Jane Austen is a luminary of the global literary canon and is adored for her wit, social observation and insight into the lives of women.

But behind the books is a life largely unknown, with an idyllic childhood, a busy social life and an affectionate family circle.

Elizabeth Jenkins' account of Austen's story not only brings to life the country gentry of Regency England, but also illuminates the character and mind of one of the most unusually perceptive and gifted writers the world has ever known.

Richly drawn and in picturesque detail, Jenkins pulls together fact and fiction to show how Jane Austen's life, lived with quiet passion, inspired some of the most beloved novels to date.

'A classic' The Sunday Times

'Ensconces us deep in the loyalties and tendernesses that held the whole Austen family together' The Observer

'Illuminating' The Times

Elizabeth Jenkins (1905-2010) wrote her first novel in 1928, from her home in Bloomsbury. Over the next 75 years she wrote a dozen novels, including The Tortoise and the Hare, and a dozen biographies, including those of Elizabeth I and Jane Austen. She was involved in the establishment of the Jane Austen Society in 1940 and even bought Austen's home in Chawton where she wrote Emma and other novels, and which would later become the site of Jane Austen's House Museum.