All Roads Lead to Austen by Amy Elizabeth Smith

One of the great advantages of owing a Nook is each week, they offer a "Free Friday" selection and typically it is a book suggestion that I typically would not have considered but who am I to pass up something free, especially when it's a book! 

Ms. Smith takes us on a Jane Austen journey through-out Latin America as she travels to teach and engage book lovers in book discussion groups.   Her book discussion groups take place with a variety of readers and locations.  Ms. Smith is a professor but as she states near the end of the book, "I'd set off from California as a teacher and quickly realized what a student I still was".  There are so many quotes from the book that made me begin to examine my life and my love of reading but one of the best is "I love teaching because I love learning, and none of us is a finished product". 

Since I still realize that I am definitly an unfinished product any lessons I can learn through reading, whether fiction, non-fiction, or personal memoir are invaluable.  In one of her first discussion groups, one insightful student shared a small gift with Amy as she left, a plage with a simple message, "Thanks to you, my world will continue to be a place full of possiblities and hope".  I hope that I have that impact on people I meet. I pray that I can help someone see the world of possibility and hope.  As much as I hope this, I am also a realist, as another quote from the book states, "But as Austen delineates so clearly, you can't stop people from making assumptions if they're so inclined.  You can only do your best to show your character through your actions and hope that other people will be capable of forming sound opinions.  And if you a realist like Austen, you'll also be wise enougth to realize how many people aren't up to it."   So again, I am challenged I need to show my character through my actions and allow others to form their sound opinions. 

One additional theme that runs through the Latin American Culture is loyalty and family.   In one discussion group, one participant states, "You expect your family to help and so many people in this book don't even treat their family right".  As the theme continues, Amy and her friend Diego continue the discussion and once again, the theme of loyality reigns true, "We care about love, but we care about family even more.  When you're hurting your family, that's no good."  These words are true and vital to the relationships we face everyday.  We need to all value our relationships this intensly.  The words that I loved most of all were ones Amy shared as she was ill and homesick.  She has loved the journey and the experiences she has had but as she talks about Jane Austen not having traveled much in her lifetime, she realizes there are compenstaions to being grounded.  She states, "there are compensations to living solidly within a family circle, one that contracts with deaths and expands with births but remains reliably, your family.  Reading was a resource Austen valued-but every one of her novels makes clear that the most important resource of all, bar none, is family". 

I'm learning that lesson daily.  I have so manh resources that I value but most importantly, I value family-close and extended.  A husband who loves me, children that I care for and love, parents, siblings, grandparents, nieces, nephews, cousins, and aunts.  These are the most valuable resources, these are the resources that help me see the possiblities and hope of what life may become.   As Ms. Smith learns lessons about life and love, she shares with me her love of reading, her life of adventure, and of course, she makes me want to add the Jane Austen novels directly to my Nook wishlist!