It’s 9 days till Christmas, and still plenty of time to order books as gifts. Cosimo’s selection of unusual and hard-to-find classics make excellent — and unexpected — presents for the book lovers on your list… or as a treat for yourself. Today: books for Jane Austen-ophiles.

As interest in 19th-century English literature by women has been reinvigorated by a resurgence in popularity of Austen’s works, readers are rediscovering a writer whose fiction, once widely beloved, fell by the wayside. British novelist Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (1810-1865) — whose books were sometimes initially credited to, simply, “Mrs. Gaskell” — is now recognized as having created some of the most complex and progressive depictions of women in the literature of the age, and is today justly celebrated for her precocious use of the regional dialect and slang of England’s industrial North.

Cranford, Gaskell’s second novel and recently adapted for TV by the BBC in an acclaimed production starring Judi Dench, was originally serialized from 1851 to 1853 in the periodical Household Words, edited by Gaskell’s friend Charles Dickens. Based upon Gaskell’s own experiences growing up in the small Cheshire town of Knutsford, this is the charming tale of two elderly spinster sisters and their young charge, a thinly disguised version of Gaskell herself. It offers a lovely depiction of village life in the mid 19th century.

Gaskell’s fourth novel, North and South, which also saw an instantly beloved BBC adaptation, draws on Gaskell’s own life as the wife of a progressive preacher in Manchester for its tale of the tumultuous romance between a minister’s daughter and a wealthy mill owner. Another work first serialized, in 1854 and 1855, in Household Words, it highlights the plight of the poor as well as the class divisions of the era, and helped establish the author’s reputation as a champion of the working class.

Newcomers to Gaskell will also love Ruth, first published in 1853, and notable as one of the rare instances in the fiction of the era of a positive portrayal of unwed motherhood and for its thematic condemnation of the social stigma of illegitimacy. The tale of a young woman seduced and abandoned by her lover, then taken in and protected by a kindly minister and his sister, it is remarkably progressive for the period.

This delightful replica volumes are an excellent opportunity for 21st-century fans of British literature to embrace one of its most unjustly forgotten authors.

For the Victorian version of snappy celebrity biography, the two-volume The Queens of Society is a treat any fan of aristocratic lives and modern fabulosity. Authors Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton — actually a pseudonym for one writer, British author Katherine Byerley Thomson (1797-1862) — define a “queen of society” as a woman who, by force of her reputation, good management, abilities, manners, and even her rank and fortune commands a circle of persons of eminence, of fashion, and of celebrity. In this charming collection of biographies, first published in 1861, we meet some of the most marvelous women of their day.

In Volume I we are introduced to: Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough; Madame Roland; Lady Mary Wortley Montagu; Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire; Letitia Elizabeth Landon; Madame de Sévigné; Sydney Lady Morgan; and Jane, Duchess of Gordon. In Volume II, we are graced by the literary presences of Madame Récamier; Lady Hervey; Madame de Staël; Mrs. Thrale-Piozzi; Lady Caroline Lamb; Anne Seymour Damer; La Marquise du Deffand; Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu; Mary, Countess of Pembroke; La Marquise de Maintenon.

These reproductions of the 1980 second edition include all of the beautiful original illustrations.

Cosimo book are also available at Amazon.com and other online booksellers. Order through Amazon, and get it in time with FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25 placed through December 17. (See the complete holiday shipping guide at Amazon.)