"Henrietta Bates, a relatively minor character in Jane Austen’s Emma, is front and center in this bold retelling that echoes Austen’s wry and satirical wit. Dismissed by many in that novel because of her incessant chattering and lowly social position, the character here is endowed with a rich inner life that belies her ridiculed and lowly position in Highbury. There is social commentary aplenty but also tragedy, violence (real and imagined), humor, and heartbreak, all culminating in a very satisfying ending."

– Library Journal

"The garrulous spinster from Jane Austen’s 1815 literary classic Emma is given voice in Catherine Cliff’s captivating historical novel Miss Bates. With absorbing historical details and a sharpened social consciousness, the imaginative novel expands upon Jane Austen’s literary universe with a twist of vengeful triumph."

– Foreword Reviews

"I read Miss Bates in a single, enraptured sitting. Cliff's prose is a joy — precise and rich and wickedly observant — and her Miss Bates, long underestimated, is one of the most fully realized characters I've encountered in fiction. It is a love letter to Austen, a propulsive sequel to Emma, and a brilliant, moving work in its own right."

– Belle Burden, New York Times bestselling author of Strangers 

“In this bold and beguiling debut, Catherine Cliff performs a feat that would make even the great Jane Austen raise an eyebrow: she rescues Miss Bates from the margins of Emma and restores to her a rich, secret interior life. Long dismissed as the garrulous bore of Highbury, Henrietta Bates emerges here as a woman of fierce intelligence and quiet strategy, whose endless chatter is not foolishness but armor; a performance honed for survival in a society that has no place for the poor, the plain, or the unmarried.”

– Paula Byrne, author of The Real Jane Austen and Six Weeks by the Sea

“Henrie Bates is a brilliant character and the contrast between her inner and outer world heightens the humor—and tragedy—in this superb exploration of a character who is so often a source of ridicule. Impressively, Catherine Cliff has struck a tone that feels beautifully similar to Austen's wry satire. Miss Bates is a wonderful portrayal of the rich inner world and inspiring inner fury of a powerless woman."

– Caroline Lea, author of Love, Sex, and Frankenstein