My year with Stella...

[Waawo]

...has begun!

I plan to spend my fifty somethingth year - and that surely is some kind of mistake - reading all of Stella Gibbons' novels. There are 26, of which I've previously read less than half, and own less than a quarter.

Since I want to read other things too, I'll try to squeeze each novel into a week, leaving a week in between for some variety. Some are not quite novels that can be read "while you eat an apple" though, so this may not work out.

Yesterday I wandered down to Waterstones to treat myself to a nice new reading copy of Cold Comfort Farm - the first novel, published in 1932. I've read this before, a few times in fact. It's a tale of our heroine Flora's attempts to tame her somewhat wild Sussex-based distant relations, as an alternative course to just getting a job.

I'm a few chapters in now, and the familiarity makes it a bit like slipping on comfortable pyjamas or slippers. I'm amazed how amongst the, honestly, slightly obvious seeming rural parody, Stella shows herself as sharp as a tack. For instance, she clearly knew what more recently we might call a 'crazymaker', since this is one the best descriptions of such a person I have read, by any author:

"If she intended to tidy up life at Cold Comfort, she would find herself opposed at every turn by the influence of Aunt Ada. Flora was sure that this would be so. Persons of Aunt Ada's temperament were not fond of a tidy life. Storms were what they liked; plenty of rows, and doors being slammed, and jaws sticking out, and faces white with fury, and faces brooding in corners, and faces making unnecessary fuss at breakfast, and plenty of opportunities for gorgeous emotional wallowings, and partings for ever, and misunderstandings, and interferings, and spyings, and, above all, managing and intriguing. Oh, they did enjoy themselves! They were the sort that went trampling all over your pet stamp collection, or whatever it was, and then spent the rest of their lives atoning for it. But you would rather have had your stamp collection."

Really looking forward to discovering the rest of her oeuvre. Enbury Heath is one of my favourite books ever - if there's anything else as good as that, this will have been time well spent!

I know there are a few here who like to see covers, so I've added a picture :)

I haven't been until now lol, but it is on my radar! The 'rather dated' thread about Westwood appears on my 'similar threads' all the time, but I'm saving it for when I'm actually reading the novel (which isn't too far away now, only five novels to go until I get there) 😀

What a fab thread, I haven't explored much of Stella G's writing yet beyond CCF and Westwood. I'm really enjoying your updates OP, especially with the added treat of a picture from time to time.

However, I was a little disappointed by Christmas at Cold Comfort. I saved it up as a festive treat for myself, but it seemed to me to fall on the wrong side of whimsy, lacking the slyly cutting character observations of CCF.

Thank you, that's kind of you to say. And thanks to everyone else who has commented too - I started this thread as more of a record for myself really, since the timeline is nicely preserved in thread format, but also to talk about an author who (I think) doesn't get enough attention. This was true whilst she was still working I believe, being somewhat outside of the "literary" set. There's a well known quote by Virginia Woolf, writing to fellow novelist Elizabeth Bowen about Stella winning the Femina-Vie Heureuse prize for Cold Comfort Farm:

"I was enraged to see they gave the £40 to Gibbons. Still, now you and Rosamond [Lehmann] can join in blaming her. Who is she? What is this book?"

And as a side benefit, I've discovered Barbara Pym through a recommendation here, have started reading Mary Webb owing to reading about CCF being (anti) inspired by such rural works, and have a couple of other recs to follow up on too! 😀

Law of diminishing returns, I fear. See also Conference at CCF.

What a delightful project. I would like to do the same.

Yes I think so. Just goes to show, cash-in books are nothing new. For whatever reason, nothing that came after CCF was as commercially successful, so I assume Longman may have perhaps suggested that a kind-of sequel or revisit may not be a terrible idea

@Waawo I just found my biog of Stella (by her nephew Reggie Oliver) and she wrote Conference at CCF in 1949 because CCF was being reprinted after very good sales, and it seemed like a good idea to write a sequel to make the most of that.

