Mary Bennet in "The Sun Also Shines for me"

The Sun Also Shines for me

      by Noe and Cindy

We've been posting some photos with excerpts from our book on our Facebook page.
Thought you might like to see them too, but first:

I love the look on this girl's face ... Tessa Peake-Jones did a great job playing Mary Bennet in the 1980 version of Pride and Prejudice.

~~~~~~~~~~
Mary is one of our favorite lesser characters, so we wrote a book all about her! "The Sun Also Shines for me" is about Mary and Georgiana Darcy and their growing friendship.

I thought this sweet picture of Elizabeth and Mary from the 1940 version of Pride and Prejudice fit this quote from the book just right. This is just after Lizzy has presented Mary with a gift:

What she found was a book with the unusual and intriguing title, Sense and Sensibility. Elizabeth explained, "It is a new story I have been hearing a bit about, but I haven't read it yet myself. I know you are not much for novels, Mary, but the title seemed perfect for you, regardless of whether the story is much to your liking. It is reported to be quite good, though, and the author is a woman, no less, whose name is Jane Austen." ....

"I shall treasure it, dear Lizzy."

~~~~~~~~~~
One of my favorites to play Mary is Talulah Riley from the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice ... she's just so cute!

Another brief excerpt about Mary:

Such things as gowns and feminine accessories were not what held her greatest interest. How pleasantly surprised she was, then, to see the beautiful blue dress set out for her, simple and yet quite lovely. Once it was on and she looked at herself in the mirror, there was no need to force herself to be pleased. Stepping out to her friends with a feeling that was new for her, Mary Bennet looked more lovely than they had ever seen her.

~~~~~~~~~~

A genuine smile makes every face pretty, doesn't it? This photo of Lucy Briers playing Mary in the 1995 version of Pride and Prejudice fits this part well:

Mary's face broke out in a wide smile as she accepted the challenge, and after a moment's pause, she declared triumphantly, "Well, how about this for music and poetry -- since they are designed to raise the passion for life and love, I think red or some variation of it would do nicely!"

~~~~~~~~~~
Our book is available in paperback or digital forms.
You can find it in just about every online bookstore.
Or ask for it specifically at your local store; they can order it for you. 

Posted by cindy, despite what the line below says :)

Goodreads giveaway winners!

Winners were chosen by Goodreads

We had a giveaway going through June for two copies of our book: 

The Sun Also Shines for me.

(winners receive book only)

Congratulations to the two winners!

Connie from Iowa

Susan from Texas

Winners are not required by Goodreads to give a review, but we sure do hope to hear from our two winners ... let us know if you like it or not!

We mailed out the packages today, 

you should receive them in a day or two.

And thank you so much to all those who signed up for the giveaway! 
We hope the sun is shining on all of you ~

Noe and Cindy

Thank you for reading what noeandcindy.write !

"The Sun Also Shines for me" giveaway!

Available till end of June

Two copies of our book are up for grabs on Goodreads.
We appreciate everyone signing up and hope that the two winners will post their reviews on Goodreads and perhaps on their own blog sites if they have one.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

The Sun Also Shines for me

by Noe

Giveaway ends June 30, 2015.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to Win

At this time, our book has a 4.4  rating on Amazon
and a 4.71  rating on Goodreads.

We're pretty sure you'll love it!

Why reviews are important

Review from a friend

OK, I've gotten through chapter two and I don't believe you wrote this! Are you pullin' my leg ? ... Seriously ?  In my opinion, it's great! At this point, you have captured me. I mean the writing is great, but I am equally caught by the mere fact that I know you and can't believe you wrote this! The way you have introduced the characters, the settings and the backgrounds, I am there. In just these two chapters I was able to picture them all. I especially loved your description of how Darcy felt in those first moments on meeting the Bingleys. You really put me in his head, I could understand his feelings.  The flow is great, the characters are alive - I see them, their house, their demeanor. I picture them speaking in my head as I read, like a movie.  The pace is great, not rushed, yet we're three years ahead now and the relationships are evolving perfectly.  I am quite impressed with you, Mr Noe.

