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ULLMAN, MONICA [MARY] DISNEY (12 Jul 1911 - ????)
(née Disney,
possible later married name Nöhren)
1950s
Prominent stage actress and dancer as a child and
author of a single children's title, Film
Star Gilly (1950). National Portrait Gallery's website mentions her
second husband's name, but I haven't been able to find any trace of her after
the publication of her book.
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UNSWORTH, MADGE (23 Jun 1888 – 7
Apr 1970)
1920s
Salvation Army member and author of one school story, Wilminster High School and Wilminster Old Girls (1929). Her later
writings are all religious-themed non-fiction and biography. Her death year
was previously erroneously given as 1960.
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UNTHANK, NITA (6 Aug 1901 – 28
Apr 1966)
1940s – 1950s
Author of three children’s titles, two of which—From Rebels to Helpmates (1949) and Robina's Secret (1951) are girls' school stories. The last was Because of Berry (1955).
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UPSON, DOROTHY BARBARA (27 Nov
1894 – 30 Sept 1965)
(aka Elizabeth Furness, aka Barbara Fawcett)
1930s – 1960s
Author of more than 80 volumes of romantic fiction.
In the 1930s and 1940s, she used her own name for her romances, but in the
1950s and 1960s she began using both of her pseudonyms as well. Titles
include Laggard in Love (1935), Tempestuous Sally (1939), Brave Music (1943), The Living Ghost (1947), The Moon and the Nightingale (1948), Soldier? Sailor? Rich Man? (1949), Sally for Short (1949), April Morning (1951), Blind Cupid (1951), The Unexpected Holiday (1953), False Star (1957), Fabulous Aunt (1958), Fancy Free (1962), and Castles in the Air (1963). She also
published several children's titles, including They Lived on London Bridge (1946), The Drakes Go West (1946), and I Spy (1948).
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URE,
JEAN [ANN] (1 Jan 1943 -
)
(married name
Gregory, aka Sarah Mcculloch, aka Ann Colin, aka Jean Gregory)
1960s - present
Prolific children's author and novelist whose first book, Dance for Two (1960), a ballet story,
just qualifies her for this list. For adults, she published nearly two dozen
romantic novels, including a series of Georgian romances using her Mcculloch
pseudonym. Sims & Clare note the tremendous range of Ure's children's
fiction, which includes a number of school stories. The Girl in the Blue Tunic (1997), for example, contains
"one of the very few real ghosts to be found in school stories."
They also single out Has Anyone Seen
This Girl? (1997) and her "Peter High" series (1990-1992).
Other titles include A Proper Little
Nooryeff (1982), See You Thursday (1983),
and the Plague trilogy, set in England following a nuclear holocaust and
plague, which includes Plague 99
(1990), Come Lucky April (1992),
and Watchers at the Shrine (1992).
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URQUHART,
M[ARYON]. (9 Apr 1870 – 27 May 1944)
(born Agnes
Marion Urquhart Unwin, married name Green)
1900s
Author of six novels, most
famously The Island of Souls (1910),
"about high magic in contemporary England, and the struggle between
forces of good and evil for the soul of a young girl." The others are A Tragedy in Commonplace (1905), Our Lady of the Mists (1907), The Wheel: A Book of Beginnings
(1907), The Modelling of the Clay
(1909), and The Fool of Faery
(1910).
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URQUHART,
MARGARET M. (17 Jun 1877 – 6 Dec 1973)
(née Macaskell)
1930s
Author of one children's book, Amiya: A
Bengali Girl (1930), as well as one work of non-fiction, Women of Bengal: A Study of the Hindu
Pardanasins of Calcutta (1925).
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Urse, Honor
see MAHON, HONOR
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UTTLEY, ALISON (ALICE) [JANE]
(17 Dec 1884 – 7 May 1976)
(née Taylor)
1920s – 1980s
Author of around 90 children's books, mostly for younger
children, but a few for older readers, as well as two novels for adults. Her
most famous work remains A Traveller in
Time (1939), about a girl transported to the 16th century, where she
becomes involved with a plot to save Mary, Queen of Scots. Her adult novels
are High Meadows (1938) and When All Is Done (1945). She also
published several books about country life, including The Country Child (1931), Country
Things (1946), and A Year in the
Country (1957). Her diaries for the years 1932-1971 were published in
2009.
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VAIZEY, JESSIE (3 Oct 1856 – 23
Jan 1917)
(née Bell, earlier married name Mansergh, aka Mrs. George de Horne
Vaizey)
1890s – 1910s
Author of more than 30 works of fiction, mostly romantic tales aimed both at
girls and women, though some do have school settings. Twentieth-Century Romance and Historical Writers refer to her
work as "refreshingly vigorous", though even her most liberated
heroines tend to find their eventual fulfillment in marriage and
child-rearing. Titles include A Girl in
Springtime (1897), About Peggy Saville (1900), Pixie O'Shaughnessy (1902), The Fortunes of the Farrells (1907), Etheldreda the Ready (1910), A College Girl (1913), The Independence of Claire (1915), What
a Man Wills (1916) and The Lady of the Basement Flat (1917). In
2010, Greyladies published The
Ignorance of Sybilla, a new collection of Vaizey's stories.
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VALLINGS, GABRIELLE (28 Aug 1886
– 7 Jul 1972)
(pseudonym of Lilian Mary Vallings, seems to have gone by Gabrielle
Francesca Lilian Mary Vallings)
1910s – 1930s
Great-niece of Charles Kingsley and cousin of Lucas MALET. A well-known opera
singer and author of around a dozen novels. Her debut, Bindweed (1916), is set in the artist community in Paris. A blurb
for her final novel, Jury of Four
(1938), calls it "a story of love, intrigue, suicide and murder."
Others include The Whispering City
(1922), Belief (1933), The Silent Monk (1935), and The Labour Leader (1937).
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VALLIS, ALICIA (dates unknown)
1940s
Untraced author of a single girls' school story, The Secret of St Mary's (1947).
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VAN DER ELST, VIOLET (4 Jan 1882
– 30 Apr 1966)
(née Dodge)
1930s – 1940s
A fascinating rags to riches (and back to rags) story in herself, Van Der
Elst was a working class girl, made a fortune creating a new shaving cream,
then lost it passionately campaigning against the death penalty. She
published two story collections along the way—The Torture Chamber (1937) and Death of the Vampire Baroness and Other Thrilling Stories (1945).
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VANE,
DEREK (22 Feb 1854 – 15 Nov 1939)
(pseudonym of
Blanche Eaton Back)
1890s – 1930s
Author of more than 20 mysteries and romance novels, including The Three Daughters of Night (1897), The Paradise of Fools (1913), Lady Varley (1914), The Trump Card (1925), The Unguarded Hour (1929), and Dancer's End (1934). Steve at Bear
Alley wrote about his research on her here.
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VAUGHAN, CELIA (dates unknown)
1930s
Unidentified author of a single novel, So Much
for Love (1935), about the difficulties of marriage and divorce. The
heroine, a product of a broken home, herself marries hastily to get away, is
unhappy, has a breakdown and a prescribed retreat to a Lakeland cottage,
where she finds a new lease on life. A contemporary review says she was a native
of Wilmslow, Cheshire, but the name is too common to fully identify her.
