Review by Linda Waldemar ,  November 5, 1997
Sometimes I liked this book better than at other times.  The beginning, which was written by Jane Austen, brought several smiles; her usual wit and humor.  The Other Lady's part of the story was uneven.  Sometimes it moved along, then it became almost unbearable, then at the end, it got good. JA introduced all the characters, but did not get much chance to develop them.  The subsequent character development was not in JA's style.  The language was okay, but not JA's. The plot was definitely not Austen. The heroine was not very different from an Austen heroine, but I thought that the hero was very un-Austen.  Charlotte Heywood is an ordinary, sensible young lady of 22.  By way of an accident, she is invited to spend the summer with Mr. and Mrs. Parker of Sanditon, a new, seaside resort.  Mr. Parker is its enthusiastic developer and promoter.  Lady Denham is the local wealthy curmudgeon.  She has several relatives around who are hoping to inherit; her late husband's nephew and niece, Sir Edward and Miss Esther Denham and Clara Brereton, Lady D's cousin.  There are a number of Parkers besides the above mentioned Mr. Tom Parker, 35, and his wife Mary and their four children.  Mr. Parker's sisters and brothers visit; Miss Parker and Miss Diana Parker, 34, and Mr. Arthur Parker, 21, are notorious hypochondriacs.  Mr. Sidney Parker, 28, is tall, handsome, rich and known for his high spirits. Then, there are other summer residents; Mrs. Griffiths who is chaperoning the Miss Beauforts and Miss Lambe; and Mr. Reginald Catton and Mr. Henry Brudenall, who are friends of Sidney Parker. The young ladies try to attract the young men.  There are secret liaisons.  There is an unlikely villain. There is a real invalid (unlike the aforementioned Parkers).  By the last two chapters, most of the lovers are revealed.  The hero and heroine do not come to an understanding until the last few pages. While the story in itself was not bad, it was far from Jane Austen.  In one instance, a single, young man not only writes to a single, young lady, but gives her a gift.  And there is a very implausible adventure at the end.  Should you come upon this book, I recommend that you read it and see what you think.

Review by Mary M. Stolzenbach , February  19, 1998
It was enjoyable and fairly seamless. In the Austen part, I disliked the new setting she chose (the shore, up-and-coming people... one can see the Victorian Age fast approaching) but there was still enough to relish. Lady Denham is an interesting study, as bossy and interfering as Lady Catherine deBourgh, but in a different way: she is rich but has no breeding, and her power comes from her money, not her consciousness of superiority.  And there's this wonderfully Janeian passage:  "I make no apologies for my heroine's vanity. If there are young ladies in the world at her time of life more dull of fancy and more careless of pleasing, I know them not and never wish to know them."

Review by Yvette ,  September 4, 1998
Near the end of her life, Jane Austen began writing Sanditon, the story of a small seaside community. Although she did not live to finish the novel, the fragment is a pleasure to read.  Despite our short acquaintance with Charlotte Heywood, she is one of my favourite Jane Austen heroines. Her powers of perception and observation continually intrigue me. It was with great interest that I first read the fragment; I was quite disappointed when I reached its last sentence and realized that I would never discover what adventures Jane Austen intended for Charlotte. The story begins when Mr. and Mrs. Parker accidentally overturn their carriage while in search of a surgeon - the novel even opens ironically! They are rescued and taken in by the Heywood family. It turns out that Mr. Parker is trying to develop a fashionable seaside resort at Sanditon, the parish in which he lives and owns much property. Mr. Parker is quite fanatical about the merits of Sanditon: Sanditon was a second wife and four children to him, hardly less dear, and certainly more engrossing. He could talk of it forever. It had indeed the highest claims; not only those of birthplace, property and home; it was his mine, his lottery, his speculation and his hobby horse; his occupation, his hope and his futurity. (Sanditon, Jane Austen, Chap. 2)  After a short stay with the Heywoods, Mr. and Mrs. Parker persuade them to allow their eldest daughter, Charlotte, to accompany them back to Sanditon for a visit. During her journey to the coast, Mr. Parker gives Charlotte a detailed assessment of the major characters currently residing in Sanditon. However, when the observant and astute Charlotte arrives and meets them all in person, she realizes that Mr. Parker's agreeable nature has caused him to misrepresent most of them. We hear Charlotte's private musings as well as Jane Austen's familiar witty commentary on each characters' idiosyncrasies. Among the inhabitants of Sanditon are Lady Denham, a rather shrewish and suspicious woman who is constantly courted by three different sets of relatives for her money; Sir Edward Denham, a silly young man who misquotes poetry and who has convinced himself that he is irresistible to women; and Mr. Parker's sisters who are extreme hypochondriacs (to say the least). Jane Austen's Sanditon ends rather abruptly right when the plot begins to pick up pace. The scene is set, the first basic sketches of the characters have been presented, and the hero has just arrived in town. Another Lady, the anonymous author of the continuation, continues the story where the fragment ends. The connection is seamless.  This novel is a delight to read - I couldn't put it down. The Other Lady follows through on the clues left in the fragment and creates a humourous account of Charlotte's stay in Sanditon. Her style imitates Jane Austen's successfully and the characters are well-developed. Lady Denham's speeches show ample evidence of her selfish nature, Sir Edward Denham is as ridiculous as he promises to be, and Mr. Parker's sisters are determined to try every unnecessary remedy (herbal or otherwise) available. Even the hero of the story lives up to his reputation. Although he has barely entered the story when the Other Lady takes over, Jane Austen left enough hints in her fragment to establish him as a clever and whimsical young man. He and Charlotte are perfect for each other.  I really enjoyed every aspect of this novel. There is a slight "mystery story" that perhaps could have been a little more subtle since I figured it out halfway through the novel (and I am usually quite oblivious when it comes to mysteries). By the end of Sanditon, I was completely in love with the charming hero but still rejoiced in Charlotte's success. I highly recommend this novel to anyone who has a thirst for Jane Austen and who was captivated by her short fragment.

