It's really remarkable that Jane Austen consistently wrote so many excellent books that I honestly love. Up until now, any time I was completely won over by a book, and tried reading other books by the same author, I was disappointed. I absolutely loved A Prayer for Owen Meany, but none of John Irving's other works even came close. The same goes for Paulo Coelho; after I read The Alchemist, I kept buying more and more of his books, only to be continually disappointed. Persuasion is the fourth Jane Austen novel I've read, and I enjoyed it just as much as the first three. Like Sense and Sensibility, it starts off kind of slowly, giving background information on rather unlikeable characters. But, I was in no way deterred, and Jane Austen came through, as expected. I probably sound like a broken record by now, but in Persuasion - as in all of Austen's books that I've read so far - I was pleased with and entertained by how keenly Austen understood and could put into words the delicate and complicated emotions that are as common today as in her own time. Even though all her books are about young women in the English countryside and their adventures in securing a suitable husband - including perhaps a jaunt to London or Bath - Austen manages to come up with fresh characters and situations for each book. Where her other novels had young, fresh-faced, optimistic young men and women, Persuasion had mature characters who viewed love and marriage from a perspective that appreciated loss and regret.
Persuasion is a comparatively short novel, and I dare say I didn't get quite as invested in the characters as I did with those in other Austen books. The dialogue wasn't as memorable, either. But, given the relative length of the material, I have high hopes for the screen adaptations!
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