Jane Austen: A Biography, by Elizabeth Jenkins (Indigo, £7.99 in UK)

It's virtually impossible to avoid Jane Austen these days - at least, it's difficult to avoid glossy celluloid reworkings of her novels - so this is a timely reissue of a biography which was first published in 1938. Elizabeth Jenkins's beautifully written study is steeped in a thorough knowledge both of Austen's work and the works which influenced her; she wears her scholarship lightly, and her vivid evocation of the country society in which the Austen family lived is engrossing from first to last.