by E.F. Benson
The ruler of Riseholme, happier than he of Russia, had no need to fear the finger of Bolshevism writing on the wall, for there was not in the whole of that vat which seethed so pleasantly with culture, one bubble of revolutionary ferment. Here there was neither poverty nor discontent nor muttered me...
Queen Lucia by E.F. Benson ★★★.5 Emmaline (Lucia) Lucas is the undisputed queen of Riseholme during the roaring 20’s, and everyone knows it. She and her husband, Peppino, are close, and her next closest friend and ally is Georgie; while some think they flirt, that couldn’t be further from th...
a four
Darlings, you simply must visit Riseholme. It's just the most precious 1920s English village that you ever could see. Delightful! Decadent! Devious! Demented! Delicious!Riseholme is ruled by its very own doyenne of style and taste and class, one Emmeline Lucia Lucas. She utterly commands the village...
This book, recommended as "just like Wodehouse", turned out to be as much like Wodehouse as the fluid given Arthur Dent when he asked the Nutrimatic Drinks Dispenser for tea. Which is to say- not my cuppa.
Unabridged and read by Nadia May.The narrator here also reads Agatha Raisin, so after listening to *shrug* number of books from that series, Queen Lucia is now interchangeable with that crabby, middle-aged advocate of one-up-manship to my mind and it all works rather well. Who would have thought!?As...
i knew about e.f. benson because ben had read some of his ghost stories, and i am wont to read ghost stories just about any where i can get my hands on them. it is not at all astonishing that i would read, for example, a collection of edith wharton ghost stories after i had forsworn reading any more...
I'm not sure I can explain why Lucia is so amusing. She's a pretentious social climber, and in real life she'd annoy the hell out of anyone. I suppose the appeal lies in how far removed the novel is from any reality I've ever known: married well-off couples who putter about getting into trouble but...
[These notes were made in 1984:]. I picked this up because Nicholas Pennell announced in an article that Benson's Lucia and Mapp stories were favourites ('Imitation is the sincerest form,' and all that). I can see how he might enjoy them - this, the first in the series, is written in a deliciously ...
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