Emma: A Modern Retelling Paperback by Alexander McCall Smith

Product Details

• Publisher: Vintage Canada (2015-10-27)
• Language: English
• Paperback: 368 pages
• ISBN-13: 9780345809070
• Item Weight: 326.59 grams
• Dimensions: 7.99 x 5.14 x 0.98 cm

Alexander McCall Smith's gentle satire and cozy, old-fashioned sensibility prove to be the perfect match for Jane Austen's wit and characters. Though carriages have been replaced by Mini Coopers and cups of tea with cappuccinos, Emma is wonderfully timeless.

     The summer after university, Emma Woodhouse returns home to the village of Highbury, and to the household of her hypochondriac father, who has been living alone on a steady diet of vegetables and vitamin supplements. Cultivating grand plans for the future, she prepares to launch her interior-design business and strike out on her own, but in the meantime turns her attention to the matching of people, rather than fabric patterns. Soon Emma befriends Harriet Smith, the naïve but charming young teacher's assistant at an English-language school run by the hippie-ish Mrs. Goddard. Harriet is Emma's inspiration to do the two things she does best: offer guidance to those less wise in the ways of the world and put her matchmaking skills to good use. Happily, this summer presents abundant opportunities for her to do just that, as many friends, both old and new, are drawn into the sphere of Emma's occasionally injudicious counsel: Frank Churchill, the attractive stepson of Emma's former governess; George Knightley, Emma's brother-in-law and dear friend; the charming yet self-important Philip Elton; and, of course, the perfect (and perfectly vexing) Jane Fairfax.

About the Author

ALEXANDER MCCALL SMITH is the author of the international phenomenon The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, the Isabel Dalhousie series, the Portuguese Irregular Verbs series, the 44 Scotland Street series and the Corduroy Mansions series. He is professor emeritus of medical law at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland and has served with many national and international organizations concerned with bioethics. He was born in what is now known as Zimbabwe and was a law professor at the University of Botswana.