Few writers have seen their work reinterpreted as much as Jane Austen’s. “We all encounter Austen differently and from the position of where and when we read her,” writes the scholar Jennie Batchelor in the book’s introduction. “How we read her changes as the world changes around us.” This anthology, a melange of fiction, poetry, essays, and interviews, reflects the diversity of reactions to Austen’s work. Katherine Reay writes of the healing experience of reading the novelist while recovering from a severe injury, while Katie Lumsden discusses the pleasure of rereading Austen’s novels over and over at different stages in her life. Fiction pieces imagine the author and her characters in new, often revisionary arrangements; in Julia Miller’s “Georgiana Darcy—Pistols at Dawn,” Pride and Prejudice’s Georgiana Darcy exacts satisfaction from the gold-digger George Wickham in the form of a duel, while in Charlie Lovett’s novel excerpt “First Impressions,” Austen defends herself against the accusation that she has “a too highly developed interest in fictionalizing [her] acquaintances.” (One particularly meta piece is an Austen update written by actress and novelist Talulah Riley, who starred in the 2005 Pride and Prejudice film adaptation.) Interviewees include Jeff James, the director who brought Persuasion to the stage at the Manchester Royal Exchange Theatre, and Martin Jennings, the sculptor who created a bronze sculpture of Austen for Winchester Cathedral. Numerous poets contribute poems, including “Witch-Wife” by Edna St. Vincent Millay, about a woman who “was not made for any man, / And she never will be all mine.” The range of the contributors leaves the reader with a sense of how important Austen is to writers in particular, who see in her not simply an antecedent or role model but as an old friend who, with constancy and wit, is always there during those transitional moments in life—the very moments that Austen herself wrote about with such precision.

As with the high wire, these stories require close attention; they should be read slowly and carefully. They seem to have been written that way, every step deft and deliberate. Take the opening title story. Its narrator is “I,” and he’s addressing “you” about their young son. The first reference to the titular alligator is the cartoon on the young boy’s shirt. Yet the alligator will reappear in various manifestations, and so will “I.” He says he’s telling “a story forming the sum of my life,” before quickly shifting and pivoting: “No. This never happened; it’s the wrong alligator. The wrong child, the wrong life. Sometimes I lie to myself because it’s the only clarity I seem to have when confronted by some terror no method of thinking can fathom. Lying meaningfully to answer certain sublime questions. Where the meaningfully is the new truth. A story.” So, these are stories about the essence, process, and value of storytelling. But they are also about those terrors—families falling apart, identities crumbling, tornadoes and earthquakes and industrial contamination wreaking havoc. Several stories include “David,” but there’s no evidence that these are more (or less) autofictional than the others. Life can change in an instant, with cause-and-effect consequences that might reverberate for decades. Particularly virtuosic is the dream-within-dream sequence of “Reliquary,” one of many stories of a young boy left with a single parent: “That night I dream that I am my mother dreaming about my father. I’m witnessing this but I am inside the dream, too. In it, he’s died and we’re watching him on the pallet pulled from the mudslide. It’s a vague memory, really. A bright red thread weaving through space between the real moment and the dream of the moment, which is itself no less real.”

It’s 1945 and World War II is effectively over in Europe. Two American GIs, Nick Genova and Joe Cohen, have fought their way up the Italian Peninsula and are now on leave in Milan. The two New Yorkers are so close that they’re known as a single unit called “Brooklyn.” Nick has heard about a local relic known as the Holy Nail—supposedly one of those used to nail Jesus Christ to the cross. The pair, with help of Maria Bravia, an antifascist and a stone-cold killer, steal it from the Duomo, the cathedral of Milan. Now the game is afoot. Do they sell it? Bargain with the Catholic Church to ransom it? Eventually the police, the Mafia (both in Naples and New York), and the Vatican are all drawn into the fray. Later, “Brooklyn” is repatriated to Brooklyn, where they’re still trying to get rid of the Nail, and hopefully profit from their crime. It does not go well, as dealings with the Mafia seldom do. However, there is a final, intriguing fillip to the tale, involving the Nail and one of Joe’s relations, just in case readers had gotten too smug. Any novel about holy relics, and particularly a satirical one such as this, must grapple with the fact that holy relics have been a booming business for scammers for centuries. The Holy Nail is an actual object that resides today at the Duomo in Milan, where it’s presumably shown to the faithful once a year—but this novel amusingly throws it into doubt, as if to ask what a reader going to believe: the skeptics or their own eyes? (The belief that Jesus’ foreskin is preserved in some church somewhere—briefly mentioned in the text—need not detain readers.) A final plot turn leaves readers with a wonderful theological teaser about the power of faith and feels as if Serby has set out to gleefully blow up his own satire.

Endingen Mole is an orphan living a quiet existence, using checklists provided by Madame Victoria, the only other mole he knows. One fateful day, his cupboard falls down, revealing a map that triggers long-buried memories and compels him to re-evaluate his solitary routine. He creates an adventure checklist that includes a visit with Mr. and Mrs. A. and E. Molesworthy of Lengnau, described as an “interesting couple.” He packs his knapsack full of tasty treats and embarks, electing to walk aboveground rather than tunneling, as moles generally do. He soon learns the hazards of such travel when he’s wounded by a falling branch. However, he meets new animal friends who help him, and he soon reaches the Molesworthys, who turn out to be a delightful older couple named Albert and Edwina. They’re thrilled to see Endingen, and they not only feed him, but also teach him about his heritage. He learns his real name—Thomas Tobler—and the truth about what happened to his parents. Despite the Molesworthys’ warnings, he continues on to Hillfoot House to claim his birthright from the clutches of his evil uncle, Julius; as predicted, greater dangers exist there. Yet another children’s tale featuring talking animals may seem like a trite idea. However, this book manages to be charming, as it immediately evokes both Winnie-the-Pooh and Beatrix Potter’s works. It features a few illustrations, mainly black-and-white drawings that add little to the text; however, its full-color map is sure to excite children’s imaginations. Also, the fact that Thomas/Endingen is an independent orphan seeking his own way will appeal to young readers. Although it’s clearly derivative of classics of children’s literature, it proves precisely why their tropes are perennial favorites.

The story, framed by the 1949 funeral of 16-year-old Thad Butler, unfolds in the grief-stricken voice of his mother, Margaret, as she revisits the events that shaped her life—and ultimately, her son’s tragic fate. Told in a rich Southern vernacular, the novel stretches back to 1915, when Margaret was a 10-year-old girl growing up in New Harmony, South Carolina. As the daughter of Black sharecroppers, Margaret came of age amid stark racial hierarchies, grinding poverty, and gendered expectations. A pivotal moment arrived when she was invited to live in the “Big House” of the white Demmings family—a gesture of apparent kindness that concealed deeper power dynamics and exploitation. Through Margaret’s eyes, readers witness the tension between survival and dignity, love and injustice. Her friendship with White Candy, the plantation owner’s daughter, adds complexity to the novel’s portrayal of race and intimacy. As Margaret’s story winds through her adolescence, marriage, and motherhood, she tries to shield her children from the pain she carries from her past. However, when her child is murdered in an act of racist terror, she’s forced to confront the forces that shaped them all. Over the course of this novel, Pettiway’s richly voiced prose is lyrical and immersive, grounded in emotional precision and a tone of oral tradition. The narrative structure, which effectively interweaves past and present events, emphasizes the enduring weight of memory and trauma; as Margaret notes early on: “The threads of our lives—the decisions, dreams, and hopes that wove in and out, over and under each other—crafted my boy’s demise.” Overall, this is a story not just of loss, but of truth-telling, resistance, and the burden of inherited injustice.