Why waste time inventing your own insults when you can borrow topnotch snipes from a literary genius? With The Jane Austen Insult Guide for Well-Bred Women, you can clap back at bad dates, micromanaging bosses, irritating strangers, and tiresome guests while keeping your chin and pinky up, just like the queen of clever comebacks herself. Austen’s timeless retorts work just as well today as they did two hundred years ago:

- When they start talking before coffee: “I am worn out with civility.”
- When They Haven’t asked you a single question: “Selfishness must always be forgiven, you know, because there is no hope of a cure.”
- When They Leave wet towels on the floor: “I send no compliments to your mother.”