Leenie Brown

Meet Philip Dobney

Painting of the parish church of St James the Greater, Stirchley, Shropshire, seen from the southeast. Circa 1850. John Holmes Smith, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

I liked sharing a full chapter last in the previous Story Connections post, that I decided to do it again. 🙂 I’m also sharing the full chapter to give you a good understanding of who Philip Dobney, the hero of And Then Love, is — just in case you haven’t already met him. If you have, it’s always fun to revisit an old friend.

Philip, as well as Lucy, in this story are good friends of Fitzwilliam Darcy. They’ve grown up together, so the friendship is of long standing. Philip is the person to whom the living at Kympton fell when Wickham refused it.

The fact that Philip is a parson is why I picked the painting above to share with this post today. I thought it was a pretty little church, even if it is in Shopshire and not Derbyshire. 🙂 I also liked that it includes a graveyard because that is the setting for the excerpt below that sets up why Lucy needs Philip’s help.

Oh, and one more note about the setting of this story. It begins at the time when Wickham is petitioning Darcy to give him that living he refused. Between him and Lucy’s uncle (who is far worse than Wickham), there’s most certainly going to be some trouble in this story.

Enjoy!

Save the Dates! (because you’re invited)

Calling all the Austen-Lovers among us to join me and my writer friends Zoe Burton and Rose Fairbanks, along with my alter-ego Annilee Nelson, in celebrating all things Austen next weekend.

This event will take place from Friday to Sunday and is a drop in as you can event. There will be posts from each of us authors and opportunities to win some Austen type prizes.

This celebration (of one of my favourite authors) is being hosted in the chat section of the Sigh-worthy Romance Tearoom’s Substack. You will have to subscribe to join the party because the chat section of our Substack is a private, subscribers-only area.

To subscribe to the SWR Tearoom, go to this link. When you get there, look for the subscribe button. Click it and enter an email address. That’s all there is to it.

You will receive a welcome email, and then, every time we create a regular monthly post or an in-between one that we don’t want you to miss, you’ll get an email.

My friends and I are new to Substack, but I believe you will also get notified of all new posts in the party chat as long as we remember to click the right thing. 🙂

There’s also a Substack app if you prefer using a phone or tablet for these things, but that’s not necessary as it can be accessed from a computer browser just fine.

That’s it! I hope to see you there, and please, feel free to invite your friends if you wish. While the event will be held in a private setting, there’s no limit on how many can join.

Have a great weekend!

Leenie

Femme à la lorgnette (Woman with Spyglass) by Henri Nicholas van Gorp

Femme à la lorgnette (unaltered from original Wikimedia Commons post). Henri Nicolas van Gorp, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Today, I’m not giving you a short excerpt to read. I’m giving you the whole first chapter of Assessing Mr. Darcy. This book is the final entry in my Dash of Darcy and Companions collection, and you can download it today for FREE from Amazon. (Today, August 9, only. It goes back to regular price tomorrow. However, it is also available to read in the Kindle Unlimited program.)

As you will see from the chapter below, Mr. Collins is not Mr. Collins in this story, but rather William Bennet.

I think you’ll also figure out why I decided to pair the above picture with this book, but I have to ask: Do you suppose the lady in the painting is spying on her new and handsome neighbours like Elizabeth is? 🙂

Enjoy!

The August 2023 Saturday Broadsheet

This month’s Saturday Broadsheet, with all my writing life updates, is now available at the link below.

In this issue of the Broadsheet you will find:

an update on my current writing projects
which books have been put on limited time promotions
which series of books will soon be moving to Kindle Unlimited
an upcoming opportunity to read and review a previously published book via Booksprout
a series highlight
and a vignette staring Lady Catherine de Bourgh

CLICK HERE TO READ THis Month’s SATURDAY BROADSHEET

Have a great weekend!

NOW AVAILABLE: An Accomplished Lady (of the best sort)

Today is the day! An Accomplished Lady (of the best sort) is now available everywhere! (Get it here)

By proving his friend wrong, he might just make everything right.

This excerpt is from chapter one. Hurst is not wrong. This Bingley will do his best to get what he wants!

For the better part of an afternoon at Netherfield, Charles Bingley has listened to his sister promote herself to his best friend, Fitzwilliam Darcy. And for the same amount of time, he’s observed his friend trying not to give in to his desire to admire Miss Elizabeth Bennet. When the discussion turns to the qualifications of an accomplished lady, he listens closely and knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that marrying such a lady would only bring sorrow to his friend.

After the ladies have left the room, he attempts to address the issue in a friendly sort of manor. However, when Darcy goes a step too far in sharing his opinions of the lady Bingley loves, friendly tactics are tossed aside in favour of a more direct and calculated approach.

An Accomplished Lady (of the Best Sort) is a novelette of just over 17,000 words and is the sixth installment in Leenie Brown’s Teatime Tales Collection of Austen-inspired quick reads. If you’re looking for a romantic and entertaining escape from the everyday, then you’ll enjoy this story where a determined Bingley does what he must to secure not only his own happily ever after, but also that of his friend.

So put the kettle on, download your copy of An Accomplished Lady (of the Best Sort), and join Bingley and Hurst as they poke, prod, and arrange for Darcy to follow his heart and marry the right sort of accomplished lady.

FInd An Accomplished Lady at your Favourite Retailer