Well, that was delightful!

Young and naive Catherine Morland travels to Bath, a bigger town than she's used to, where she enters new social circles and learns about relationships, society, and herself. Jane Austen's tongue-in-cheek social satire captures the ridiculousness of some of Catherine's new companions, creating humor for the reader while Catherine remains oblivious. An avid reader of Gothic novels, Catherine expects hidden meanings in everything, and she is often let down by the simplicity of the world around her, where people act in certain ways only to achieve money or status. Through her relationships with Eleanor and Henry Tilney, Catherine begins to mature and find her place in society without losing her moral compass.

I really enjoyed this novel! It's a quick read, and I found myself laughing and smiling throughout. The biggest issue I had when I read [book:Pride and Prejudice|1885] was an expectation of romance (and I was let down, of course, because the objective is not at all romance but rather satire). Going into this novel, I knew what to expect, and that knowledge definitely allowed me to get more out of the reading experience.