Northanger Abbey

Northanger Abbey is Jane Austen's lightest and most satirical novel. It follows the story of a over imaginative, 17 year old girl, Catherine Morland. Catherine is the one of the daughters amongst her many siblings. She reads a lot of Victorian Gothic novels and is low-key obsessed with them. 

The novel is divided into two parts- the first one concerning Catherine's stay at Bath, the second one, Northanger Abbey. 

Catherine Morland arrives at Bath with her neighbours, Mr and Mrs Allen. In Bath she meets two very contrasting sets of siblings, the Tilneys and the Thorpes. Henry and Eleanor Tilney are a respectable and elegant pair. On the other hand, John and Isabella Thorpe are a conniving bunch, and often get into Catherine into situations that embarrass her in front of the Tilneys. 

Both Eleanor Tilney and Isabella Thorpe want to be Catherine's best friend. Eleanor Tilney wins this round, when Isabella is revealed to form a friendship with Catherine only so that she could marry her elder brother, who she thought would have better prospects than her. Isabella ends up ruining herself, while Eleanor sticks with Catherine like a true friend. 

Both Henry Tilney and John Thorpe vie for Catherine's attention, in hopes of marrying her, but for very different reasons. John Thorpe comes from a rather poor family, and wants to marry Catherine thinking that she is rich due to her connections with Mr Allen, who is rich. Henry Tilney, our hero, likes her genuinely, and is one of the most major characters who are responsible for making her mature. He also knows his muslin, which gives him major points. 

This novel also takes a dig at the Victorian Gothic novels which were popular at that time. Jane Austen clearly thought that these were for the empty- headed. Catherine reads way too many such books, and her imagination tries to see their happenings in real life. She was originally excited about her stay at Northanger Abbey (the Tilneys' home) because she thought it would be a perfect gothic setting. At Northanger Abbey, her imagination makes her believe that her friends' mother had been trapped and killed by her rather cold and aloof husband, General Tilney. She starts investigating and snooping around the place and gets caught by Henry Tilney, who she is in love with. Henry is disappointed in her, and tells her, 

"Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?" 

This speech is can be considered as the climax of the story, and is one of the best written by Jane Austen.

 When she arrives here, she rather naive and vain about her blossoming from a small, plain child into a pretty girl.  However, at the end of the book, she matures and learns the responsibilities and adversities of life. This novel is extremely funny, and perfect for a light hearted read.