Synopsis
Just returned from their honeymoon, Emma and George Knightley begin married life together in Highbury in Surrey, England, exuberant over the joyous turn of their lives and the lives of their friends, the Westons, the Churchills, the Martins. "May we all live happily ever after," prays Emma. In Emma and George: The Knightleys of Highbury that prayer is put to the test. Can the "perfect happiness of the union" prevail? Can love survive and thrive amidst life's harsh vicissitudes and the failings and deficiencies of the human spirit?
Among the many spinoffs, parodies, and adaptations of Jane Austen's novels, Robert T. McMaster's sequel to Emma stands apart. His portrayals of the familiar characters are remarkably faithful to the originals. Emma Knightley née Woodhouse—charming, witty, unfailingly affable, yet also strong-willed and much too sure of herself. Mr. Knightley, the Squire of Donwell Abbey—beneficent, egalitarian, sometimes even to a fault. Frank Churchill—handsome and genial on the outside, qualities that belie a dark, brooding interior, moral weakness, and a shocking tendency to dissemble, even with those dearest to him.
Lovers of Jane Austen will admire McMaster's prose as it mirrors Austen both in language and in style. His descriptions of setting—lush Surrey landscapes, tidy villages, and stately homes—add richness and depth to his story, as do the details of politics, religion, even farming, in the Regency Era of early 19th century England.
To those unacquainted with Austen's novels: Welcome to her world—but be forewarned! This story will beguile you, twist you about, amuse you one minute, appall you the next.
Where Jane Austen's Emma leaves off, Emma and George: The Knightleys of Highbury, begins.
About the Author
Robert T. McMaster completed his undergraduate education at Clark University, then earned graduate degrees from Boston College, Smith College, and the University of Massachusetts. Early in his career he taught middle school science, then worked as an administrator for several environmental education organizations. After completing his graduate studies, he taught biology and botany at Smith College, Connecticut College, and Holyoke Community College.
One of McMaster's interests is New England history, especially the early twentieth century. He found inspiration in his parents' reminiscences of growing up in that era, particularly his father's stories of riding the streetcars that plied city streets and country roads in those days. Those stories led him to write "The Trolley Days Series" of four historical novels. Set in the Connecticut River Valley of western Massachusetts, they follow the lives of four young people growing up in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in the tumultuous World War I era.
McMaster's ancestral ties to Ireland led him to undertake a second project, "The County Wicklow Mysteries," in 2022. Set in modern-day Ireland, Rose of Glenkerry and Fugitive from Injustice follow the lives Rosie O'Malley and Cary McGurk as they set out on their adult lives in a changing world. Rosie's story is unique in contemporary fiction, including her struggle with colitis as a child and adjusting to life with an ostomy.
McMaster 's latest novel, Emma and George: The Knightleys of Highbury, is a sequel to Jane Austen's beloved Emma, following Emma and George Knightley and their friends through harrowing times in early nineteenth-century England.
McMaster's fascination with Edward Hitchcock began when he visited the Pratt Museum of Natural History at Amherst College over half a century ago. In 2021 he published All the Light Here Comes from Above: The Life and Legacy of Edward Hitchcock, the first biography ever written of one of 19th-century America's most eminent scientists.
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