I love Jane Austen. I remember reading Pride and Prejudice for the first time when I was in seventh grade, sleeping over at a friend’s house and staying up late by myself with a flashlight to finish the novel, quietly gleeful when Elizabeth finally accepted Mr Darcy’s proposal.

I have since read and re-read Pride and Prejudice, and have gradually devoured all of Austen’s other novels with almost as much pleasure.

You would think an avid fan of Austen’s writing, herself a member of a book club, would find a book entitled The Jane Austen Book Club enthralling. Instead, I am sorry to say, I just didn’t like it.

By all means, if you are a hardcore Austen fan and hunger for anything even mildly related to Austen or her books, give it a go. The writing is not bad. It is simply contrived. What is it with this tide of books using motifs from the classics to infuse what would be plain and mundane stories with something that might pass for a touch of high-brow? I must admit, though, that I really enjoyed Bridget Jones’s Diary. Because the writing itself is amusing and Fielding doesn’t take herself or her characters too seriously, I found the parallels in the framework of Bridget Jones to Pride and Prejudice to be entertaining rather than distracting or just plain irritating, as they become in The Jane Austen Book Club. Similarly, I confess to having greatly enjoyed Sophie Gee’s The Scandal of the Season (not Austen but Alexander Pope is emulated here) – again because it was a little tongue in cheek, a little original in and of itself before borrowing substantially from the English Canon. In order for a writer to be permitted to improvise from the springboard of the Canon I think it is essential that they first earn the right through innovation, creativity, great writing or – at the very least - a sense of humour wittily expressed through the written word.

Many people have given Fowler’s most recent novel stunning reviews. The Washington Post, for example, ends its stellar review of the book with this line:

“That it is wonderful will soon be widely recognized, indeed, a truth universally acknowledged.”

Again, with the borrowing. It is like the repeated cheapening of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony or Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana by their use in pop/techno/dance songs or advertising jingles. The opening line of Pride and Prejudice was once dear to me but now, after so much re-hashing and over-use in the popular media it is beginning to grate. Similarly, when one of the characters in The Jane Austen Book Club persists in referring to Austen as ‘Jane’, it is grating – even if this is intended, even if it is critical to the development of that character, it grates like fingernails on a blackboard.

The Jane Austen Book Club follows the lives of five women and one man over a period during which they meet regularly to discuss Jane Austen’s work. At each book club meeting a different Austen novel becomes the focus of discussion. Each book club member is dealing, in his or her life, with significant issues – separation from a spouse, falling in love, homosexual love, the lure of an adulterous liaison – all of these themes are explored through the characters. And each character, each relationship, is meant to reflect – some with more subtlety than others – a Jane Austen character or plot.

The novel is set in California.

Am I the only reader who feels that an attempt to set a re-hashed version of all of Jane Austen’s novels in modern-day California might be a bit of a stretch? We don’t have the literary equivalent of Baz Luhrmann’s directorial genius to turn a classic into a modern cult icon (as he did with the 1996 film version of Romeo and Juliet). Nor does Fowler have, as Luhrmann did, the excuse of altering aspects of the original text with the liberty permitted by the use of a different medium. Shakespeare never had the medium of film at his fingertips.

Fowler’s novel is accompanied, at the end, by various appendices – synopses of all of Jane Austen’s novels (so you don’t actually have to read them), an admittedly riveting collection of comments by Jane Austen’s family, friends, colleagues on her novels and her life, and the now ubiquitous set of Questions for Discussion. Like that episode of Seinfeld where Kramer creates a coffee table book about coffee tables that actually becomes a coffee table, here is a novel about a book club created especially for book clubs, cheat-tools included. Worse still, the questions are apparently posed by the book’s characters themselves. Questions by the characters about the characters, in which they seek to draw parallels between their lives and the lives and characters in Jane Austen’s novels.

