Here Austen reveals the connection between Laura and Isabel. The uncertainty of Laura's memory causes Austen's work to resemble a fairy tale in its qualities of ambiguity. Laura ends the letter by posing the idea that her misfortunes in life “do not make less impression… than they ever did,” but that her accomplishments have begun to fade (Austen 517). She emphasises her "accomplishments", which in that period would have been things that made a woman a better companion for her future husband (Austen 516). Laura pauses to describe herself at this age.
At 18, Laura returns to her parents’ home in Wales. In the 3rd, Laura gives a brief overview of the origins of her parents, her birth in Spain, and her education in a convent in France. Laura's narrative to Marianne begins in the third letter and continues through to the 15th letter. Janetta's relations with her father and with her lover, Capitan M’Kenzie in the twelfth letter, shows Austen mocking the fickleness of family ties and romantic relationships. As seen throughout the work, these two relationships are constantly criticised by satirical anecdotes. Poplawski highlights the importance of the relationship between females and their lovers and also between females and their fathers as a means through which Austen is able to criticise stereotypical female behaviour. The useful lessons are lessons learned from the misfortunes caused by "disagreeable lovers" and "obstinate fathers" (Poplawski 183). Laura agrees to write to Marianne and detail her life experiences to "satisfy the curiosity of Marianne" and to teach her useful lessons (Poplawski 183).
Laura initially disagrees with Isabel's assessment that she is safe from "misfortunes" simply because of her advanced age (Austen 516). This consists of a reply from Laura to Isabel. This initial letter sets up the rest of Austen's narrative through Laura's letters to Marianne. Isabel argues that because Laura is turning 55, she is past the danger of "disagreeable lovers" and "obstinate fathers" (Austen 516). Isabel asks Laura to tell the "misfortunes and adventures" of her life to Isabel's daughter Marianne (Austen 516). This presents a glimpse into the life of Laura from Isabel's perspective. The 2016 film Love & Friendship is a film version of Lady Susan, borrowing only the title from Love and Freindship.
The story shows the development of Austen's sharp wit and disdain for romantic sensibility, characteristic of her later novels. In form, the story resembles a fairy tale in featuring wild coincidences and turns of fortune, but Austen is determined to lampoon the conventions of romantic stories, down to the utter failure of romantic fainting spells, which always turn out badly for the female characters. This is clear even from the subtitle, "Deceived in Freindship and Betrayed in Love", which undercuts the title. Love and Freindship (the misspelling is one of many in the story) is clearly a parody of romantic novels Austen read as a child. The instalments, written as letters from the heroine Laura, to Marianne, the daughter of her friend Isabel, may have come about as nightly readings by the young Jane in the Austen home.
It was dedicated to her cousin Eliza de Feuillide, known as "La Comtesse de Feuillide". Written in epistolary form like her later unpublished novella, Lady Susan, Love and Freindship is thought to be one of the tales she wrote for the amusement of her family.
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