When ten-year-old Fanny Price is plucked from squalor to be raised in comfort at elegant Mansfield Park, home of her well-off relatives, the Bertrams, only her teenage cousin Edmund notices her homesickness and distress.

He comforts her, instructs her, and helps her to become a competent, self-possessed young woman.

Fanny thrives as a useful and happy member of the household, while her natural feelings of gratitude and respect for Edmund grow into something deeper--but then trouble arrives at Mansfield Park. Rich, sophisticated Londoners Henry and Mary Crawford are a brother-and-sister act to be reckoned with.

Mary sets her romantic sights on Edmund, and Fanny is faced not only with a powerful rival, but also with Edmund's need to talk endlessly about his infatuation with the dark-eyed beauty.

Forced to hide her abiding love for Edmund, Fanny must soon fend off amorous advances from a most unwelcome source--advances that Edmund encourages her to accept.

With further help from Henry and Mary, even a bad situation can become much worse.