I understand the concept. And yes, the novel is diverting – I was absorbed and read it very quickly – but it is certainly contrived. And the notion of the book, what it is meant to do, the discussions Fowler envisions her readers having across America (and the world?) is, to me, a kind of Austen equivalent to the science fiction convention, science fiction being a genre which does also feature in this book (in the Pride and Prejudice themed relationship, no less – along with Rhodesian Redbacks and an age gap – a Demi Moore/Ashton Kutcher age gap, not the traditional Elizabeth Bennet/Mr Darcy age gap).

Fowler says towards the beginning of the book that each of her characters has his or her own ‘private Austen’ – an image or an understanding of Austen (the person, not the books) of his or her own making. This continued emphasis by Fowler and her characters on the author rather than the literature is another annoyance. But I suppose that Fowler is partly right – I too have a private Austen. And she is just that – private.

By all means, if you are an Austen fan who is not troubled by the increasing popularization of her novels amongst people who have seen the BBC series and the Keira Knightley movie but have not read the books, read this novel and enjoy. For those of you who prefer to remember Austen as you read her, stay away.

I have been very busy at work. You know, the kind of busy that wears you down, prevents you from sleeping, encourages much consumption of unhealthy food and halts any exercise regime you once adhered to.

During times like this I don’t, generally, stop reading. My reading menu, does, however, change dramatically. A friend of mine once said to me that she could tell what frame of mind I was in from the book I carried in my handbag on any given day. This is true. During sleep-deprived overly stressed periods of work insanity or pre-exam anxiety, my reading menu of choice is heavy on comfort.

Comfort books – books you are already familiar with, which you already know you love, by authors whose writing you already know lulls you into a warm state of contentment.

So a week and a half ago, when I was close to tearing my hair out from stress, I bought This Charming Man by Marian Keyes.

It was perfect. It did the job. And, even though I have ostensibly had no time to think about anything other than work, I have fit in enough reading time – on trains, in cabs, during brief coffee breaks, before falling asleep late at night – to have finished the book, which is not insignificant.

I will review it properly next week, when I am able to give it my full attention. For now, though, a gift from me to you: a list of my top five comfort reads of all time (in no particular order).

1. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen

I know it’s predictable. I know some people won’t agree with me that Austen is comfort reading. But I defy you, once you are truly familiar with the story, to pick up the book during a stressful period in your life, turn to the scene in Mr Collins’s parsonage during Elizabeth’s visit to Lady Catherine’s Rosings estate during which Mr Darcy proposes for the first time, and not become truly absorbed. It is heady, romantic reading at its mannered best.

2. Fiona Walker

Author of Between Males, Well Groomed, French Relations among many others, you can always count on Fiona Walker to provide humour, sex, romance in a well-written package. I love good chick lit as much as the next chick, but I can’t bear badly written chick lit – and Fiona Walker is always on target, both in her writing and her subjects.

3. Georgette Heyer

“Historical Romance” – that is the official genre of Georgette Heyer. Every novel – and there are many to choose from – is filled with debutantes, the vivid colours and fashions of ‘the Season’, foppish men who spend more time on their appearance than the women do, and the requisite damsels in distress (‘distress’ in these cases generally equating to the threat of living life without a society husband). Utterly diverting.

4. Barbara Trapido

Brother of the More Famous Jack. Temples of Delight. Noah’s Ark.

I can’t bear to write more about Trapido without the space to do her justice, but let me just say this: if you love books and you love language, you will adore her writing. Temples of Delight is my favourite. Any scene involving Giovanni, the man of letters, will transport me from the realms of earthly stress in a matter of seconds.

5. Enid Blyton – especially The Magic Faraway Tree books

I am a woman in her thirties, yes. But there is something about The Magic Faraway Tree – the pure fantasy of it, the true escapism (quite literally!) that is incredibly satisfying. The Wishing Chair stories and the Twins at St. Clare’s books also carry me away to a different place.

When I am feeling ill or fragile and just want to curl up inside with a cup of hot cocoa, Enid Blyton is just the right thing.

In writing this list, so many other comfort books come to mind. But I promised you five and there they are. Feel free to write in and share your own preferred comfort books with me – it is a list I am always very pleased to add to!