…And chances are that you wouldn’t be reading this blog if you didn’t…

You might be interested in this website I discovered in the course of writing The Secrets of Darcy and Elizabeth. It was particularly useful for someone writing a Pride and Prejudice variation: the Austen Thesaurus.  Yes, that’s right, someone actually cataloged all the words Jane Austen used in her novels.  So, you can look up a word to see if Austen ever used it and how many times it was used.  For example, look up the word “grin” and you will discover that Austen never used it, but she used “smile” 175 times, “beam” 2 times, and “simper” and “smirk” both once.  It’s an invaluable resource for someone like me who is attempting to avoid anachronistic words and sound something like Austen in her writing (of course, no one is as good as the original).  But it would be fascinating for anyone who liked Austen — actually it’s addictive.  You can easily waste a lot of time being surprised about which words she did and didn’t use. Here is the url: http://www.writelikeausten.com/