Oh thanks, yeah, that makes sense

Also, I need a copy of Out of the Woodshed lol. I have found a few online, it's surprisingly rare and expensive now! Not crazy money, but not trivial either 😐

[ETA: example eBay item right now: https://ebay.us/m/xP2Ptc]

If you get really desperate it’s on Open Library - not a perfect solution but it’s my ultimate go-to for books I can’t get hold of or don’t want to pay huge prices for (they don't have Miss Linsey and Pa - I was curious and checked!)

Oh that’s good to know. I’ve also reserved a physical copy at City of London library but there’s only one copy so I expect it will be awhile lol…

Forgot to post this - when I went to collect something from my local library on Saturday, CCM proudly on display 😀

Although the universe is good at teaching one not to assume lol

Are you going to read the biography before or after Nightingale Wood? I read it a couple of years ago and enjoyed it - it's a very very loose 'modern' retelling of Cinderella.

Ooh, interesting. I popped to the library after work, so I have it in my bag now. I suspect I won't be able to resist at least starting it... 😀

[ETA part of me thinks I should get through the entire oeuvre before reading a biog though, in order to get what I can from the novels (which so far all seem to have something of an autobiographical flavour) before being influenced by reality. Hm, decisions...]

In fact I've answered my own question. I just flicked through the book, looked at the photographs, and it fell open at a page, at the top of which was a paragraph about Miss Linsey and Pa (which I've just read) that contains a massive spoiler, and gives away the shocking end of the story. I don't want that to happen with any of the as yet unread novels!

This is the book we’re talking about above btw, an autobiography (of sorts?) of Stella by her nephew Reggie Oliver, entitled Out of the Woodshed.

Although as I’ve decided not to read it yet for fear of spoilers, I should probably return to the library straightaway and give someone else a chance, and get it out again if I haven’t found my own copy by then!

[ETA: it’s really hard to photograph books in library jackets!]

This arrived with the post this morning. Good timing, as I’ll finish an “in between” book today, so can make a start on this tomorrow 😀

I wasn’t expecting this cover! Always a risk with World of Books lol, they use a single picture per title. There are two versions of the Sophie Dahl introduction volume with a darker blue cover and I think I prefer both of them!

I thoroughly enjoyed Nightingale Wood. I was always surprised that Persephone hadn’t picked up on SG's lesser-known novels, but maybe they didn’t have the rights or something.

After Vintage [14], Dean Street Press [5] and Virago [1], there are only four novels that are currently out of print. Miss Linsey and Pa is one, which might be tricky to re-issue without a significant re-write; I haven't read any of the other three, but I wonder if there's a reason why Vintage in particular didn't pick up on these when they had a bit of a re-issue blitz on Stella?

There's a bit of background on the Vintage re-issue in this old Observer article: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/aug/07/stella-gibbons-westwood-starlight-vintage

I saw this in a Guardian article and thought of you @Waawo

The author Jan Carson also reads annually an author's entire catalogue.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/feb/21/last-year-i-read-137-books-could-setting-targets-help-you-put-down-your-phone-and-pick-up-a-book

Ah I read that this morning too! From the title of the article I was half expecting the 50 bookers thread to be mentioned lol

I have just stumbled across this thread OP and it’s great as I am reading CCF for the first time - how did it evade me for so long? It’s making me hoot with laughter and I wish I had discovered Flora Poste earlier (particularly having just seen the new Wuthering Heights the other night - I enjoyed it but I think had I read this first I’d have been sniggering a bit more).

Hello! Yes, CCF is wonderfully funny. Flora is so fantastically modern as well. It's a very easy book to love I think!

I’m delighted to have found this thread. CCF was my A level text & we all loved it. Then in my 20s I found a few more SG novels of my aunt’s. Here Be Dragons has stuck in my mind. The film Absolute Beginners had just come out & I saw that & read the book. Both books describe a London of the time my Mum & Dad met & dated there & I was fascinated.

Oh, Absolute Beginners. I remember the film coming out (and the Bowie song!) but the novel has passed me by. Another one to add to the ever growing pile… 😀