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"There is such a treasure store of wonderful books and things here, such as I never believed existed in England, much less in this very house."

This is the sterling truth shining as bright as any fancy British silverware. Rosing Park is the epitome of the grand life. This is the time when librarians like, Mr. Frank Burnett, had tons of materials to organize and gather for the home library. There is also a museum curator, Mr. John Adams, to establish the provenance of exquisite antiques. However, even the grandest of homes are not everlastingly ours to hold in our families. Un fortunate disasters slide in and slide out taking everything away.

This is only one of the setbacks the Harrison family must endure. There is the health of Dr. Harrison, the new life for Catherine and her daughter, Lilian. To get through it all there is always family tongues wagging, the ocassional journeys and of course, the blossoming of love.

Lilian is a fantastic character. Some of the ton might think she is quite the uppity one. When she visits her aunt Becky in London, she longs for the journey back home to quieter surroundings. In London, I will always remember her standing up to Captain Hastings. It is not unfit to think of Captain Hastings as very hasty indeed. However, Lilian handles him with control and grace.

I also liked Lady Ashton. She knows all there is to know about any person in London. If she does not know it, it is not worth knowing. She is a character. Lady Ashton is a leader. Others are followers. Becky and the others are all very happy if a little pearl from Lady Ashton’s gown might fall in their soup. Aaah, wonderful. Catch the seed pearl, take it home and put it under your pillow. You have proof of a shared evening in the company of a lady.

There is so much going on in "Recollections of Rosing Park" by Rebecca Anne Collins. There is talk of Keats’ Endymion, described as "such beauty and sadness." There is talk of Ben Jonson and Mr. Handel’s Harmonious Blacksmith. Also, a play titled "School of Scandal" playing in Drury Lane.

Still, there is time to worry about John Adams. He’s simply a mystery. No one knows about his family. God forbid, if he comes from a family of merchants. Well, as usual I can’t stop. Rebecca Anne Collins fills every page with laughter, tears, lovelorn eyes, curiosity, unexpected letters and talk. Well, who can mind a bit of chatter when on the table there are bunches of cream roses and silver candlesticks? Yes, "Recollections of Rosings" is filled with all the beauty we deserve to experience. After all, beauty is what dries our tears and gives us thoughts of love tomorrow.

As adults, Catherine and her sister Becky have only one thing in common, their parents. They were both raised in Rosings Park but they had different ideas about how they wanted to live their lives. Catherine remains in the area she grew up but Becky decides it’s time to start a new chapter in her life. When Becky makes a trip back to Rosings because of a devastating fire, secrets are revealed and it might have better if the truth had stayed buried.

I found this book to be entertaining in a relaxing way. It’s the type of book that you want to curl up with on the couch for hours. I really liked the relationship between Catherine and Becky. Sisterly love is sometimes tough to capture but Rebecca did it beautifully.

If you like Pride and Prejudice, you’ll like Rebecca Ann Collins’s Recollections of Rosings. Recollections of Rosings, Book 8 of The Pemberley Chronicles, follows the Pride and Prejudice characters and their offspring into the future with this tale of love new, love old, and love lost. Emotional intensity, pictures painted with words, and an engrossing story—Recollections of Rosings has it all.

The Chronicles have now reached the Victorian age, and Ms. Collins deftly interweaves the stories of Catherine Harrison and Becky Tate, daughters of Elizabeth Bennet’s friend, Charlotte Lucas, and Mr. Collins, and Catherine’s daughter, Lilian. Lilian is caught up in her first love, and Becky’s marriage is troubled.

But the story centers on dutiful daughter and wife Catherine, who has spent her entire life near Rosings, the palatial residence of the late, unlamented Lady Catherine de Bourgh. The book opens with a devastating fire that incinerates part of Rosings. The destruction dredges up twenty-five year old memories, which force Catherine to reexamine her experience as companion to the difficult Lady Catherine, and her valued friendship with Mr. Frank Burnett, who was then the great house’s librarian.