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VAUGHAN, HILDA [CAMPBELL] (12
Jun 1892 – 4 Nov 1985)
(married name Morgan)
1920s – 1950s
Playwright and author of ten novels, many set in
her native Wales, particularly in and around Radnorshire. Her most famous
work is A Thing of Nought (1934),
which I reviewed here. The others
are The Battle to the Weak (1925), Here
Are Lovers (1926), The Invader
(1928), Her Father's House (1930), The Soldier and the Gentlewoman
(1932), The Curtain Rises (1935), Harvest Home (1936), The Fair Women (1942), Pardon and Peace (1945), Iron and Gold (1948), and The Candle and the Light (1954).
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VAUGHAN, JEAN (dates unknown)
1940s - 1950s
Unidentified author of three children's titles—Lone Star (1940), Star and
Company (1947), and Elizabeth's
Green Way (1950). The last of these is about a dreamy girl whose family
members are all great successes and who must find her own way in the world
(thanks to Nicola Davies for these details).
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VEHEYNE, CHERRY (13 Jan 1886 – 8
Dec 1975)
(pseudonym of Ethel Williamson, aka Jane Cardinal)
1920s – 1930s, 1960s
Actress and author of nine novels in all. Swift
Adventure (1925) and The Living
Idol (1933) appeared under her Cardinal pseudonym. The others are The Journal of Henry Bulver (1921),
which won the Collins Open Novel Competition, Fay and Finance (1922), about the theatre, According to Their Deserts (1924), The Devil Is Sick (1930), The
Taming of the Despot (1934), and Evolution
of James (1935). After a considerable absence, she returned with Horror (1962), a thriller about Jack
the Ripper.
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VEREKER, BARBARA (16 Jun 1921 –
16 Aug 1993)
1950s
Journalist, playwright, and author of four girls’
stories—Caroline at the Film Studios
(1955), Adventure for Caroline
(1956), Caroline in Scotland
(1957), and Caroline in Wales
(1959)—as well as The Story of Films
(1961).
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VERNHAM,
KATHERINE ELIZABETH (7 Apr 1858 – 3 Mar 1938)
1890s - 1910
Author of more than 20 works of fiction, most apparently storybooks for
children. However, several, including Perry's
Pilgrimage (1895), Miss Haldane's
Lodger (1909), and Grantham Gates
and Other Stories (1910), appear to be for adults.
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VERNON, MARJORIE (dates unknown)
(pseudonym of Marjorie Cottam)
1940s – 1980s
Prolific author of romantic novels. She has remained an enigma for many
years, but John Herrington recently discovered her real name and is moving
closer to a definite identification. Her titles include Captive of the Sheik (1943), The
Lonely Caravan (1946), Wild
Heritage (1947), The White Lotus
(1953), September Sunday (1956), Tender Tigress (1959), Beloved Enemy (1961), Riviera Romance (1963), Paris Is a Girl (1966), Love Has Jagged Edges (1967), Nurse on the Riviera (1979), and Love, Come to My Castle (1982).
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VERSCHOYLE,
CATHERINE MILDRED (6 Dec 1873 – 22 Mar 1951)
1920s – 1930s
Poet and author of three novels—Oldam
(1927), Willow and Cypress (1929),
which traces a young girl through a tragic life and spiritual awakening, and Sleeping Echo (1931), in which a woman
adopts her divorced husband's child. Of Willow
and Cypress, the Saturday Review
said, "What is best in the story is borrowed from convention. The rest
is sheer artificiality." And the Spectator
said of Sleeping Echo,
"Although this story of a woman who adopts her divorced husband's child
moves in an improbably rarefied atmosphere, it has about it a certain
wistfulness and grace."
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VINCENT, KITTY [EDITH BLANCHE]
(5 Feb 1887 – 17 Oct 1969)
(née Ogilvy, second married name Ritson)
1920s – 1960s
Author of children's fiction, humor, and thrillers.
Her first book was a tongue-in-cheek guide to Good Manners (1924), followed by three volume of humorous
sketches, with much of their humor directed at the upper crust of which she
was very much a part—Lipstick
(1925), Sugar and Spice (1926), and
Gin & Ginger (1927). Her spy
thrillers, often involving British Intelligence, include No. 3 (1924), The Ruby Cup
(1928), An Untold Tale: A Secret
Service Story (1934), and Lost
World (1937). These Within
(1943) features Nazis and fifth columnists against a backdrop of
international dog shows, while Dark and
Deep (1945) may involve horse shows. The
Fiery Cross (1930) is a historical novel dealing with the 1845 Jacobite
Rebellion, while Sea-Change (1933)
appears to be a romance set among the passengers of a cruise ship. Her
children's titles include, Lad: The
Story of a Border Collie (1938), Molly,
the New Forest Pony (1940), Tessa
and Some Ponies (1953), and Tessa
and the Rannoch Dude Ranch (1961). She also published a travel book, Two on a Trip (1930), about her
adventures in "the snow-covered bush of Canada." Even her birth
record, as well as marriage and probate records, show her unusual first name.
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VINTER, MARY [MARGARET KELL] (25 May 1902 – 8 Feb
1987)
(née Hardy)
1930s - 1940s
Author of nearly a dozen novels. Her debut, Rain on the Just (1931), sounds like
soap opera—young heiress falls for scoundrel who commits bigamy to marry her,
later dies, and she is left impoverished. Return
to Earth (1933) is about the discovery of a drug to bring the dead back
to life—what could go wrong with that? Her other titles are Which Would You Rather? (1931), Where Are the Nine? (1934), Lament for Simon (1935), Son of Simon (1936), Easy to Know (1947), Fun While It Lasts (1948), Agents in Arms (1950), The Unsettled Year (1951), and Akin to Love (1952).
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VINTON,
ANNE (2 Sept 1913 - 2001)
(née Smith, aka
Juliet Shore, aka [?] Jan Haye)
1950s – 1980s
Author of more than 40 romance novels, many set in hospitals. Titles include The Time of Enchantment (1956), Doctor Memsahib (1958), Hospital in the Highlands (1960), Doctor Down Under (1964), Even Doctors Weep (1967), and Tropical Hospital (1978). The
association with Jan Haye is often noted, but John Herrington thinks this
could be an error.
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Vinton, Mark
see LIVINGSTON, MARJORIE
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Vipont, Charles
see VIPONT, ELFRIDA
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VIPONT,
ELFRIDA (3 Jul 1902 – 14 Mar 1992)
(married name
Foulds, aka Charles Vipont)
1930s – 1970s
Children's author and Quaker historian best known for her series of
interrelated novels about various members of the artistic Haverard family—The Lark in the Morn (1948), The Lark on the Wing (1950), The Spring of the Year (1957), Flowering Spring (1960), and The Pavilion (1969). This was followed
by the Dowbiggins series, about the Conyers children, comprised of The Family of Dowbiggins (1955), More about Dowbiggins (1958, aka A Win for Henry Conyers), and Changes at Dowbiggins (1960, aka Boggarts and Dreams). She published
two children's adventure stories under her pseudonym—Blow the Man Down (1939) and The
Heir of Craigs (1955). She also published one adult novel, Bed in Hell (1974), set in the 18th
century, as well as biographies of Jane Austen and George Eliot and numerous
works about Quakerism.
