A Life of Her Own: The Story of Margaret Dashwood

By: Wendy Zomparelli

Narrated by: Lily Travers

Length: 13 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

A Sequel to Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility... Read by enchanting British actress Lily Travers.

In this captivating historical fiction novel set in the 19th century, young Margaret Dashwood’s lifelong dream is to travel to Pompeii. Accompanied solely by female companions, Margaret learns that danger is real – but that she can overcome it. Margaret refuses to let a lack of money ruin her dreams of visiting Pompeii and making discoveries of her own. To her family’s dismay she begins earning her own living as a companion to an elderly lady in London. Some years later, an unexpected inheritance gives her enough money to travel -- despite her family’s insistence that she keep it as a marriage portion.

What she lacks are male relatives to escort her, so she recruits a small party of ladies to go on their own – a daring project for an Englishwoman in the 1820s. When her ambition to join an archeological expedition leads her into danger, she discovers that lofty goals and scientific advancements cannot thwart evil – but that courage and determination can.Margaret is the youngest of the three sisters in Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, in which she makes only minor appearances. Austen’s book concludes when Margaret is about 13 years old. My novel continues the story of her life and adventures – but it is more than a sequel.

It is a meticulously researched historical novel about one woman’s attempt to overcome the constraints limiting the choices of pre-Victorian ladies – constraints upon the books they were permitted to read, the places they could go unescorted, and the people with whom they could associate. Margaret attempts to work within and around society’s norms to construct a life that brings her meaning and joy – the task with which we all contend.

©2021 Wendy Zomparelli (P)2024 Wendy Zomparelli