"Northanger Abbey" by Jane Austen

This is the shortest of all the Jane Austen novels, and perhaps also the most simplistic in its storyline and outlook. The novel centres around 17-year old Catherine Morland, the sheltered daughter of a country clergyman, with a very active (probably overactive) imagination.

If you have been looking for a way into the Jane Austen mini-genre, then I would recommend this as a good starter book-(mainly due to its length.) There are no real 'bad' characters, the worst feels quite fictionalised, and the rest naive and a bit bland.

Not a whole lot happens in this book, its a simplistic story with a few morals thrown in, but as it is written with the same wit and insight that marks all of Austens novels, this brings it higher than many that have a lot more going on plot-wise.

A light read.