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Vivenot, Baroness
see HALLAM-HIPWELL, HERMINE
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VIVIAN, ALISON [LENNOX] (27 Jan 1888 – Oct 1968)
(née Irwin)
1920s - 1930s
Author of six novels, some possible set in
Rhodesia. Titles are Out of Your Tears
(1925), Reluctant Shores (1926), Beneath the Moon (1927), Dreams to Sell (1928), The Dark Secret (1930), and High Life (1935). She had herself
farmed in Rhodesia before her marriage in 1922. Her sister was poet and
gardening writer Muriel Stuart.
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VON ARNIM, ELIZABETH (31 Aug
1866 – 9 Feb 1941)
(pseudonym of Mary Annette von Arnim, née Beauchamp, later married name
Russell, aka Elizabeth, aka Alice Cholmondeley)
1890s - 1940
A cousin of Katherine Mansfield (also née
Beauchamp) and author of 19 novels called by Hugh Walpole "some of the
wittiest novels in the English language." After relocating to Germany with her first husband, she published her
debut, Elizabeth and Her German Garden
(1898), a somewhat autobiographical, humorous story of a woman who cares more
for her garden than for society, which became a bestseller. Her most famous
novel is The Enchanted April
(1922), made into a successful film in 1991, about four variously frustrated
or unhappy women who take a villa in Italy for the summer. Her final novel, Mr. Skeffington (1940) was also
filmed, in 1944 with Bette Davis. Christine
(1917), written under her pseudonym during World War I, and partly a
remembrance of her daughter who had died of pneumonia in Berlin at the
beginning of the war, had considerably darker tones, and was used as
anti-German propaganda. Vera
(1921), which Nicola Beauman has called von Arnim's masterpiece, is, in
Beauman's words, "a ferocious and at times macabre indictment of"
von Arnim's second husband. The British Library Women Writers series has
reprinted Introduction to Sally (1926) and Father (1931), and Persephone reprinted Expiation (1929).
Her other novels are The Solitary
Summer (1899), The Benefactress (1901), The Adventures of Elizabeth in Rugen (1904), Princess Priscilla’s
Fortnight (1905), Fraulein Schmidt
and Mr Anstruther (1907), The Caravaners (1909), The Pastor's Wife (1914), Christopher and Columbus (1919), In
the Mountains (1920), Love
(1925), and The Jasmine Farm
(1934). In 1936, von Arnim published her memoir, All the Dogs of My Life.
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Voyle, Mary
see MANNING, ROSEMARY [JOY]
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VOYNICH, ETHEL [LILIAN] (11 May
1864 – 27 Jul 1960)
(née Boole, aka E. L. V. or E. L. Voynich)
1890s – 1910s, 1940s
Translator, musician and author of five novels
reflecting her enthusiasm for Russia and its revolutionaries. She was a
member of the Society of Friends of Russian Freedom, alongside Sergey
Stepnyak-Kravchinsky, who also inspired Olive GARNETT and the sisters Olivia
and Helen Rossetti (nieces of Dante Gabriel and Christina Rossetti), who wrote
about their youthful activism under the pseudonym Isabel Cameron in A Girl Among the Anarchists (1903).
Voynich's work with the Society included translating Russian tales, which led
to her non-fiction publications Stories
from Garshin (1893) and The Humour
of Russia (1895). She is by far best remembered, however, for her first
novel The Gadfly (1897), a
political melodrama about a socialist revolutionary, which has, according to
her ODNB entry, "a delirious,
Dostoyevskian intensity," and which had particular success in Russia.
There, it was eventually translated into 18 languages, was adapted into an
opera, made into an acclaimed film scored by no lesser composer than
Shostakovich, and is still considered a classic. Three more novels followed
in the subsequent decade—Jack Raymond
(1901), Olive Latham (1904), and An Interrupted Friendship (1910)—which
were still more melodramatic but less successful. In later years, she devoted
herself to writing and teaching music, and it was only after a gap of more
than three decades that she published her final novel, Put Off thy Shoes (1945), a sequel to The Gadfly.
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VYNNE,
NORA (ELEANOR) [SUSANNAH] (31 Oct 1864 – 18 Feb 1914)
1890s – 1910s
Journalist, activist, and novelist. Her story collection The Blind Artist's Pictures (1893) and novel A Man and His Womankind (1895) were praised by the likes of J. M.
Barrie and H. G. Wells. Later work includes the novels The Pieces of Silver (1911) and So It Is with the Damsel (1913).
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WACE,
[ALICE] MURIEL (5 Apr 1881 – 12 Nov 1968)
(aka Golden
Gorse)
1920s – 1930s, 1950s
Author of six children's titles, some of them non-fiction for children
learning to ride and care for horses. She is best known for her horse
stories, particularly Moorland Mousie
(1929) and its sequel Older Mousie
(1932). Janet and Felicity, the Young
Horsebreakers (1937) may also be fiction, as well as the later title Mary in the Country (1955). Wace
fiercely guarded her privacy, as a result of which few details about her are
known.
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WADDELL, HELEN [JANE] (31 May
1889 – 5 Mar 1965)
1930s
Poet, playwright, scholar, translator of medieval
poetry, and author of one highly acclaimed, bestselling historical novel, Peter Abelard (1933), which, according to her ODNB entry, is "an authentic evocation of the worlds of
twelfth-century Paris and Brittany." According to ODNB, she planned to continue the story in two further novels,
but her plans, like those of many other authors, were disrupted by World War
II. Among her scholarly work is The
Wandering Scholars (1927), about the creators of medieval Latin poetry,
and her own translations in Medieval
Latin Lyrics (1929).
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WADE, ROSALIND [HERSCHEL] (11
Sept 1909 – 25 Jan 1989)
(aka Catharine Carr, married name Seymour)
1930s – 1970s
Author of some 40 novels, including 9 under her pseudonym.
Her seventh, Treasure in Heaven
(1937), about an unhappily unmarried woman trying and failing to find
fulfillment by "do-gooding" among the working classes, was
discussed by Nicola Beauman in A Very
Great Profession (1983) and critiqued by Virginia Nicholson as
"bleak and sadistic". Her debut, Children, Be Happy! (1931), is set in a girls' school and was
suppressed due to a libel action. Sims & Clare note that it is
"unintentionally hilarious in its attempt to show that girls' schools
are a hotbed of unnatural (and admittedly a fair amount of natural)
vice." A bookseller description summarizes the later novel Cassandra Calls (1954): "A woman
returns to the village to which she was once evacuated to stay with her
future mother-in-law, and finds herself caught up in the emotional problems
of those she had known, now fully grown." Other titles include Men Ask for Beauty (1936), Bracelet for Julia (1942), The Widows (1948), Come Fill the Cup (1955), The Ramerson Case (1962), The Umbrella (1970), and Red Letter Day: Twelve Stories of Cornwall
(1980). She contributed ghost stories to various anthologies, and some of her
novels also contain supernatural elements. Muriel SPARK rather cattily notes
in her memoirs that Wade's husband once tried to seduce her, and suggests
that Wade was offended that she wasn't interested.
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WADELTON, MAGGIE-OWEN (24 Jan
?1894 – 4 Feb 1972)
(née Kearns or Coughlin, earlier married names Kenmore and Turner-Holt)
1940s
Memoirist and novelist whose revelations about her own life in Ireland and
the U.S. and their conflicts with official records are discussed in
fascinating detail here. Her three memoirs are The Book
of Maggie Owen (1941), Maggie No
Doubt (1943), and Gay, Wild and
Free: From Captain's Wife to Colonel's Lady (1949). Her one published
novel was Sarah Mandrake (1946),
about a British war veteran who inherits a haunted house on the Hudson River.
