Doctor Thorne & Framley Parsonage by Anthony Trollope
Reviewed by Harriet Anthony Trollope was born in April 1815, which makes this year his bicentenary. I assume that this is why Oxford World’s Classics is reissuing his novels in…
Mystery in White: A Christmas Crime Story by J.Jefferson Farjeon
Reviewed by Harriet Love reprints? Looking for the perfect Christmas story? Look no further. The British Library Crime Classics have excelled themselves with this delightfully lively and tantalising novel, which…
Together and Apart by Margaret Kennedy
Reviewed by Lyn Baines Together and Apart is a novel about marriage and divorce and about how events can very quickly run out of control. Betsy Canning is bored with her…
The Lost Prince by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Reviewed by Elaine Simpson-Long The Lost Prince is not one of Burnett’s well known titles. The Little Princess and The Secret Garden are those that spring to mind when this author’s name is mentioned and The…
The Love Child by Edith Olivier
Reviewed by Simon Thomas Edith Olivier’s The Love Child (1927) was her first novel, and easily her best. Although rediscovered as a ‘modern classic’ in 1981 by Virago, it has not been…
The Hawk & Knight Crusader by Ronald Welch
Reviewed by Jodie Robson Over the last few weeks I’ve been rediscovering an almost forgotten aspect of childhood in the company of two very exciting young men: Phillip D’Aubigny, Knight…
The Good Comrade by Una Silberrad
Review by Jane Carter I must confess that until quite recently I had never heard of Una L Silberrad, but now that this lovely book has fallen into my hands…
The Water-Babies by Charles Kingsley
Reviewed by Harriet Devine I think I must have been about seven or eight when I was given this book for Christmas. I doubt if it can have been the…
The Ghost and Mrs Muir by R.A. Dick
Reviewed by Simon Nobody loves a good reprint better than I do, and so I was quite excited to see a series from Vintage called ‘Vintage Movie Classics’, wherein they…
The Forgotten Smile by Margaret Kennedy
Reviewed by Simon Thomas The Ladies of Lyndon, Margaret Kennedy’s first novel, was published in 1923, while the one which followed in 1924 – The Constant Nymph – was an enormous bestseller,…
This is the End by Stella Benson
Reviewed by Simon Thomas One of the more unusual novelists being reprinted at the moment is Stella Benson. Her work is issued by Michael Walmer, a one-man publishing house that…
The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole
Reviewed by Simon If you’ve ever wondered what sort of prose Catherine Morland might have read before she ventured to Northanger Abbey, then look no further than Horace Walpole’s The Castle of…
The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde
Reviewed by Jane Carter My mother, when she was a very small girl, was given a beautiful copy of The Happy Prince and Other Stories by Oscar Wilde. She loved that book,…
Old Friends and New Fancies by Sybil Brinton
Reviewed by Harriet Devine There is one characteristic which may be safely said to belong to nearly all happily married couples – that of desiring to see equally happy marriages…
Marrying Out by Harold Carlton
Reviewed by Simon Thomas I am an enormous fan of Slightly Foxed Editions, which are reprints of memoirs published in beautiful little hardbacks, complete with their own bookmark-ribbons. Obviously the…
Mapp and Lucia by E.F. Benson
Reviewed by Karen Langley In his time, E.F. Benson was a prolific writer of many different types of fiction, but nowadays he is best remember for his much-loved stories about…
Love Insurance by Earl Derr Biggers
Reviewed by Simon Thomas It’s fun occasionally to read a book that doesn’t take itself remotely seriously. And it would be impossible for Love Insurance (1914) by Earl Derr Biggers to take…
Fire from Heaven and The Persian Boy by Mary Renault
Reviewed by Jenny. Mary Renault has a genius for the past. It’s in all her historical books: the stony, fated world of the Greeks, rushed forward to our softer and…
Facial Justice by LP Hartley
Reviewed by Harriet Devine The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there. So, famously, wrote LP Hartley at the beginning of his most famous novel, The Go Between. But what…
Desperate Games by Pierre Boulle
Translated by David Carter Review by Annabel Gaskell While Desperate Games is not a great work of literature, it is a book that is BIG on ideas. This philosophical satire on science,…
Bed Manners by Dr Ralph Hopton and Anne Balliol
Reviewed by Simon Thomas One of the more niche tastes I have, when it comes to books, is for fake etiquette guides (for which I am sure there is a…
A Scream in Soho by John G. Brandon
Reviewed by Harriet Devine “A lace handkerchief without even a monogram on it and a bloodstained knife without fingerprints or marks of any kind”, McCarthy said. “There’s nothing whatever in…
A Lady of Quality by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Reviewed by Elaine Simpson-Long Over the last ten years or so I have tracked down and read all of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s adult writing. I had been totally unaware that…
The Strange Stories of Robert Aickman
Reviewed by Annabel Gaskell 2014 marks the centenary of the birth of Robert Aickman, an author who once encountered demands that you read more of his output – particularly his…