet showed us that persons of a certain age could find love
and become the best versions of themselves and do what all parents must.
The volumes became a biography of the Bennet family after the double weddings. However, it was an arc with a purpose, and a traditional Austenesque one at that. The Grail: The Saving of Elizabeth Darcy fulfills that objective. Looking back across the previous seven books, we can see the path leading to the eponymous final book. The Wardrobe’s goal was to preserve the greatest love story ever told. Grail is a story that focuses on the great binary. Without the Bennet sisters, though, the Wardrobe could never execute its will upon the universe. With them, though, the wonder that began with a spinster lady bent over her writing desk brings readers—I hope—to a new understanding of the eternal characters and their supporting cast.
Chapter 43
The sight of a sleeping Elizabeth
made Jane gasp.
“Oh, Lizzy,” she breathed,
“how well you look after only one night’s treatment! This is indeed the age of
miracles. I do wish I could be here when you awaken, but I fear I must leave
you now. The Keeper of this age has insisted that I must return home lest I create
temporal currents. I am not pleased with that edict. However, the Countess of
Pemberley—yes, one of our later monarchs bestowed upon your family an unentailed
earldom!—would not be gainsaid. She is a formidable woman. Even so, I gather
she will discover that you are also a force of nature. Lady Pemberley had
better watch out for her great-great-grandmother!”
Jane’s heart clenched as
she tried to memorize Elizabeth’s features, which were still drawn but now suffused
with a delicate blush of health. “Time grows short, Lizzy. Before I leave, a
promise: I will stand as mother and grandmother to your children and
descendants for as long as I am able.”
Her eyes were now moist
with unshed tears. “So, my dearest Elizabeth, revel in this bright new day of
wonders. You are not alone. You will find dozens ready to love you. And never
forget that I, too, will be praying for you every day. I will write you through
the Trust’s auspices…and if I am able, I will bring him to you.”
And with that, the eldest
of the Five Roses of Hertfordshire blessed the second sister’s forehead with
the softest of kisses and moved to the Wardrobe.
* * *
The
door closing behind her shook Eileen from her trance. Seeking to regain her
composure, she shot her cuffs and tugged at her jacket’s hem to tighten it
around her shoulders. Then her head began to swivel as she stood post. She
would know when to call the medical team back. The sound of the Wardrobe would
be unmistakable.
“Is she inside?”
“Georgie: have you been
taking classes at the Nursery? If so, you have mastered whisper-walking.”
“You must have been
daydreaming, Cousin, or perhaps you are out of practice. ’Tis rare for anyone
to be able to sneak up on you.”
Pemberley made to step
past Matlock, her hand reaching out for the doorknob. She acted as though she
was the local liege lord asserting droit du seigneur.
Eileen put the tiniest
pressure on that spot in her brain where Rose rested.
The splinter lifted herself above the background noise that was their melded
personality, and a flash of blue ice altered her mien. “Don’t, Georgie.
Simply…do…not. I have twenty years on you.”
Georgiana raised her hands
in surrender, a soft smile on her lips, not one of fear but rather in grudging
appreciation of another tigress defending a loved one.
Both ladies started when
the sound reached them through the oak panel: a thousand bees buzzing and a pop as the room’s air was sucked inward to fill a void
carved out by forces beyond comprehension.
* * *
Mistress’s
Suite, Pemberley, April 23, 1836
The
transition was instantaneous. One moment Jane was standing before the Wardrobe
with Elizabeth, then both were gone with a rush of air. In the next instant,
Lydia heard the thump of a weight landing inside the
cabinet. She muttered a brief prayer for what would be revealed when the doors
swung open.
She was sorely
disappointed when only one voyager appeared. “Jane, where is Lizzy?”
“She is there and shall
remain. She cannot return even if healed.”
“Even
if healed? Did you leave her there by herself? You did not deign to know
whether she would be cured? HOW COULD YOU?”
“Lydia, calm yourself and
do not allow your inner Mama to run rampant,” Jane replied calmly as she
stepped out of the Wardrobe. “In what universe could you imagine me abandoning
our Lizzy?”
“Forgive me, dearest. That
was unkind. We all have been under considerable strain. My patience is worn to
a nub.”