She reportedly also wrote a second novel, Gillian
Benedict, about an alcoholic in London, which was rejected by her
publisher.
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WADSLEY, OLIVE [MARY] (1885 – 4
Mar 1959)
1910s – 1950s
Author of nearly three dozen romantic novels, with
additional work serialized in The Star.
Titles include The Flame (1913), Sand (1922), Spring Dust (1930), Cabaret
(1931), Seventh Wave (1937), And One Was Mine (1951), and So Green the Grass (1952). Kirkus called At Last (1934) "rental library drip."
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WADSWORTH, PHYLLIS MARIE (1 Jul
1910 - 2006)
(née Carter, aka P. M. Wadsworth?)
1940s (?) – 1960s
Definitely the author of two novels—Young
Miss Isotope (1959), about a young women writing a book on the
"chemistry of love," and Overmind
(1967), a science-fiction tale of aliens proclaiming a new messiah via
telepathy. She may also have written one earlier novel, The Big Fiddle (1946), described as a light-hearted romance,
using only her initials.
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Wainwright, Lucian
see ALLATINI, ROSE
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Waite, Phyllis
see WELLER, MARY [ELIZABETH
PHYLLIS]
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WALES,
JOAN (18 May 1905 – 20 Jan 1981)
1920s – 1930s
Author of ten Mills & Boon romances—Never Comes Twilight (1927), Spring
Stays Ever (1932), Buses Pass the
Door (1933), Fun for Elizabeth
(1933), Kind Gentleman (1934), Play for Safety (1934), The Price Varies (1936), There She Walks (1938), Wait-a-Little (1939), and Lindon Manor (1939).
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WALFORD, LUCY [BETHIA] (17 Apr
1845 – 11 May 1915)
(née Colquhoun)
1870s – 1910s
Biographer and
novelist influenced by Jane Austen and Charlotte Yonge. ODNB describes her debut, Mr.
Smith (1874), as a "light-hearted treatment of domestic life,"
while OCEF notes that Leonore Stubbs (1908) is "a love
story featuring a peppery old general and his four daughters." Other
titles include Pauline (1877), The Baby's Grandmother (1884), Cousins (1885), Stiff Necked Generation (1889), The Havoc of a Smile (1890), The
Matchmaker (1894), The
Enlightenment of Olivia (1907), and David
and Jonathan on the Riviera (1914). She published two memoirs, Recollections of a Scottish Novelist
(1910) and Memories of Victorian London
(1912).
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WALKER, E. M. (dates unknown)
1920s
Unidentified author of a single novel, God Loves
the Franks (1927), set in a French boarding school for soldier’s
daughters and focused on three young teachers who have very different
destinies ahead. A contemporary review asserts that the author is definitely
a woman, but no other details seem to have been publicized at the time. There
is an E. M. Walker who translated works from French, and also a composer by
the name, but it’s unclear if they’re the same person.
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WALKER,
[WINIFRED] JOAN (21 Nov 1908 – 27 Jul 1997)
(née Suter,
earlier married name Mackenzie-Kerr, aka Joan Suter, aka Leonie Mason)
1950s – 1960s
Journalist, novelist, and
memoirist, best known for Pardon My
Parka (1954), a humorous memoir of her experiences as a Canadian War
Bride in Northern Quebec. She published four novels in all. As Joan Suter
(after her first marriage had broken down but before her second), she
published East of Temple Bar (1946),
set in the world of Fleet Street. Her second novel, a mystery called Murder by Accident (1947), was
published as Leonie Mason and is set in an English country house turned
boarding house. Following the success of her memoir, she returned to fiction,
publishing, as Joan Walker, Repent at
Leisure (1957), about a postwar marriage, and Marriage of a Harlequin (1962), about playwright Richard
Sheridan.
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Wall, Barbara
see LUCAS, BARBARA
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WALL, MARY (dates unknown)
1900s - 1910s
Author of two novels which contemporary reviews suggest were rather
sensational, as well as periodical fiction. A Writing-Woman's Romance (1908) deals with the "love-story
of the sub-editor of a provincial temperance journal and the manager of a
wholesale whisky business," but that's only a fraction of the drama
included in her second, Back to the
World (1916). The Month notes
that the latter "treats with much psychological insight of the
sensations of a discharged lunatic, rendered insane in childbirth by the
callousness of an unsympathetic husband, and 'put away' for the space of
twenty years." She also published one volume of poetry, The Millionaire and Other Poems
(1913). One review John Herrington found suggests she may have been Irish.
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WALLACE, DOREEN (DORA EILEEN)
[AGNEW] (18 Jun 1897 – 22 Oct 1989)
(married name Rash)
1930s – 1970s
Grammar school
teacher, activist, and author of more than 40 volumes of fiction. She was a
member of the same Somerville
group as Dorothy L. SAYERS and Vera BRITTAIN. She was married to a farmer and
much of her fiction dealt with rural and agrarian concerns, though one
exception is Forty Years On (1958),
a post-nuclear war dystopia set on the Isle of Ely. Other titles include A Little Learning (1931), The Gentle
Heart (1932), Barnham Rectory (1934), The Time of Wild
Roses (1938), The Spring Returns
(1940), Green Acres (1941), Willow
Farm (1948), Sons of Gentlemen
(1953), Richard and Lucy (1959), Woman with a Mirror (1963),
An Earthly Paradise (1971), and Landscape with Figures (1976).
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WALLACE,
HELEN [GRACE] (24 Oct 1852 – 8 Oct 1929)
(aka Gordon
Roy)
1880s – 1910s
Daughter of a Scottish clergyman and author of 12 novels which seem to be
melodramatic in theme. The first three—For
Her Sake: A Tale of Life in Ireland (1888), Her Cousin Adair (1892), and For
Better, For Worse (1892)—appeared under her pseudonym. The others are Lotus or Laurel? (1900), The Greatest of These (1901), Hasty Fruit (1906), To Pleasure Madame (1907), The Coming of Isobel (1907), Life's Chequer-Board (1908), Blind Hopes (1909), The Yoke of Circumstance (1910) and Morning Glory (1913).
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WALLACE,
KATHLEEN [MONTGOMERY] (1890 – 29 Mar 1958)
(née Coates)
1930s – 1950s
Author of more than 30 volumes of fiction for children and adults. She
apparently lived in China for some time in the 1920s, which experience
informed some of her fiction, including Without
a Stair (1933) and Cross the Bridge
and See (1949). Immortal Wheat
(1951) is her retelling of the story of the Brontës, while The Prize Essay (1953) is a children's
title about a girl writing a report on the Brontës who slips back in time and
observes them firsthand. Some of her later novels appear to be romances.
Other titles include I Walk Alone
(1930), The House with a Key
(1937), Ancestral Tablet (1938), Without Signposts (1941), Grace on Their Doorposts (1944), Time Changes the Tune (1948), Scroll with Figures (1954), Pathway for Celia (1955), and Faileth the Dream (1959). At Girton,
she was friends with mystery writer Margaret COLE and author Monica Mary
CURTIS.
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WALLACE, PHYLLIS (dates unknown)
1920s
Untraced author of a single girls' school story, Well Played, Midhurst (1926).
