Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict: A Novel (Jane Austen Addict Series)

Jane awakens to strange surroundings, not the bed of her manor but a small room with iron bars on the window and not a servant in sight. Her voice is unfamiliar and her reflection shapely but not her own. A young man enters from the adjoining room, and Jane finds that he has mistaken her for a woman named Courtney. She has never laid eyes on the stranger, Wes, before, and he tells her that she hit her head at the bottom of a swimming pool. Nursing a headache but certain that Wes is mistaken, Jane knows she is not this Courtney who has injured herself and forgotten her past, but is Miss Jane Mansfield. Her efforts to convince Wes concern him, so he calls her two closest friends, Anna and Paula, who of course Jane has never met. Upon arriving, Anna and Paula quickly become as alarmed as Wes has been. All three insist on taking her to a doctor, and clothe her in garments that are shocking to Jane in their impropriety. They then push her inside the body of a strange carriage called a "car," which begins the surreal, illuminating ride that Jane's dream has been. She is seen by a physician who drugs her with some unpleasant pill, and when she awakes from an indistinct sleep, her situation is unchanged. Jane's more practical side kicks in gear, and she calms herself enough to become determined to make the best of the situation, or at least try to keep Courtney's friends from thinking she's gone mad. Jane herself is much like the heroines of her favorite Jane Austen novels: charming, humble, kind and, yes, very proper when it's called for. She never, ever forgets what society expects of her. So it's disturbing for her to learn that Courtney was about to be wed to a questionable man named Frank but had called off the wedding just before hitting her head, apparently because Frank is a cheat. On actually seeing Frank, however, Jane is surprised to find that he still has some kind of hold on her, or at least on Courtney's body, because she can't seem to keep her eyes off him. She wonders immediately if Courtney has been spoiled in her courtship with this man. Even more disconcerting and exciting, Jane discovers that Wes is more completely alluring than Frank is. Wes saves the day when Courtney is in a pickle financially and helps Jane learn the ropes of using a computer and a phone, even finding a new job for her. He's handsome, kind, wealthy and an eligible bachelor. On an outing with Frank and Wes, Jane runs into an old acquaintance of Courtney's, an Indian barmaid named Deepa. Jane instantly trusts Deepa and dares tell her who she really is within the impostor, nervously asking Deepa if she believes in reincarnation. Deepa is quiet yet seems convinced and leads Jane down the hall in the bar to the door of a psychic, an oddly familiar woman who resembles a fortuneteller Jane recently met at a fair in England. This strange lady warns her of the danger in judging others, particularly Courtney and her life. Her words are prophetic: "Most of us walk throu

After seeing the title, Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict, and being suspicious about its content, I bought the book but forgot about it while reading other Austen fan fiction. I saw the new title, Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict, and figured the first must have been interesting enough for the public to demand a sequel so I bought it. Withing a few days I was too curious and read the first book. In a little over 48 hours I had read both books and laughed out loud during each! Since the sequel is out the complaints I read after the first book are invalidated because the sequel answers those nagging questions the first book left unanswered. I highly recommend Jane Austen fans to read both of these books. Which one of us hasn't imagined what it would be like to live in the 19th century? Then turn it around and imagine what it would be like for a 19th century gal to come forward to this century? I loved the adaptations of each character to the new century and customs. Could we get Laurie Viera Rigler to write another book in this vein? I'm rooting for it!

I won't write a synopsis as others have already done that. I simply want to express how much I love this book. If you haven't read Confessions...read it first and continue on with Rude Awakenings. It's an entertaining, seamless tale. I love especially the author's writing style. I felt drawn into the story immediately. I had been waiting for some months for the sequel and found it to be a thoroughly satisfying read. Highly recommend both books.

As much as I would prefer to present myself as a credible reviewer, this novel has reduced me to nothing more than a squealing fangirl! As Jane Austen wrote, "How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!" Since reading author Laurie Viera Rigler's "Confessions of A Jane Austen Addict" in 2007, I have been anxiously anticipating this sequel, or rather parallel story as "Confessions..." left me with several burning questions: Did Jane and Courtney swap back lives, did they stay or did they go, or were they just the same soul and maybe, just maybe, lifetimes are on a continual loop, of sorts?? IN "Rude Awakenings" Regency era, Miss Jane Mansfield awakens to find herself, not in her own body! And in modern day LA! Although the modern world of computers, cars, airplanes, cell phones, etc etc etc are rather frightening & intimidating at first-- as she acclimates, she finds it all, not only the modern conveniences like electricity and running water, quite liberating! As she learns to maneuver through the mores of modern times, along with her friendships with women and her realtionships with the opposite sex, she decides she must also accept where she is and help improve the lot she has been given. Blessedly, Rigler gifts the reader in "Rude Awakenings" with lovely, and most satisfying closure, indeed. You need not be a Jane Austen addict like myself to enjoy this smart and witty novel-- but I dare say you will become a fan of Laurie Viera Rigler!

Is there always another chance at happiness? Are we bound to our past, or do "we all have the power to create heaven on earth, right here, right now?" Important questions heroine Jane Mansfield must come to acknowledge and understand in Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict, Laurie Viera Rigler's parallel story to her best selling novel, Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict. This time around, it is Jane Mansfield a gentleman's daughter from 1813 who is transported into the body of twenty-first century Los Angelean Courtney Stone. Jane awakens with a headache, but it will take more than aromatic vinegar to solve her problems. Where is she? Her surroundings are wholly unfamiliar to the usual comforts of her parent's palatial Manor house in Somerset. Is she dreaming? She remembers a tumble off her horse Belle, but nothing after that point. She looks in the mirror and the face reflected back is not her own. How can this be? A young man named Wes arrives who calls her Courtney. Is he a servant? Who is Courtney? Ladies arrive for a visit concerned by her odd behavior. Why is she acting like a character in a Jane Austen novel? Jane is indeed a stranger in a strange land. As her friends, or Courtney's friends Paula, Anna and Wes, help her navigate through the technology of cell phones, CD players, washing machines and other trappings of our modern life it becomes les taxing. She relishes her privacy and independence to do as she chooses, indulging in reading the four new (to her) novels by Jane Austen that she discovers on Courtney's bookshelf - one passion/addiction that she shares in common with her over the centuries. Between Jane Austen's keen insights and the fortune teller called "the lady", she might be able to make sense of this nonsensical world she has been thrown into. Is this the same fortune teller she met in Bath in her own life? She had warned her not to ride her horse. Or did she? Are her memories and Courtney's one in the same? The lady tells her she has work to do to put Courtney's life in order. Jane only wants to return to her former life and Charles Edgeworth, the estranged beau she left behind. Seeing our modern world from Jane's nineteenth century eyes was quite revealing. I do not think that I will ever look at a television screen again without remembering her first reaction to the glass box with tiny people inside talking and dancing like characters from Pride and Prejudice! These quirky insights are what Rigler excels at, and her Regency era research and knowledge of Jane Austen plays out beautifully. We truly understand Jane's reactions and sympathize with her frustrations. Not only is Rude Awakenings a comedy of lifestyle comparisons across the centuries, it supplies a very interesting look at modern courtship and romance with a bit of genteel feminisms thrown in for good measure. Interestingly, what principals and standards that Jane learned in the nineteenth century, will straighten out Courtney's mixed up twenty-firs