Sarah Emsley’s debut novel, The Austens, brings to life the story of Jane Austen’s friendship with her sister-in-law Fanny Austen, who lived for a while in Nova Scotia with her naval captain husband during the years when Jane was writing Pride and Prejudice and other novels that would eventually make her famous.

Sarah’s previous books include Jane Austen’s Philosophy of the Virtues; a history of St. Paul’s in the Grand Parade, the church in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where Jane Austen’s niece was baptized in 1809; and a critical edition of Edith Wharton’s novel The Custom of the Country. After receiving her PhD from Dalhousie University, she held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford and then taught for a few years in the Writing Program at Harvard University. She lives in Halifax with her family.