As Catherine tends her seriously ill husband, Frank returns as an advisor on conserving the remaining Rosings treasures. Their friendship resumes and she wonders if she felt more than friendship for him in the past, and if he felt the same.

Ms. Collins keeps you guessing almost to the end before she reveals what happened between Catherine and Frank so long ago, including Lady Catherine’s meddling, and what their feelings for each other are now. Both characters are finely drawn. And while I love Catherine, I adore Frank. Would that more romance novel heroes were like him.

Since Recollections of Rosings is Book 8 of The Pemberley Chronicles, a lot of story has gone before. I haven’t read Books 1 to 7 yet, but Ms. Collins has kept any necessary explanations of the past to a minimum.

So, if you can’t get enough of Pride and Prejudice, try Recollections of Rosings. Book 9 is sitting in my TBR pile, and I can’t wait to see how the story continues.


I loved this book and cannot wait to read more from author Rebecca Ann Collins. She has carried on with her sequels to Pride & Prejudice seamlessly blending the lives and characters she has created for her characters with the lives that Jane Austen crafted for them. Loaded with period drama that ascends time and place. Brilliantly composed, Rebecca Ann Collins has a connection to these characters that comes to life on the pages of this novel. When the author connects with the era in which she is writing as well as the lives of the characters you know that something magical is going to take place, and Rebecca Ann Collins has definitely created something magical. Although this is the eighth book in The Pemberley Chronicles it does work as a stand alone novel, although I do wish that I would have the previous books. An excellent addition to your Jane Austen collection. I will be looking forward to seeing what adventures transpires next in The Pemberley Chronicles.

While this is book 8, I found it fairly easy to get into. This is only the second book in the series that I’ve read. I reviewed Postscripts from Pemberly back in December 2009. If you’ve read Pride and Prejudice, you’ve got an understanding of the major characters. And while these characters have moved on, had children, had their children marry, lost loved ones — reading Collins’ work is like dropping in on a huge family reunion after being out of touch for a long while. The books, or at least the ones that I’ve read have an Appendix that lists the major characters and the relationships between them.

I’m starting by pointing this out because there’s a relaxed atmosphere about the stores in Postscripts… and now Recollections…. Collins has a way of presenting the stories partly through the type of narrative/interactive story you’d expect, but she also uses journal or diary entries and letters to help us get a deeper understanding of the characters that have a major part to play. This makes reading the books a lot like being asked to read someone’s personal journal when you know all the people involved (society pages without the cattiness).

Recollections of Rosings is, as you’ve probably guessed about Rosings, the major residence of Lady Catherine de Bourgh. Lady Catherine has been gone for sometime and the estate is run by a board of trustees on which Fitzwilliam Darcy serves. The story opens with the terrible news that there has been a fire at Rosings that has caused considerable damage. The current Vicar, Mr. Harrison, suffers a heart attack and his continuing illness causes some drastic changes to his situation for himself and his family. His wife Catherine, one of Charlotte and Mr. Collins’ daughters, is now caring for her husband and dealing with her grief over the damage done to Rosings where she lived when Lady Catherine took her in as a young child to be a companion for Anne.

The Rosings estate has recently hired a curator to deal with the historic artwork and others treasures of Rosings. Luckily he had done much of the work to catalog what was in the house and it will be useful to the board in determining their loss and what can and should be done to rebuild. That he is also someone who had worked at Rosings while Catherine lived with Lady Catherine helps to bring back many memories and releasing many emotions of her childhood and early adulthood before her marriage.

Meanwhile, Catherine’s daughter seems to be falling in love with a young man in the neighborhood that few people know anything about other than he’s a gentleman and very good at his job. Beck Tate, Catherine’s sister, is at loose ends as her husband has gone to America on business, leaving her behind. Unfortunately for Catherine, Becky feels it is her duty to watch out for her supposedly more naive and unsophisticated sister.

