This book draws the attention of readers of Jane Austen's work to important aspects which have never been taken into due consideration by critics and are yet keys to the meaning of the relationship between individual, family and society in her writings. These aspects include the amazing number of ill-assorted married couples, and heredity through which conflicting characters in the parents are transmitted to their children. This accounts for strained relationships between siblings, further complicated by the inheritance customs of entail and primogeniture. The linkage seen by Austen between ill-matched couples, heredity (a natural process), and inheritance (social laws) is undoubtedly essential to action in her books.Within the families stand heroines, isolated yet central individuals, detached enough for keen observation of familial and social ills. Indeed, all criticism and all suggestions for reform are to be traced to their consciousness and conscience. Interestingly, the heroines' own developments are concomitant with momentous changes in the world in which they live. As the book shows, Austen is keenly aware of and mostly receptive to socio-economic evolution, pervasive bourgeois ideology, and social mobility, with their combined effects on the relationships between individuals, families, and society.
