Mistress Blog Tour: Excerpt and Giveaway

Greeting, dear readers! Are you excited to read another new Pride and Prejudice variation? Then let's welcome author Sophie Turner who is on her eight blog tour stop to promote her newly released Mistress. We have a memorable excerpt today which Sophie would like to share from her fourth published Austenesque book. Be sure to read through to the end of the post and participate in the giveaway. Over to you, Sophie.

Thank you, Lúthien84, for inviting me to visit with your readers today to share this excerpt from my new release, Mistress. In Mistress, some of the usual things that act as obstacles in the Elizabeth/Darcy relationship are tempered by time and their present situation, but there are new obstacles Darcy must overcome. He must spend a great deal of time simply earning Elizabeth's trust, after a marriage that made her miserable. I hope your readers enjoy this excerpt!

Excerpt

       They had reached the house, but Elizabeth indicated the path to the garden, and they walked on.

       "It is possible to feel alone amongst others, when those who understood you are gone."

       "Your father?"

       "Yes, and Jane. At least she had not gone far." Elizabeth's eyes filled with tears, and she was surprised to find him reach over with his free hand and cover hers.

       "You and your father were very close, were you not?" he asked. "The loss of a parent can never be easy, but that must have made it all the more difficult."

       "Yes, we were very close. I knew, of course — I knew that someday I would lose him, but I did not think it would happen so soon. Although in truth, the difficulties of our situation outweighed the difficulties of the loss, when it happened."

       "Of course. I am sorry — I spoke without thinking," he said, withdrawing his hand.

       "You need not apologise. I do wish the loss could have been my focus, at least for a little while," Elizabeth said. "I wanted to mourn my father for longer, but he — but it was determined best under the circumstances that I marry quickly."

       "I would have — I would have thought some arrangement could have been made to allow you that time. You should have been allowed time to mourn."

       Once again, Elizabeth struggled to contain her tears, seeking to divert the conversation once her voice was steady enough to do so: "You have known the same loss, of course, twice over. How old were you, when your parents died?"

       "Seventeen, for my mother, and two and twenty, for my father. Each loss was difficult in its own way, but I believe my father's was the more difficult. I was fortunate, if such a thing can be called fortune: his illness was of slightly longer duration, and thus I had a little time to prepare."

       "How does one ever really prepare for such a thing, regardless of how much time one has?"

       "You are right: you can never be truly prepared. I felt that acutely, in the beginning. To have lost forever the person whose company I enjoyed, whose advice I had relied on, was difficult enough in itself, but added to that was finding myself bearing the burden of his responsibilities. For that, at least, I was glad to have some little warning."

       "I understand you. When my father died, it was so unexpected. Everything and everyone in the house was all in chaos. I wanted to cry — I wanted to have time, just to comprehend what had happened — but someone needed to take charge of everything."

       "And it was you, of course, who carried the responsibility for your family in that situation, as you do now."

       "I did, for a time," Elizabeth said, bitterly, "but my responsibilities ended on my wedding day."

       "I understand yours was not a happy marriage," he said, quietly.

       "In that, I bore some fault, too. Someone less headstrong than myself might have attempted persuasion, or even manipulation, to bring about her wishes, but I hated that Mr. Collins would not listen to me, and the more I argued with him, the more he diminished my role." Elizabeth could not believe she had shared such a thing with him, something she rarely even spoke of with Jane, and yet she had no regrets in saying what she had. She had thought Mr. Darcy reserved, but in truth, his quiet demeanour made him a very good listener, and he always spoke with what seemed an astute sympathy, when he did speak on delicate topics.

       "Do not put the blame on yourself, Mrs. Collins," he said. "You were placed in an impossible situation, and Collins was a fool if he would not listen to you."

       He had again spoken so as to nearly overwhelm her, and Elizabeth wondered how her opinion of him could ever have been what it was. Still, she had shared as much as she was willing to, and did not want to continue the conversation in this line any further, so she took a deep breath, attempting a cheery tone as she said, "It is in the past, now. Even my half-mourning is complete — I am so looking forward to the ball. I suppose you are not. I recall you were not very fond of dancing."

       "I would wish to dance with you, if you have not filled your sets."

Book Blurb

One night, to decide his entire life's happiness.

Chastened by Charles Bingley following Mr. Bennet's untimely death, Fitzwilliam Darcy determines he will offer marriage to Elizabeth Bennet, but she marries another.

Years later, a widowed Elizabeth is mistress of Longbourn, and has vowed she will never marry again. A house party at Netherfield brings them back together, but Darcy will have to win more than her heart if he is to have any chance at making her mistress of Pemberley.

Book Links

Amazon  |  Kindle

Spotify Playlist

Sophie has created a fantastic playlist that accompanies her book so check it out:

Author Bio

Sophie Turner worked as an online editor before delving even more fully into the tech world. Writing, researching the Regency era, and occasionally dreaming about living in Britain are her escapes from her day job.

She was afraid of long series until she ventured upon Patrick O'Brian's 20-book Aubrey-Maturin masterpiece, something she might have repeated five times through.

Alas, her Constant Love series is only planned to be seven books right now, and consists of A Constant Love, A Change of Legacies and the in-progress A Season Lost.

She blogs about her writing endeavours at A Lady's Imagination, where readers can find direction for the various social drawing-rooms across the Internet where she may be called upon.

Author Links

Blog  |  Facebook  |  Twitter  |  Goodreads  |  Pinterest

Giveaway

Sophie, thank you very much for providing the excerpt above and donating two e-books of Mistress. All the best in your writing journey and do continue to publish more entertaining Pride and Prejudice sequels and variations. I would also like to offer my gratitude and appreciation to Just Jane 1813's Claudine Pepe for your kind invitation to participate in this book tour and coordinating this virtual event.

If you like to enter the giveaway, just leave a comment mentioning your thoughts on the excerpt, the book or ask the author questions. The contest is open to all international readers but please make sure you comment by 11.59 pm on Sunday, 2 April 2017.

The winners will be announced two days later and must contact me on this page within 72 hours after the winner's post is up to claim the prize. Please take note that although you may have written your email address in your comment, you still need to inform me. If I do not hear from you, a new winner will be selected instead.