Sara Waters - Dancing with Mr Darcy - Stories Inspired by Jane Austen

I almost went after her when she left the car. But what could I say to her? Wasn’t it a shame that he came over when he did, because for a moment there I thought we were going to kiss and I ached all over and this was so pure that the words shouldn’t be spoken or embroidered or played with, and now I feel bruised and I want to sit rigid looking into her eyes, not even touching and then fall asleep wrapping myself in her hair and when we wake we are so entangled that we don’t know where Bina ends and Emma begins. And this wouldn’t be a partnership, a convenience. It would be everything.

My inspiration: In writing ‘Bina’ my starting point was Jane Austen’s Emma, a character whose comic meddling and ambitions set off a chain of events that transform her and allow her to find the love that was there all along. My Emma is the narrator of the story.

Lane Ashfeldtgrew up in Ireland and England, and has lived and worked in several European countries. She is working on a collection of short stories. Her ambition is to live in the past; somewhere sufficiently far back for there to be no mobile phones or speaking buses, but not so far back that chalk gets passed off as food. Information about areas of Europe with permanent network voids gratefully received – contact Lane via her website www.ashfeldt.com.

Esther Bellamyis 28 and lives and farms in Hampshire. She read history at Oxford and worked at the House of Commons before studying land management at Cirencester Agricultural College. Between chasing beef cattle and avoiding paperwork she is studying for a Masters in Research in English at Southampton University where she is writing her thesis on the concept of failure in the novels of George Eliot. She is working on a novel. She reads omnivorously and a trail of destruction at the back of her house indicates that she may recently have taken up gardening as a hobby.

Kelly Brendelwas born in 1989 in South London. She is currently a student at the University of York studying English Literature.

Suzy Ceulan Hugheswas born in England but has lived in mid-Wales since 1977. She is a writer, translator and book reviewer. This is her first short story to be published.

Beth Cordinglywas born in Brighton and attended Birmingham University where she gained a double first in English and Drama. She is currently doing the MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck. She is a founding member of Nomads, a writers’ workshop and of Lou’s Crew, who are working on a comedy series for television. She is an established television and theatre actress.

Felicity Cowieis a former BBC Panorama journalist and a student on the MA in Creative Writing course at Bath Spa University. She is currently finishing her first novel and wrote ‘One Character In Search Of Her Love Story Role’ whilst developing the central character of Hannah Peel.

Felicity was longlisted for the Fish International Short Story Prize 2006 and, as a teenager, won the WH Smith Young Writer of the Year Competition. As a journalist, her most interesting guest was Buzz Aldrin.

Elaine Grotefeldwas born in Montreal, Canada and grew up in the UK, where she read English at Jesus College, Cambridge. She wrote two of her dissertations on her favourite writer, Jane Austen (the second to attempt reparation for the first). Since then she’s lived and worked in London, Vancouver, Hong Kong and Singapore – where she ‘headhunted’ technology executives by day and wrote poems, short stories and her novel by night. Happily squeezed between mountains and sea, Elaine is now back in Vancouver – with her Scottish husband, two children, and the occasional rummaging bear. Persuasion’s theme of long-lost love inspired Elaine’s short story ‘Eight Years Later,’ as well as her first and almost-cooked novel, Meeting Joe McManus.

Jacqui Hazellwas born in Hampshire in 1968. She studied textile design at Nottingham and has had a range of humorous greetings cards published. She has also been a runner-up in the Vogue Talent Contest for young writers and worked briefly as a secretary at Buckingham Palace. She is a journalist and magazine editor and is currently studying for an MA in Creative Writing at Royal Holloway. Her first novel is entitled, The Flood Video Diaries. She lives in London.

Elizabeth Hopkinsonusually finds her imagination veering towards the fantastic, and is therefore very pleased (and a little surprised) to find herself doing so well with a (nearly) straight story. She lives in Bradford, West Yorkshire, where she finds an endless source of inspiration in the coffee shop in the old Wool Exchange. Her stories have appeared in several genre magazines, webzines and anthologies, and her themed collection of 12 short stories, My True Love Sent to Me, is available from Virtual Tales. Her website is: www.hiddengrove.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk

Mary Howellwas born with many advantages, most of which she turned her back on.

Educated to be a lady at a private convent, she excelled at truancy, managing only to achieve a fistful of star A levels. Her university career and her nursing career both ended abruptly with spells in prison. Both times she was released without stain.

She has lived all over the world, with as many aliases as lovers, She has been an orthodontist’s assistant, a serial absconder, sawn in half by a magician and a happily married mother of three. She now lives in North Wales.

Clair Humphriesgraduated with a BA Hons in English Literature. She has worked in the Official Publications Reading Room of the British Library and is currently employed at a London university, where she provides support for disabled and dyslexic students. She writes humorous contemporary fiction and lives in Kent with her husband, Steve.

Kirsty Mitchellis 25 and was born in Ayr on the west coast of Scotland. She now lives in Glasgow. Her short stories have previously been published in Mslexia magazine, and placed in the Cadenza Short Story Competition, Frome Festival Short Story Competition, and the Bristol Short Story Prize. She is a graduate of Philosophy and History at Glasgow University.

Victoria Owensworked first in the book trade and later as a legal executive before reading for an English degree. PhD research on John Dryden’s translation of the Aeneid followed; she finished her thesis about ten days before her eldest daughter’s birth. She wrote her first novel when her younger daughter started playgroup and her second on Bath Spa University’s MA in Creative Writing, but neither has found a publisher. Victoria runs and swims to keep fit, enjoys choral singing and belongs to the Gaskell Society. She lives near Bristol.

Penelope Randallwas born in Leicester. She grew up in Norfolk and Nottinghamshire and, for three teenage years, in the Bahamas. She read Engineering Science at Oxford University and has worked as a civil servant, editor, typesetter and playgroup assistant. She currently teaches science and maths and wants to start a campaign against education buzzwords. She has always loved writing stories, and recent successes (and near-misses!) encourage her to hope that her three novels may one day find a publisher. She lives in Manchester.

Nancy Saunderslives in a Hampshire village and works in Library Aquisitions, sending out lovely new books to hungry readers. Writing, fiddle-playing and enjoying the great outdoors are all squeezed in around the job. Nancy is a past member of Alex Keegan’s Bootcamp online writing group – without which her writing would not have won a couple of prizes and appeared in various publications. Elly and Oscar are Nancy’s two true significant others.