That sets out the parameters of the book, but the journey and the experience of reading it yourself is the frosting on the cake. Collins is not flamboyant — the writing is very reminiscent of sitting about with a best friend talking about family, friends, what is happening with the neighbors, what’s going on, what can be done to make life better for those around you — and yourself, of course.

That’s not to say that you won’t shed tears, laugh out loud, try to get characters to look before they leap, get angry about how some are treated, wonder why other won’t mind their own business, and smile because sometimes love does conquer all. And best of all, for some people there are second chances and, while they don’t come often, when they happen you should not stand and watch them pass you by but reach out for new dreams and a new life.

There’s a very comfortable feel to The Pemberly Chronicles. These are people most of us have spent a lot of time with. Austen created characters that still resonant with us so many years after she wrote her books. That Austen often left her characters just as the leave they church after their wedding, it’s no wonder that so many of us want to know what happened next. Rebecca Ann Collins gives us one possible future — it’s a comfortable one that we can relate too that differs only in degree from the future we see around us for our friends and family.

These are wonderful books for a rainy day — or any day — when you want to believe that people are good at heart and that families stand together in times of trouble. These are books that continue the story of some well loved characters but they are also books of hope and of dreams of communities that many of us would like to live in.


I was provided this book for review by Sourcebooks, the publisher to read and review. This is no way affects my honest review of this book.

This was my first time reading a novel by Rebecca Ann Collins. This is book 8 in the The Pemberley Chronicles series. This series is based of the characters from Jane Austen’s beloved novel Pride and Prejudice.

By now everyone should know how much I adore Pride and Prejudice. I admit, I was skeptical before I even picked up this book. I’ve never read a Pride and Prejudice sequel, even though they have come out in droves the past few years. I also wasn’t sure I would be able to enjoy "book 8" when I hadn’t read any of the others that came before it.

I have to say I was pleasantly surprised with this novel. I was instantly captured by the characters, their surrounding and the circumstances in which they found themselves. There is very little of Darcy and Elizabeth in this novel, mostly just mentions of them throughout the book. Rebecca Ann Collins has done a wonderful job developing the main characters. I feel like I would have enjoyed this book even if it hadn’t been part of The Pemberley series.

I enjoyed this book so much that I’ve already bought and downloaded book 1 in the series to read. Anyone that enjoys historical fiction or romance will like this book. You won’t need to be a diehard Pride and Prejudice fan to adore it.

I gave it 4 out of 5 stars !


My love for this story started before I even opened the book because I enjoyed Pride and Prejudice so much. Thankfully for people like me, the story has continued and it is certainly worth the time to read and enjoy. I appreciated how real the story stayed to the events of that time period, you feel submersed into that era. Although the time period is much different than today, the problems are not any less significant and it’s not long before you realize that as you turn through the pages. I found the characters to be well written. Although you might not see yourself in each character, you can certainly find personalities traits that match some of your very own family members, and the same problems that perhaps you have encountered. You will be eager and curious to follow the story through to see how things end for Catherine and Lilian, two ladies you wouldn’t want to miss reading about. If you were not ready to say good-bye to Pride and Prejudice then you should certainly follow this series.


Recollections of Rosings is the story of Catherine Harrison and Becky Tate, sisters and daughters of Charlotte Lucus Collins. After a tragic fire at Rosings Park the story follows the sisters and the twists and turns their lives lead.

If I were a betting girl I would bet that Catherine is a favorite of the author, Ms. Rebecca Ann Collins, due to the fact that she is so eloquently spotlighted and portrayed in this book. It was so easy to fall in love with her character!

As Catherine returns to Rosings after the fire to find her husband injured, her daughter, Lilian finds love - but her Aunt Becky is unsure if it is the right love for her and tries to intervene. I was so impressed with Collins ability to write about the incidents in London at Lady Ashton’s parties in a clean and modest fashion. Too many books I’ve read - even Jane Austen sequels include such incidents, as I’m sure they did happen during the time, but without leaving anything to the imagination or decency for the characters.

