Books by Stella Gibbons

'Don't show proper feelin', does it, not turnin' up for 'is dad's funeral?'Siblings Sophia, Harry and Francis have lost both their parents in the last six months. Attending the funeral for their estranged father, they wonder what will become of them now that the last connection to their difficult childhood has been severed. What have they inherited - financially and emotionally - to guide them to adulthood, and build a new home together? Enbury Heath is a semi-autobiographical account of the years which Gibbons and her brothers spent living in a cottage in Hampstead Heath: a wonderfully astute, bittersweet novel about family, grief, money, and the pleasures of London.

Roman. Lynende skarp og sjov satire. For alle fans af Brontë-søstrene og Jane Austen (Stella Gibbons bliver ofte sammenlignet med Jane Austen). Engelsk klassiker fra 1932 – aldrig ude af tryk i UK (ligger nr. 49 på The Guardians liste over de 100 vigtigste bøger nogensinde). Foreligger nu for første gang på dansk. Da overklassepigen Flora Poste bliver forældreløs, blot 19 år gammel, synes hun ikke, hun har andet valg end at forlade London og flytte ind hos nogle slægtninge i det mørke Sussex og lade sig forsørge af dem. Det er den excentriske familie Starkadder, der i fællesskab driver slægtsgården med det velklingende navn Den Rene Ynk, og de viser sig hurtigt hver især at have en masse at slås med. Heldigvis er Flora både viljestærk og praktisk anlagt, og hun beslutter sig for at give de enkelte familiemedlemmer en hjælpende hånd. Stella Gibbons (1902-1989) var en engelsk journalist, forfatter og digter. Cold Comfort Farm var hendes debutroman, og ingen af hendes senere bøger opnåede samme succes som den (heller ikke fortsættelsen til Cold Comfort Farm, Conference at Cold Comfort Farm).

Cherry Hellin'sworth is fulfilling her Community Service stint by working at a Village Hall as the Functions Manager. But she's not terribly good at it. On one evening she manages to to hire out the hall to the Village Drama Society, the Cricket team, a Singing Telegram and a Country and Western group called the'southern Fried Chickens.13 women, 13 men

Flora Poste, orphaned at twenty, decides to go and live with her relatives at Cold Comfort Farm. Once there she discovers they exist in a state of chaos and feels it is up to her to bring order.

Wilfred Davis, quiet, retired, respectable widower, is sitting and sobbing on a park bench. He has lost his daughter and any sense of purpose. A mysterious stranger passes him a handkerchief, and strikes up a conversation that leads to friendship and an unconventional new home for Wilfred.

Adam Lambsbreath dresses up as Father Christmas in two of Judith's red shawls. There are unsuitable presents, unpleasant insertions into the pudding and some good Starkadder table talk over. Aunt Ada Doom orders Amos to carve the turkey, adding: "Ay, would it were a vulture, 'twere more fitting".

Thrown out of her long-established office job, Miss Christine Smith takes up a new role as housekeeper for a group of middle-aged artists. Written in the 1960s, surrounded by social and political transitions, the novel focuses on change, or the lack thereof.

Gladys and Annie Barnes are impoverished sisters who have seen better times. They live in a modest cottage in the backstreets of Highate with Mr Fisher, a mild but eccentric old man living secretively in the attic above them. Their quiet lives are thrown into confusion when a new landlord takes over, a dreaded and unscrupulous 'rackman'.

Robert Poste's child is back at Cold Comfort Farm. Flora finds the farm transformed into a twee haven filled with Toby jugs and peasant pottery, and rooms labelled 'Quiete Retreate' and 'Greate laundrie'.

Set on the eve of World War II in a resort on the east coast of England, The Rich House follows the love affairs of six young people and their intertwined adorations. These three tip the balance, and relationships shift, but even war cannot halt the passions of the young.

On the dunes west of Bruges, two-year-old Ydette is found wrapped in a blanket and taken back to live in a small grocer's shop. Opposite the shop live the wealthy van Roeslaere family and their son, Adriaan, a spoilt boy, plagued by ugliness.

When Nell Sely moves from sleepy Dorset to Hampstead she leaves behind a childhood of dull teas and oppressive rules for the freedom of the big city. In this city of seductive, shifting morals, smoke-filled jazz-clubs and glamorous espresso bars, Nell must master her new found independence and learn to strike her own course.

The Club in central London holds the quarters of Queen Victoria's finest regiment: the First Bloods. Inside the mighty building, with its two exquisite glass towers, the First Bloods and their regimental servants tussle over a portion of recreational ground.

Brother and sister, Constance and Kenneth Fielding live in calm respectability, just out of reach of London and the Blitz. But when a series of uninvited guests converge upon them - from a Balkan exile to Ken's old flame and the siblings' own raffish father - the household struggles to preserve its precious peace.

One of the BBC's '100 Novels That Shaped Our World''Brilliant ... very probably the funniest book ever written' Sunday TimesWhen sensible, sophisticated Flora Poste is orphaned at nineteen, she decides her only choice is to descend upon relatives in deepest Sussex. At the aptly-named Cold Comfort Farm, she meets the doomed Starkadders: cousin Judith, heaving with remorse for unspoken wickedness; Amos, preaching fire and damnation; their sons, lustful Seth and despairing Reuben; child of nature Elfine; and crazed old Aunt Ada Doom, who has kept to her bedroom for the last twenty years. But Flora loves nothing better than to organise other people. Armed with common sense and a strong will, she resolves to take each of the family in hand. A hilarious and ruthless parody of rural melodramas and purple prose, Cold Comfort Farm is one of the best-loved comic novels of all time.'Screamingly funny and wildly subversive' Marian Keyes, GuardianThe Penguin Classics edition of Stella Gibbons's Cold Comfort Farm is introduced by Lynne Truss, author of Eats, Shoots and Leaves.If you enjoyed Cold Comfort Farm you might like George and Weedon Grossmith's Diary of a Nobody, also available in Penguin Classics.

Life is not quite a fairytale for poor Viola. Left penniless, the young widow is forced to live with her late husband's family in a joyless old house. There's Mr Wither, a tyrannical old miser, Mrs Wither, who thinks Viola is just a common shop girl, and two unlovely sisters-in-law, one of whom is in love with the chauffeur. Only the prospect of the charity ball can raise Viola's spirits - especially as Victor Spring, the local prince charming, will be there. But Victor's intentions towards our Cinderella are, in short, not quite honourable . . .