Jane patted her sister’s slumped
shoulder. “Lizzy’s death in this here/now was
ordained. Even if I were unsure of the outcome, her passage through the
Wardrobe could deliver no worse result. I could have
simply pushed her into the hands of those awaiting her—which reminds me, I must
write a letter to that Keeper to advise her of our arrival in that where/when so there will be a reception committee—and
jumped back here. However, I doubt that the Wardrobe would waste its efforts simply
for our sister to sleep the cemetery sleep far from here.
“Was she healed when I left? No, Lydia, she still was quite ill—unconscious, in fact. However, I was in a world where doctors wield remedies unimagined by the greatest minds today. What I can tell you is that the Elizabeth I carried was an empty husk when compared to the woman whose cheek I kissed five minutes ago. She has stepped away from the abyss and is beginning her climb to health. More I cannot—no—will not say. Now you must go and break Darcy’s heart. I cannot, for mine is already split in twain.”
* * *
Oh my days, this was a sad excerpt, although hopeful.
* * *
Don Jacobson has written
professionally for forty years, from news and features to advertising,
television, and radio. His work has been nominated for Emmys and other awards.
He has previously published five books, all nonfiction. In 2016, he published
the first volume of The Bennet Wardrobe Series, The Keeper: Mary Bennet’s Extraordinary Journey. Since
then, Meryton Press has re-edited and republished Keeper
and the subsequent six volumes in the series. The Grail: The
Saving of Elizabeth Darcy is the eighth and concluding volume. Other
Meryton Press books by Jacobson include Lessers and Betters, In Plain Sight, and The Longbourn Quarantine. All his works are also available as
audiobooks (Audible).
Jacobson holds an advanced
degree in history with a specialty in American foreign relations. As a college
instructor, he taught United States history, world history, the history of
western civilization, and research writing. He is currently in his third career
as an author and is a member of JASNA and the Regency Fiction Writers.
Besides thoroughly
immersing himself in the Austenesque world, Jacobson also enjoys cooking,
dining out, fine wine, and well-aged scotch whiskey.
His other passion is
cycling. Most days will find him “putting in the miles.” He has ridden several
“centuries” (hundred-mile days). He is especially proud of having completed the
AIDS Ride–Midwest (five hundred miles from Minneapolis to Chicago) and the
Make-a-Wish Miracle Ride (three hundred miles from Traverse City to Brooklyn,
both in Michigan).
When not traveling, Jacobson lives in Las Vegas, Nevada, with his wife and co-author, Pam—a woman Miss Austen would have been hard-pressed to categorize.
Contact Info
Amazon Author’s Page / Goodreads Site / Austenesque Thoughts newsletter / Author Website / Twitter (@AustenesqueAuth)
The Grail: The Saving of Elizabeth Darcy is available to buy now in Paperback, Kindle and Kindle Unlimited. The previous books in the Bennet Wardrobe series are also available in audio so I am hopeful in time that this one will be available on audio too.
• Amazon US • Amazon UK • Amazon CA • Add to Goodreads shelf
Giveaway Time
Mertyon Press are generously giving away six
ebooks of The Grail: The Saving of Elizabeth Darcy to accompany the blog tour.
To enter, use the rafflecopter linked below.
Note about comments: If you have any problems adding a comment to this post please contact me and I will add your comment for you :)
The Grail: The Saving of Elizabeth Darcy Blog Tour Schedule
March 1 So Little Time…
March 2 The Literary Assistant
March 3 From Pemberley to Milton
March 4 Babblings of a Bookworm
March 7 Savvy Verse & Wit
March 9 My Vices and Weaknesses
March 12 Interests of a Jane Austen Girl
* * *
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Looking forward to all of your comments! What did you think of the excerpt? By the way, it is the shrtest chapter in the entire book. Good luck on the giveaway.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for stopping by. All the very best with this release, Don!
DeleteEnjoyed the excerpt especially the comment "allow your inner Mama to run rampant" as that made me laugh out loud.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed that reference too. Whether it just meant inner-mother or inner Mrs Bennet, who knows!
DeleteFascinating to get the thinking behind the creation of the series, Don.
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to my turn at this last book.
Hope you enjoy the book when you read it.
DeleteThank you for hosting, Ceri. Good post, Don. This was a tough scene. It was touching and necessary, but still broke my heart. Well done.
ReplyDeleteThanks Janet!
DeleteThank you for the excerpt. Saddened by this scene...Heartbroken...
ReplyDeleteIt was such a sad scene to share!
Delete