Collection of short stories, set in the world of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (apart from one which brings the Duke of Wellington to the world of Neil Gaiman’s Stardust). I’ve read all of Jane Austen since I first read Clarke, so I’m now more able to appreciate the style that she takes off so devastatingly. In general this is a successful reclamation of fairies and Faerie from being twee to being dangerous and simultaneously alien and familiar, with a much more feminine perspective than is seen in the longer novel. Generally excellent stuff. My eye was caught by the last story which features Mary Queen of Scots’ embroidery in her imprisonment, but for historical rather than literary reasons.