That was so sweet of our friend, quite candid too! She has gone on to finish it and still was impressed (hee-hee), but I really loved her "first impressions" of our book, Mr Darcy falls in love. It made me laugh, but it also touched my heart that she would write us what she thought about it. Without reviews, authors can't reach people who would actually like their books but just cannot decide whether or not to take a chance on them. 

A lot of authors have the support of friends and family. But some, like us, don't have family that like to read! Honestly, how do you stay informed without reading? How do you relax without a good book in your hand, at least once in awhile?

So to everyone who has given a review of any of our books, Noe and I thank you so much! We have not been given one bad review, yet we have not personally met a single person who has left an Amazon review on Mr Darcy falls in love, The Sun Also Shines for me, or Mr Darcy and the Space-time Continuum. It is tremendously encouraging, and we can't thank you enough ~
cindy

♥ We would love to hear your comments ♥

Thank you for reading what noeandcindy.write !

https://www.amazon.com/author/noeandcindy.write

Get your free Amazon Kindle apps

The Sun Also Shines for me

IT'S OUT! ... THE SUN ALSO SHINES FOR ME
featuring Georgiana Darcy

Get your copy, hot off the press! Or straight from the digital world, whichever you prefer ;)

In this story, we took shy Georgiana Darcy and the undaunted Mary Bennet and made them close friends. (See our previous post about Mary) You may remember, Pride and Prejudice describes Georgiana as being so shy she can barely speak among strangers. Quite likely, after a year of being with her brother and Elizabeth, she would have grown out of that, at least somewhat. Jane Austen says at the end of P&P: “Georgiana had the highest opinion in the world of Elizabeth” and that from Lizzy “her mind received knowledge which had never before fallen in her way.”

You can imagine then, that Lizzy’s sisters Mary and Georgiana would have come to know one another through their new connection. We felt showing these two girls associating and drawing close—in effect drawing strength from each other—would make for a great story. The natural response of their friendship shows us a maturing of each one, bringing them out from the background and allowing them to display what fine qualities lay hidden from our view. Hence, we considered the appropriate title for our new book should be The Sun Also Shines for me, because it does for both of them. 

In writing our novel, we did not want to make the characters of Mary and Georgiana so altered from P&P that they would be unrecognizable; rather, we wanted them to be like a relative you haven't seen since the last family reunion ... you know who they are, they're just older and more mature. We aimed for our readers to have a feeling of familiarity with P&P, focusing the light on these two girls who had been hiding in the shadows, as it were. We just know you’ll enjoy it! 

It is currently available on Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle format, CreateSpace, Barnes and Noble, and will soon be available on other book websites as well. (In case you can't tell on your browser, the bold words are links to those webpages)

That middle child!

Miss Mary Bennet

We chose Mary Bennet as the main character of our second novel because of where she falls in the Bennet family. I had been doing some reading on "middle child syndrome" and it struck me as a wonderful opportunity to give a voice to those people that are so often ignored or easily swept into the background. You could say my feelings about this subject were personal, because the individual for whom I have the greatest respect and high opinion of, my dear wife, is a middle child like Mary.

The more I thought about how amazing my good wife is, therefore, the more I considered what potential there must be in the fictitious character Mary Bennet, who had the tenacity to study diligently and read extensively, something she did for the sole purpose of bettering herself. And this in the face of a family of siblings each pursuing, in one way or the other, the pleasures and advantages to be found at the time. In addition to this, Mary had the will to excel at the piano by constant practice, even without the stated advice of someone like Lady Catherine; it seems she received no encouragement from anyone in the family for that matter. I asked myself, why would Mary not improve with the passage of time? Certainly seeing the events in her family’s life would have undoubtedly caused her to think seriously about what she wanted to do herself. So I set about giving Mary a life of her own.

In the writing team of Noe and Cindy, the imagination to come up with a story is from me, but Cindy contributes the touch that makes it more worth reading. We both look forward to the release of this book in the very near future and hearing what you think of it!

You may want to read:
The Middle Child Syndrome
The Secret Powers of Middle Children
Middle Child Syndrome - keep scrolling down on this one
What are the effects of middle child syndrome?