Best Selling Books by Stella Gibbons

When a well-educated young socialite in 1930s England is left orphaned and unable to support herself at age twenty-two, she moves in with her eccentric relatives on their farm

Available for the first time since its original publication more than fifty years ago, Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm is a charming collection whose hilarious title story features Christmas dinner with the Starkadders before Flora''s arrival. With Adam playing Santa while draped in Mrs. Starkadders''s shawls, the family shares their traditional "Christmas pudding"-a mélange containing random objects of doom foretelling the coming year: a coffin nail for death, a bad sixpence for financial ruin, and a menthol cone to indicate that the lucky recipient will go "blind wi'' headache." These lively tales will delight anyone who loves Stella Gibbons and her signature wit.

A sly and satirical fairytale by the author of Cold Comfort Farm Unavailable for decades, Stella Gibbons''s Nightingale Wood is a delightfully modern romance ripe for rediscovery by the many fans of Cold Comfort Farm. Poor, lovely Viola has been left penniless and alone after her late husband''s demise, and is forced to live with his family in their joyu00adless home. Its occupants are nearly insufferable: Mr. Withers is a tyrannical old miser; Mrs. Withers dismisses her as a common shop girl; and Viola''s sisters-in-law, Madge and Tina, are too preoccupied with their own troubles to give her much thought. Only the prospect of the upcoming charity ball can lift her spirits-especially as Victor Spring, the local prince charming, will be there. But Victor''s intentions towards the young widow are, in short, not quite honorable.

In St Alberics, Hertfordshire, stands a newly built family home: Sunglades. Its seven rooms house Kenneth and Constance Fielding, middle-aged bachelor and spinster, along with Kenneth''s old flame, an industrious Balkan exile, a young economist and the Fieldings'' raffish father. Together they attempt to create a rural idyll.

Set in wartime Highgate, ''Westwood'' tells the story of Margaret Steggles, a plain bookish girl whose mother has told her that she is ''not the type that attracts men''. What she lacks for in looks she makes up for with a romantic nature and cultural aspirations.

English schoolteacher returns lost ration book, and develops a bad case of hero worship for an aging playwright.

Dans l''Angleterre du début du XX e siècle, les aventures désopilantes de Flora Poste, jeune orpheline déterminée à transformer les vies chaotiques des excentriques cousins qui l''hébergent dans leur ferme décrépite, au fin fond du Sussex. Œuvre culte au Royaume-Uni dès sa parution en 1932, La Ferme de cousine Judith dresse l''irrésistible portrait des travers et petites médiocrités de la middle-class, avec un charme et une ironie so british qui rappellent Jane Austen. Alors qu''elle a toujours vécu dans l''opulence de la bonne société londonienne, Flora Poste se retrouve à tout juste vingt ans à la fois orpheline et pauvre. Contre l''avis de son amie Mrs Smiling qui la pousse à trouver un emploi, Flora choisit ce que lui dicte la raison : abuser de la générosité de cousins éloignés. Et c''est ainsi que Flora fait la connaissance des Starkadders : cousine Judith, constamment déprimée par une faute secrète ; son mari Amos, médiocre fermier qui enflamme les foules en les menaçant de la damnation éternelle ; leurs trois enfants, le très lascif Seth, instrument de perdition pour toutes les jeunes filles de la région, l''ambitieux Reuben, bien décidé à reprendre la ferme et la jeune Elfine, qui passe ses journées en jupon dans les bois à réciter des poèmes ; et puis, celle qui mène la ferme à la baguette lors même qu''elle n''a pas quitté sa chambre depuis vingt ans, la terrifiante tante Ada Doom. Face à ce sommet de chaos et d''hystérie, armée de son seul bon sens et de son livre de chevet, Les Pensées de l''abbé Fausse-Maigre, Flora va entreprendre de transformer la vie des Starkadders, pour leur bien et surtout pour le sien...

Stella Gibbons ya nos fascinó con las aventuras de "La hija de Robert Poste" y con esa moderna fábula londinense de la Cenicienta titulada "Westwood". Ahora, en lo que se ha convertido en una de las grandes sensaciones del año en el Reino Unido, una Gibbons en estado de gracia nos ofrece "Navidades en Cold Comfort Farm": dieciséis chispeantes y deliciosas historias repletas de personajes que viven rodeados de un glamour y una frivolidad que van repartiendo por fiestas, picnics y encuentros amorosos, y que culminan en el relato que da título al volumen, una precuela de su obra maestra, "La hija de Robert Poste", donde se nos narra una sangrienta e hilarante cena de Navidad años antes de la primera visita de Flora Poste a Cold Comfort Farm, la granja de la Inglaterra profunda que daría título a la saga. Un libro sabroso y adictivo, en el que Stella Gibbons se vale de toda su magia narrativa para mostrarnos el lado más cándido, divertido y perspicaz de la sociedad de su época.

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. With overtones of Beauty and the Beast, their romance matures as they grow up together and learn what should truly be valued in life.

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. Mary Davis wants only four things out of life: a husband and three children, so at seventeen she runs away from school, her father and her home and moves to London to find them. Only a few months later Mary is engaged, but love and marriage promise to be very different from her childhood daydreams. For Mary and Wilfred, it seems Fate has taken a hand, or is there another kind of guiding spirit at play? Stella Gibbons'' final novel, written in the 1970s but only discovered many years after her death, is published here for the first time.

Dieciséis años después de haber puesto el pie por última vez en el pintoresco pueblo de Howling, Flora Poste, la díscola y encantadora protagonista de La hija de Robert Poste, vuelve a la carga para socorrer a los atribulados Starkadder, propietarios de la granja de Cold Comfort. La finca ha sido rehabilitada como un museo decorado en falso estilo rústico inglés, y se convierte en el lugar de celebración de una conferencia del Grupo de Expertos Internacionales, entre los que se cuentan inefables pintores, escultores insufribles, excéntricos sabios orientales, y toda una&#x