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Wallis, Irene
see CORNWALLIS, KAY
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WALMSLEY, ELIZABETH (dates
unknown)
1920s
Author of five widely-varied girls' school stories—Jonquil (1926), A Misfit at
School (1926), Mary Court's Company
(1925), The Wishing Chair (1926),
and The Princess Imelda (1928)—and
two additional children's titles, Pom
and Pearly (1926) and The Prodigal
Son (1927). She may be the Elizabeth Walmsley, née Young, 1872 – 21 Aug
1958, who co-wrote typing manuals with husband William Walmsley, but there is
too little supporting detail to confirm.
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WALTER,
ELIZABETH [MARGARET] (25 May 1927 – 8 May 2006)
1960s - 1990
Novelist, translator, and editor for many years of the Collins Crime Club.
Best known for her short stories of ghosts and the supernatural, compiled
into six collections in the 1960s and 1970s, and more recently published in
one volume, The Spirit of the Place and
Other Strange Tales: The Complete Short Stories of Elizabeth Walter
(2017). Her four novels bookend her story collections—the first two, The More Deceived (1960) and The Nearest and Dearest (1963),
appearing before her stories, and two final, apparently non-supernatural
novels, A Season of Goodwill (1986)
and Homeward Bound (1990),
appearing after her final collection.
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WALTON, AMY CATHERINE (1849 – 5
Jul 1939)
(née Deck, aka Mrs. O. F. Walton)
1870s – 1910s
Author of at least two dozen Christian-themed children's books for the
Religious Tract Society, with one final work, Strange Diana, appearing in 1919 to qualify her for this list.
Her most famous titles are A Peep
Behind The Scenes (1877) and Christie's Old Organ (1874).
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WALTON,
RUTH (dates unknown)
1920s
Untraced author of two romantic novels—Little Meg, or, Homeless in London (1920) and Nancy Number One (1921).
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WARBY,
MARJORIE [ALICE] (3 Jul 1897 – 10 May 1997)
(married name
Lang)
1920s – 1970s
Author of nearly 50 romantic novels, including Lady Disdain (1929), Too
Many Girls (1931), Love in Little
Melchester (1931), The Blue Sky
Above (1946), The Mad Merediths
(1949), When the Chestnuts Bloom
(1952), The Laird Across the Loch
(1960), Beloved Barbarian (1964), Summer at Hope House (1970), and Desmond's Daughters (1977).
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Ward, E.
see EVERETT-GREEN, EVELYN
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WARD, E[DITH]. M[ARJORIE].
(dates unknown)
1920s - 1950
Author of around a dozen novels, many with Lake District settings. Appledore Bay (1941) is about two
women fighting for the same man, one of whom nurses her wounds while running
a hotel. The Guardian review of it
concluded: "What matters more is the delicacy shown in the handling of
life's politer derelicts, old ladies driven by the insolubulity of the
servant problem and the like. There are pages when Jane Austen might have
been prompting Miss Ward as she wrote." Other novels include The Luck of Dolorous Tower (1928), Far Easedale (1931), Deborah in Langdale (1933), Alpine Rose (1934), Mountain Waters (1935), Dancing Ghyll (1937), Sea Wind (1938), Forest Silver (1941), Isle
of Saints (1943), Voices in the
Wind (1944), Green Hedges
(1946), and Kilmeny (1950). She also
published a travel book, Days in
Lakeland (1929), and a non-fiction work, English Coastal Evolution (1922). It's possible that she's the
Edith Marjorie Ward 1898-1968, daughter of John and Beatrix Ward, but so far
it hasn't been possible to be sure.
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WARD,
GERTRUDE (dates unknown)
1920s – 1930s
Untraced author of eight romantic novels—Rose of a Day (1921), Nance
of the Footlights (1923), The Penny
Plain Girl (1923), The Conquest of
Kitty (1924), His Spangle Girl
(1924), The Unexpected Girl (1927),
Wheels of Chance (1929), and Fetters of War (1933).
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WARD,
JOSEPHINE MARY (18 May 1864 – 20 Nov 1932)
(née Hope, sometimes Hope-Scott,
aka Mrs. Wilfred Ward)
1890s – 1930s
Author of ten novels about which little is known. Titles are One Poor Scruple: A Seven Weeks' Story
(1899), The Light Behind (1903), Out of Due Time (1906), Great Possessions (1909), The Job Secretary (1911), Horace Blake (1913), Not Known Here (1921), The Plague of His Own Heart (1925), The Shadow of Mussolini (1927), and Tudor Sunset (1932).
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WARD, MARY AUGUSTA (11 Jun 1851
– 24 Mar 1920)
(née Arnold, aka Mrs. Humphry Ward)
1880s – 1910s
A niece of poet Matthew Arnold, and author of 15
novels. Her most successful works, including Robert Elsmere (1888), a bestseller focused on religious doubt
and faith, David Grieve (1892), for
which she was paid an unheard-of £7000 for the American rights, and Marcella (1894), were published in the
late Victorian years. However, she later produced two particularly
well-received novels during World War I—Lady
Connie (1916), about 19th century Oxford, and the war novel Missing (1917). She was distinctly not
a feminist, and two novels in particular, Daphne
(1909) and Delia Blanchflower
(1915), reflect her aversion to the suffrage movement. Her other novels are Miss Bretherton (1884), Helbeck of Bannisdale (1898), Eleanor (1900), set in Italy where
Ward frequently visited, Lady Rose's
Daughter (1903), Fenwick's Career
(1905), The Marriage of William Ashe (1905), The Testing of Diana Mallory (1908), and The Case of Richard Meynell (1911),
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WARD,
RUTH CAMERON (19 Apr 1903 - 1996)
1930s – 1970s
Author of at least a dozen volumes of romantic fiction, including Swallows Eaves (1939), Snow on the High Ground (1942), Green Fields Beyond (1945), Filly Cliff (1949), The Bystander (1959), The Sweetest Thing (1961), and The Second Time Around (1973). Her
sparse output over such a long period makes one wonder if she also wrote
under as-yet-unidentified pseudonyms.
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Ward, Mrs. Wilfred
see WARD, JOSEPHINE MARY
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WARDE, E[LAINE]. J[OAN MURRAY].
(21 Feb 1909 – 10 Dec 1980)
1960 – 1970s
Author of nearly a dozen volumes of adventure and mystery fiction for
children. Titles are Dangerous Diamonds
(1960), The Delmore Feud (1961), Stoneacres (1962), Crisis in Cedar Close (1963), The Riddle of Anchor Farm (1965), Clues for Sixpence (1966), Follow My Leader (1967), Adventures in Anderton (1968), Power Point (1969), Stowaway Farmer (1973), and The Jigsaw Puzzle (1978).
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WARDEN,
FLORENCE [ALICE] (16 May 1857 – 11 Mar 1929)
(pseudonym of
Florence Alice James, née Price)
1880s – 1920s
Sister of Gertrude WARDEN. Playwright, actress, and author of more 150 novels
which, according to OCEF,
"specialized in courtship and marital dilemmas." She once bragged
that she wrote more than a million words a year, and she routinely published
2-4 books per year throughout her career. Judging by titles, some of her
books could be mysteries. Among her many titles are The White Witch (1884), A
Vagrant Wife (1885), St Cuthbert's
Tower (1889), A Wild Wooing
(1893), Our Widow (1896), A Sensational Case (1898), The Bohemian Girls (1899), Beatrice Froyle's Crime (1903), Blindman's Marriage (1907), Miss Ferriby's Clients (1910), The Beauty Doctor (1911), A Mystery of the Thames (1913), Lord Quare's Visitor (1915), The Girl with the Haunting Eyes
(1920), and The Girls at the Cottage
(1924). From Stage to Peerage
(1911) appears to be a memoir.