I absolutely loved the journal entries that we were able to read from Catherine’s past - they were so fascinating I felt like Catherine herself, wanting to stay up all night reading more and more.

I still hold mixed feelings towards Becky Tate. Throughout half the book I had such a dislike for her and her character, she was just so shallow and petty! Then at the end when I read about her separation I did feel sad for her and was happy with the ending that was given her. I just received my advanced copy from the publisher of the next book in this series, A Woman of Influence, in which Becky is a main character. I cannot wait to dive into and read the rest of her story.

Recollections of Rosings does not disappoint. Rebecca Ann Collins is able to create a world of characters that can be loved and cherished. These books are my "feel good" books that I go to anytime I need a good book for a pick-me-up.


The Pemberley Chronicles are notable for three reasons-historical detail (and amazing writing), great romances, and Fairy Godmother Darcy who makes good things happen all the time. This book no exception. This was my favorite of the whole series.

The romance was very different from the previous books. It was not a story of new love but of two people that have been separated by outside forces (Lady Catherine’s machinations, of course) and never given the chance to fall in love. It was like watching what Elizabeth and Darcy would have been if Darcy had let Lady Catherine influence him.

Catherine Harrison was one of those characters that I remembered from the previous books and was not looking forward to reading a book about her. She seemed to be so weak and lacking of any backbone. When I started the book, I was actually hoping that the book would be more about her daughter, Lillian, because I thought she might be more of an interesting character than her mother but I am glad that I was wrong. Catherine surprised me and came into her own in Recollections of Rosings and her relationship with Frank Burnett, former Rosings librarian and friend, was one of the major reasons this book was such a good read. He was one of the sweetest, kindest and most genuine male characters that I have ever come across.

This would be a great read for any Jane Austen fan. You do not necessarily have to read any of the previous books to enjoy this one (even though you should because they are excellent).

Grade: A


Marrying for love rather than for money, prestige, power, or expediency makes Recollections Of Rosings a celebration of an evolving society where a woman’s intelligence and her contributions to society are recognized and appreciated.

Rebecca Ann Collins’ “Austen-like” writing style creates an ambiance that lures the reader into the Victorian Age and particularly into the lives of characters connected to Pemberley. This charming style entices the reader away from the modern, fast-paced multi-tasking world and invites her into a more gracious time where afternoon tea and walks in the woods create opportunities for leisurely conversation and for awakening love to be nurtured.

Catherine Harrison, having been the ideal parson’s wife for many years, for the first time in her life, is faced with making decisions without someone to tell her what she should do. For her entire life, Lady Catherine de Bourgh then her husband had directed her choices. How the copes and how she aspires to fulfill her dreams deep the reader turning pages. She is remarkable.

As Catherine and her seventeen-year-old daughter Lilian emerge from their restrictive lives at the parsonage, they are settled in the Dower House of Rosings Park where they bloom like Rosings’ renowned roses. Love tiptoes in. Like the dawn that brings vibrant light and color to the black and grey of night, it brings s myriad of new, exciting possibilities to Catherine and Lilian’s once drab lives.

Becky Tate, Catherine’s more worldly-wise sister, feels compelled to meddle in their lives, even though her own life seems less than satisfying. However well intended, her efforts to manage her goddaughter Lilian creates a situation where the reader gets to see the true personality of Lilian that highlights her strength of character and confidence in her own values.

Mr. John Adams and Mr. Frank Burnett, both associated with the Rosings Trust, are highly regarded for their expertise, but little is known about their family backgrounds. As they become more involved with Catherine and Lilian, some diehards that still try to impose old standards cause trouble by searching out family information from the past generations of the Adams and Burnett families. Stress and conflict arise with family and friends that threaten the hopes and dreams of Both Catherine and Lilian.

If one has had the pleasure of reading the previous books of “The Pemberley Chronicles”, Recollections Of Rosings is like a visit with friends and family. If not, then this book will be a special introduction to some remarkable characters—characters that celebrate the joy of both young and mature love. Extremely good reading!