Review by Jenny Allan December 9, 2003
Austen's fragment Sanditon begins when a Mr. and Mrs. Parker have the misfortune (or is it fortune?) to overturn their carriage in front of the Heywood home. Mr. Parker sprains his ankle in the accident an event which inspires the Heywoods, though complete strangers, to invite the Parkers to stay with them till his ankle is healed. During this time they discover that Mr. Parker is a gentlemen of means who has put his money into speculation on the latest up and coming resort, Sanditon. He urges the Heywoods to visit him there, but being sensible homebodies, they offer their daughter Charlotte as a better choice as a companion. Charlotte becomes the main character of the novel, and her impressions of the people at Sanditon melt with the narrative voice, in typical Austenian style. We meet the headstrong penny pincher Lady Denham who has invested heavily in Sanditon. One suspects an effort to promote the sale of her Asses' milch to any invalid visitors. Lady Denham's family by marriage, the verbose and despicable Sir Edward, and his sister, hover around her in order to win favor and some of the fortune. Lady Denham has a poor niece, Clara Brereton, who appears to be the object of Sir Edward's affection, though we are never sure how she feels about him because she is as shy and retiring as a poor relation in an Austen novel should be.  Soon we meet the Parker's siblings Susan, Diana and Arthur who are all terrible hypochondriacs and whose antics provide much of the comic relief of the book. Arthur's treatise on unbuttered toast hurting the coats of his stomach is a delight. We are continually tantalized by the absent Sydney Parker who is renowned in the neighborhood as a witty and lively fellow and a handsome and eligible bachelor to boot. Sadly he is not introduced until the very last pages of Austen's writing and it is left to the Other Lady to form his character for the most part. She does a reasonable job with this, making Sydney into a more affable and charming version of his meddling sisters, with a bit of Henry Tilney thrown in.  The chief problem that the Other Lady faces is trying to match the style of Austen's writing which is always perfectly balanced between concrete detail and generalization. She too often tells us about a scene instead of showing it. She is also impatient during scenes where Austen would revel. Instead of slowly unfolding a tea party, teasing us with long passages of the hypochondriacs interspersed with bits of Sydney, she seems eager to be rid of the annoying Parkers and then tells us that Sydney was very charming and made the time fly by for Charlotte. Jane would have handled that mostly through dialogue I feel. When one reads Austen one feels securely in the hands of a master technician as well as a master artist. Her pace is exactly what it should be and her plot never gets away from her. It felt like at times that The Other Lady was just letting the story flow where it may with no real plan in her head except of vague idea of who ends up with whom.  On the other hand, the Other Ladies' set pieces such a long walk in which various couples pair up and attempt to get along with another is handled in a way that is amusing and would make Austen proud I think. There are shades of Fanny in the Wilderness and Anne watching Captain Wentworth with the Miss Musgroves in this section. The Other Lady has done her homework and her details about fabric and carriages are correct to the period without being too showy. She gives us a world, but lets us live in it instead of just sightseeing.   Sanditon by Another Lady is a successful continuation of the fragment left by Jane Austen. Though the Other Lady is not as funny as Austen and some of her attempts at humor seem a bit forced, I think it is true to the spirit of the characters and the plot as Austen set it into motion. I would recommend it to other Austen fans with the caveat that it ain't Jane, but it's pretty good anyway.