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WARDEN, GERTRUDE (1859 – 3 May
1925)
(pseudonym of Gertrude Isabel Price, married names Jones and Devot, aka
G. De Vauriard)
1890s – 1910s
Sister of
Florence WARDEN. Author of more than 30 works of fiction, including As a Bird to the Snare (1888), The Wooing of a Fairy (1897), Merely Man (1909), The World, the Flesh and the Casino
(1909), and Two Girls and a Saint
(1915). She published four novels as G. De Vauriard—The Sibyl of Bond Street (1909), The House of the Majority (1909), Mated in Soul (1912), and The
Lily and the Rose (1914).
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WARING, D. GAINSBOROUGH (8 Jun
1891 – 25 Apr 1977)
(pseudonym of Dorothy Grace Waring, married name Hartnett)
1930s – 1940s
Author of ten novels, at least some of which are spy thrillers and which
often feature Irish characters or themes. Titles are Nothing Irredeemable (1936), Wilful-Missing
(1936), Fortune Must Follow (1937),
The Oldest Road (1938), This Day's Madness (1939), This New Corn (1940), And If I Laugh (1940), Against My Fire (1941), Hatred Therewith (1942), and Not Quite So Black (1948). According
to ODNB, she was a member of the British Fascists for several years, and her
early novels "made clear her continued admiration for Hitler."
She had earlier been a controversial figure in Northern Ireland, where she
and her father were strong Unionists. In later years, she became a regular on
the Northern Ireland Home Service's radio quiz Up Against It.
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Waring, Molly
see LINDSAY, KATHLEEN
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WARNER, PRISCILLA MARY (2 Mar
1905 – 27 Jan 1994)
(née Ellingford)
1940s – 1960s
Author of eight children's titles, including Embroidery Mary (1948), Biddy
Christmas (1948), Picture Come True
(1951), Tessie Growing Up
(1952), Mr. and Mrs. Cherry (1953),
A Friend for Frances (1956), If It Hadn't Been for Frances (1957),
and The Paradise Summer (1963).
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WARNER, SYLVIA TOWNSEND (6 Dec
1893 – 1 May 1978)
1920s – 1970s
Poet, expert on English church music, and author of seven novels and numerous
story collections. Lolly Willowes
(1926), the quirky tale of a "superfluous woman" who moves to a
small village and becomes a witch, was the first selection of the American
Book-of-the-Month Club, as well as an international bestseller. Mr Fortune's Maggot (1927) is about a
missionary having a crisis of faith on a South Seas island, while The True Heart (1929) is a romantic
novel inspired by the myth of Cupid and Psyche. Summer Will Show (1936) is the tale of an abandoned high-society
wife finding liberation with her husband's French mistress in the middle of
the 1848 revolution in Paris. After the
Death of Don Juan (1938) is set in the 18th century but forms an odd
allegory of the rise of fascism in Spain. The
Corner that Held Them (1948) is a strange, plotless, but completely
compelling saga of life in a medieval convent, and The Flint Anchor (1954) is another experimental historical saga
set in a Norfolk fishing town in the 1840s. Warner was a prolific contributor
of short stories to The New Yorker
for 40 years, and her stories, collected in ten volumes in her lifetime and
several more following her death, are among her most acclaimed works. Her Selected Stories appeared in 1988. She
was effectively married to poet Valentine Ackland for 40 years, and the
couple's letters appeared as I'll Stand
by You (1999). A selection of her diaries were published by Virago in
1994. She was also an acclaimed poet, and her Collected Poems appeared in 1983. I've written about Warner
several times, including my very first review on this blog—see here.
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WARREN,
KATHLEEN [JANE] (22 Jul 1916 - 1996)
(married names
Glauser and Donald)
1950s
Journalist and author of three novels. The
Locked Gates (1950) is a mystery with a touch of gothic, about a young
woman “determined to unravel the mystery underlying the alleged madness of
her old friend.” Intruder in the House
(1951) and The Long Fidelity (1952)
are more serious, semi-autobiographical novels. She married in 1954 and lived
in Wimbledon next to the tennis club for many years. My thanks to Annabel
Glauser, the author's step-granddaughter, for generously sharing details
about Warren and her books.
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WARREN,
LILLIAN [DAISY] (17 Oct 1909 – 24 Nov 1961)
(née Potter,
aka Rosalind Brett, aka Celine Conway, aka Kathryn Blair)
1940s – 1960s
Author of more than 60 romance novels, including several appearing
posthumously, mostly for Mills & Boon. Titles include Secret Marriage (1947), Pagan Interlude (1947), Brittle Bondage (1951), Whispering Palms (1954), Tangle in Sunshine (1957), Love This Enemy (1958), Ship's Surgeon (1962), and For My Sins (1966). She lived in South
Africa following her 1933 marriage.
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WARREN, REBECCA (15 Jun 1894 – 12 Feb 1984)
(pseudonym of
Bertha [Bee] Dulcie Baker, née Callander, possible earlier married name
Hayman)
1950s – 1960s
Author of three humorous memoirs/novels about life
in a country cottage—Where No Mains
Flow (1959), A Lamb in the Lounge
(1959), and Vino Tinto (1961). Both
Callander and Hayman are linked to her as possible earlier names, but it
seems her father's name was the former.
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Warrener
see PEARCE, [ANN] PHILIPPA
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WARWICK, PAULINE (12 Feb 1883 -
1960)
(pseudonym of Betty [or Bessie?] Eveline/Evelyn Davies)
1930s – 1950s
Author of more than a dozen volumes of fiction, including 10 romantic novels
for Mills & Boon. A later title, Death
of a Sinner (1944), was published in a collection of detective fiction,
but it's unclear if any others fit that genre. Other titles include The Secret Year (1930), The Girdle of Venus (1931), Fairweather Ladies (1936), The Princess of Marmalade (1937), Madonna of the Thimble (1940), and The Preacher's Daughter (1953).
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WASSERMANN, LILLIAS (1846 – 10 Nov 1932)
(née Robson, aka Adam Lilburn)
1880s – 1920s
Journalist and author of nearly a dozen works of
fiction. Her earliest novels—David
Armstrong, or, Before the Dawn (1880), A Man of the Day (1881), and The
Counter of This World (1884)—were co-written with Isabella Weddle. Others
include The Daffodils (1891), The Goddess of the Dandelions (1895), A Tragedy in Marble (1898), Rose Campion's Platonic (1908), and The Rest Cottage (1923). Fiddler Matt (1908) appears to be a
children's title.
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WATKINS, OLGA [FLORENCE] (1889 – 6 Dec 1947)
(née Baillie-Grohman, earlier married name
Thompson)
1930s
Author of a single volume of stories, Tales from Tyrol (1935). She was the daughter of one
William Baillie-Grohman, known as a big game hunter, Canadian pioneer, and
author of numerous books about the Tyrol and hunting.
