Sanditon

Following a chance meeting with Mr and Mrs Parker, Charlotte Heywood accompanies them to their home in Sanditon, extravagantly vaunted by her excitable hosts as the future epicentre of society summers. On arrival, our heroine finds herself confronted with a very new and all but deserted town, which nevertheless, and with no small effort from her hosts, begins to fill with holidaymakers. Austen assembles a cast of characters of varying degrees of absurdity and sense, and sets about describing their relations with characteristic wryness and ingenuity. Though unfinished, this fragment demonstrates Austen’s flair for observation and satire in the final stages of her life.