Read, Miss

(British, 1913– )

‘Miss Read’ is the pseudonym of Dora Jessie Saint whose writing-career started with Village School (1955), since when she has written more than forty books, many of which have been collected into omnibus editions. Her novels and collections of short stories about the inhabitants of Thrush Green and Fairacre, are character studies of village people, their concerns and lives. Begin with Encounters at Thrush Green (1998), an omnibus edition of two Thrush Green books, and where we meet the village schoolmistress and her assistant on the verge of retirement, the village curmudgeon, Albert Piggott, and his long suffering wife, Molly, the village doctor, and assorted other characters.

E. M. Delafield, Elizabeth Goudge  IP