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WATNEY, MARIGOLD (14 Mar 1886 –
8 Jul 1965)
1930s - 1960
Author of
more than a dozen novels, often praised for quiet humor and effective
descriptions of nature. Ducks on a Pond
(1932) is about the aftereffects of an elopement in a quiet English village,
and Mulberry Green (1934) is
likewise focused on village life. Uncertain
Glory (1932) tells the story of one man’s life by focusing in turn on six
fellow members of his London church congregation, while Unexpected Interlude (1937), set among holidaymakers in the
Austrian Tyrol, "brings the people of to-day face to face with the
question of what they would do should Christ appear on earth in their
midst." What Shall We Do with
Anne? (1937) is about an “ugly duckling” who publishes a novel and finds
love. Dangerous Secret (1939) and Laugh
When You Can (1945) seem to be Watney’s only ventures into crime themes;
the first deals with a penniless young woman’s unfortunate marriage, and the
suspicions aroused by her husband’s convenient murder, while the latter is a mystery
set in a village. At a House Called
Hassocks (1940) is about the impoverished heirs of an artist, who open a
boarding-house in a tumble-down house, and Do You Remember? (1944) is
an elderly woman’s look back, “recalling memories of a romantic youth in the
England and Russia of yesterday and the day before." Her Name Was Cornelia (1947), set at
the end of the 19th century and up to WWI, is about a village girl who
becomes a successful dancer, then returns to the village when theatres close
due to the war. The Other Side of the
Wall (1949) is about aristocrats letting part of their estate to a
nouveau-riche family, and includes a character recovering from being a POW in
the war. Amberley Close (1950) deals
with the residents of a London close that forms the remains of a much larger
estate; I reviewed it here. And James's Room (1960)
seems a bit of a departure, seen through the eyes of a child, Victoria, and
charting her life with her parents and the times she is allowed to visit her
grandfather in a castle. Of all her books, "All I Ask" (1933) is the only one I could find no
details at all about.
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Watson, Florence Jacoba
see FORREST, NOEL
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WATSON, HELEN H[ARRIET]. (1856 –
9 Apr 1934)
(née Rogers)
1890s – 1920s
Author of a dozen works of fiction, some of them historical. Sims & Clare
single out three of her children’s titles, two—Peggy, D.O. (1910) and Peggy,
S.G. (1911)—featuring the same protagonist, while the third, The Making of a Heroine (1926), is
something of a satire of traditional school stories. A few of her other
titles seem to be for adults, such as Andrew
Goodfellow: A Tale of 1805 (1906) and When
the King Came South: A Romance of Borwick Hall (1912).
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Watson, Lizzie
see HARKER, L. ALLEN
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WATSON, WINIFRED [EILEEN] (20
Oct 1906 – 5 Aug 2002)
(married name Pickering)
1930s – 1940s
Author of six novels, most famously Miss
Pettigrew Lives for a Day (1938), a romantic comedy about a frumpy
governess sent by mistake to be personal assistant to a glamorous nightclub
singer. It was reprinted by Persephone in 2001, bringing her renewed fame in
her 90s, and it was made into a film starring Frances McDormand in 2008. An
earlier planned film to have starred Billie Burke was scrapped because of
World War II. Watson's earlier novels—Fell Top (1935), Odd Shoes
(1936), and Upyonder (1938), were quite different in tone, serious
country dramas along the lines of Mary WEBB. I wrote about Odd Shoes here. She published
two more novels after Miss Pettigrew—Hop Step and Jump (1939), about a
working class woman who leaves her husband to become a kept woman, and Leave
and Bequeath (1943), described as part murder mystery and part
psychological study. Anne Sebba wrote an informative article about Watson here.
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WATT, ELIZABETH ORD (dates unknown)
(aka Elizabeth Watt)
1930s
Author of six novels, most of them apparently
cheerful romances. The first four seem to have appeared under the name
Elizabeth Watt. Blue Salon (1931) is the tale of a young woman from a Scottish manse who heads to
London to sell dogs in the titular shop. In Beyond Idolatry (1931),
two bright young things set out for the glamourous Italian Riviera to be
artists, falling in love, facing tragedy, and sometimes shocking the locals. Pyjamas
for Drusilla (1932) features a young woman raised by aunts in Somerset,
who starts a shop in Mayfair, enjoys the London nightlife too much, neglects
her business, and then must outwit a crooked investor with designs on her
honor. Doubting Moon (1933) is narrated by a mother who has done her
best to prevent her son's happy marriage, and telling how and why she was
such a "damned fool." Watt’s final two works appeared as by
Elizabeth Ord Watt, though it’s unclear where the Ord comes from. This Is
the Way We Go to School (1935) is about a woman who raises a Canadian
niece—"how the upbringing of the disturbing, if charming, Marily is
achieved by her aunt, and how these two react upon families of neighbouring
children and grown-ups, provides refreshment not easily forgotten." And
in Leave Us the Years (1939), a newspaper advice columnist, who has
long advised her readers against going on cruises, tries one herself, with
perhaps predictable results. One wonders if it might have been based on
reality, since a review of it mentions that she “has recently left England to
marry a naval chaplain stationed in Hong Kong.” Alas, I can’t locate any
records for an Ord Watt at the time and there are far too many Elizabeth
Watts to narrow down.
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WATT, MARGARET [HEWEIT] (11 May 1877 –
4 Apr 1947)
1930s – 1940s
Literary historian, playwright, and
author of three novels. The House in the Square (1931) is the story of
a charming Edinburgh family in the mid 19th century. Although a contemporary
review calls Early Portrait (1935) “'eminently,' softly Victorian,”
it’s unclear if it’s actually set during that time or if the family of ten
children on which it focuses simply harks back to earlier times. It focuses
on one daughter, Kate, who becomes the headmistress of a large girls’ school
and is inspired by a miniature portrait of her grandmother. Family Matters
(1938) seems to have a modern setting, and traces a mother’s care for her
children, even after they’re busy with their own lives. Watt turned to
non-fiction with The History of the Parson's Wife (1943), which
"takes us down the centuries and delightfully reviews the wives and
daughters of the parson as fact and fiction have presented them to us."
She also wrote a one act play, Visitors at Birkenbrae (1934). Watt
grew up in Liverpool, attended Somerville College, and later lived in
Edinburgh. She appears on one census as an assistant to a school
headmistress.
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WATTS, WYN (WINIFRED) M[ORGAN].
(10 Apr 1890 – 4 Dec 1965)
(née Phillips)
1920s
Author of two novels—Cul-de-sac
(1928) and Miasma (1928)—about
which details are lacking.
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Wayne, Heather
see BRADLEY, NORAH MARY
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Wayne, Hilary
see BROWN, JOAN MARY WAYNE
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WAYNE, [ANNE] JENIFER (1 Aug
1917 – 10 Dec 1982)
(married name Hewitt)
1960s – 1970s
Children’s author and producer of the BBC series “This Is the Law”, for which
she also published a companion volume, This
Is the Law: Stories of Wrongdoers by Fault or Folly (1948). She published
more than a dozen children's titles, most successfully humorous family tales
such as Clemence and Ginger (1960),
The Day the Ceiling Fell Down
(1961), and The Ghost Next Door
(1965), as well as a series for younger children about a character named
Sprout. She also published two memoirs, Brown
Bread and Butter in the Basement: A Twenties Childhood (1973) and The Purple Dress: Growing Up in the
Thirties (1979).
