Congrats Lori!

Another thought, you can sermonize until the cows come home, but unless you're a good storyteller, people aren't going to read your novels.

So, the important point for everyone to remember about Jane A, is she's a fine storyteller, and her books are a delight to read.

A LOL opening sentence from P&P: "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."

Ta Da!

Was Jane Austen's time so different:

"Animal and even vegetable rights were championed. Fox-hunting was criticized. Travel and travel-writing became middle-class obsessions. Women's fashions became characterized by plunging necklines and daringly provocative bottoms. Debate raged over the 'masculine' roles of active women and the need to keep them attending to home and children. Sexual mores were chewed over relatively openly...Capitol punishment, penal reform, and poverty were earnestly debated. Aristocratic decadence and irresponsibility were satirized and demonized...
(The War of Wars by Robert Harvey)

The Philosophes pursued no concerted agenda. They questioned traditional assumptions and sought to explain the world in rational terms. Most attacked religion, especially the established churches and any faith which relied on "revelation" for it's teachings.
(Gurps, Age of Napoleon)