Downton Abbey is not the only famed but fictional residence—here’s a survey of the most memorable manors in literature. Elizabeth Wilhide is the author of the new novel Ashenden, whose title ‘character’ is also a house. Ashenden Park is based on Basildon Park (pictured), the Berkshire stately home that featured as Netherfield Hall in the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. The novel traces its 240-year-long history as readers meet those who lived in it, worked in it and loved it, along with those who subverted it to their own ends. Architects, housemaids, prisoners of war, soldiers, and the privileged are among the cast whose individual stories are interwoven into a tapestry of history and architecture.