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WEALE,
ANNE (c1929 - 2007)
(pseudonym of
Jay Blakeney, aka Andrea Blake)
1950s – 2000s
Journalist and author of more than 80 romance novels spanning nearly five
decades. Titles include Winter is Past
(1955), Castle in Corsica (1959), The House on Flamingo Cay (1962), The Sea Waif (1967), Stowaway (1978), A Touch of the Devil (1980), Yesterday's
Island (1983), Sea Fever
(1990), The Fabergé Cat (1993), and
Sea Change (2002).
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WEAVER,
MARJORIE [LAURA] (1899 – 4 Sept 1964)
(née Pryor)
1940s – 1960s
Editor for Women's Pictorial and
author of 10 romantic novels, including Trusting
Journey (1949), Time to Forget
(1950), Nevermore Alone (1952), Romantic Journey (1954), Time Off for Love (1956), Wanted on the Voyage (1957), Hope Against Hope (1957), No Blameless Life (1958), The Recovered Past (1959), and Mixed Motive (1961).
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WEBB, DOROTHY ANNA MARIA (1875 –
22 Apr 1957)
(née Stephens, aka Jermyn March, aka Christopher Reeve)
1920s – 1940s
Author of mysteries and thrillers under two pseudonyms. She was also on the
staff of Cassells during the 1920s, and worked as a reader for other
publishers after that. She published four novels as Jermyn March, including Rust of Murder (1924), Dear Traitor (1925), The Man Behind the Face (1927), and a
fourth which contains an offensive racial term. As Christopher Reeve (not to
be confused with Superman), she published The
Ginger Cat (1929), The Toasted
Blonde (1930), The Emerald Kiss
(1932), Hunter's Way (1934), Murder Steps Out (1942), The House that Waited (1944), and Lady, Be Careful (1948).
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WEBB, E. KANE (2 May 1891 – 15
Jun 1948)
(pseudonym of Eileen Mary Webb, née Kane)
1920s – 1930s
Author of four novels about which little
information is available. Quinton's
Rock (1927) and The Golden Chance
(1931) are listed in Hubin as having a crime element, but the former's
dustjacket would lead one to suspect romantic melodrama. The others are The Shining Path (1924) and Temple, K.C. (1928).
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WEBB, JOYCE BEVINS (dates
unknown)
19??s
Untraced author of apparently only one
school-themed story, The Clue in the
Castle. The book has become so obscure that I couldn't find it or the
author in either the British Library catalogue or Worldcat, but Call Me Madam
tracked down a copy and discussed it here. She described
it as "a mad web of intrigue and coincidences," which apparently
include a 29-year-old woman masquerading as a schoolgirl. She could be the
Joyce Bevins Webb who in 1938 was working as a clerk typist for the courts in
London and who was likely born 1920, but this remains unconfirmed.
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WEBB,
MARION ST. JOHN (1888 – 2 May 1930)
(née Adcock)
1910s – 1930s
Sister of Almey St. John ADCOCK.
Author of fiction and poetry for children, including Knock Three Times! (1917), The Girls of Chequertrees (1918), and
a series featuring Mr Papingay, including Mr
Papingay and the Little Round House (1924), Mr Papingay's Ship (1925), Mr
Papingay's Caravan (1929), and Mr
Papingay's Flying Shop (1931).
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WEBB, MARY [GLADYS] (25 Mar 1881
– 8 Oct 1927)
(née Meredith)
1910s – 1920s
Poet and author of six novels with a dark, symbolic,
mystical vision of rural life. Webb was probably one of the authors Stella
GIBBONS was satirizing in Cold Comfort
Farm. She was something of a tragic figure herself, suffering
disfigurement early in life due to Graves' disease, which eventually, along
with anemia, took her life at age 46. Her most famous and most personal novel
was Precious Bane (1924), in which
the main character's personal deformity forces her into more independent
roles than were typical for women at the time. The others are The Golden Arrow (1916), Gone to Earth (1917), The House in Dormer Forest (1920), Seven for a Secret (1922), and Armour Wherein He Trusted (1927), the
last of which was incomplete at her death but was published posthumously. Her
works were bestsellers in the 1930s and 1940s, but later fell out of fashion
until Virago retrieved them in the 1980s.
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WEBBE, [ANNE] PENELOPE (16 Nov
1908 – 10 Jun 2004)
(married name Massingham)
1950s
Wife of author H. J. Massingham, who wrote about the countryside. Author of a
single girls' school story, The Autumn
Term at St Gabriel's (1950).
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WEBLING,
PEGGY (MARGARET) (1 Jan 1871 – 27 Jun 1949)
(aka Arthur
Weston)
1900s – 1930s
Sister of Lucy Betty MACRAYE. Actress, biographer, playwright, and author of
nearly 20 novels, including Blue Jay
(1906), A Spirit of Mirth (1910), The Pearl Stringer (1913), Boundary House (1916), Comedy Corner (1920), The Amber Merchant (1925), Strange Enchantment (1929), and Opal Screens (1937). She also wrote
the 1927 play adaptation of Frankenstein,
which was used for the famous film from Universal Studios. Her great-grandniece
noted in a comment on this blog that there is extensive surviving
correspondence between the sisters, which gives fascinating glimpses of their
involvement with suffrage and women's rights, as well as day-to-day life in
London between the wars.
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WEBSTER,
ELIZABETH CHARLOTTE (c1900 – ????)
1920s – 1940s
Scottish author whose work included one novel, High Altitude: A Frolic (1949), written with her sister Mary
Morison WEBSTER. Expiring Frog
(1946) appears to be set in South Africa. Her other fiction is Pot Holes: A Adventure in the Diamond
Fields (1928), Bullion: A Tale of
Buried Treasure and the Bush (1933), and Ceremony of Innocence (1949). She relocated to South Africa with
her family in the 1920s. There is some considerable uncertainty about her life
dates. Her birth has previously been given as 1905, but she clearly appears,
age 1, with family including her sister, on the 1901 census. In addition, one
online family tree has her supposedly dying of pneumonia on 12 Aug 1934, but
this would leave an open question as to how she wrote three more novels in
the 1940s.
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WEBSTER,
EVELYN (1904 - 1988)
(married name
Harbord)
1940s
Author of a single novel, Mountain of
the Star (1947), apparently a love story set in Portugal, where she had
lived for a time.
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WEBSTER,
MARY MORISON (26 Jan 1894 – 6 Jan 1980)
1920s – 1960s
Sister of Elizabeth Charlotte WEBSTER. Scottish poet and novelist who
relocated to South Africa with her family in the 1920s. Her novels were Evergreen (1929), The Schoolhouse (1933), High
Altitude (1949), written with her sister, The Slave of the Lamp (1950), and A Village Scandal (1965).
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WEBSTER,
NESTA HELEN (24 Aug 1876 – 16 May 1960)
(née Bevan, aka
Julian Sterne)
1910s, 1930s
Novelist and author obsesssed with conspiracies, including the anti-Semitic
Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the Illuminati, and the Masons. She
published three novels—The Sheep Track
(1914), about high society, The
Chevalier de Bouffleurs (1916), set during the French Revolution, and,
pseudonymously, The Secret of the
Zodiac (1933), about (of course) a global conspiracy to bring down
civilization.
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WEDGWOOD, IRIS [VERONICA] (8 Dec 1887 –
17 Feb 1982)
(née Pawson)
1920s
Mother of historian C. V. (Cicely Veronica)
Wedgwood, and author of four novels. The Livelong Day (1925) is a tale
of the murder of a drunken Earl and the difficulties his widow has until her
new romantic interest can be cleared of the crime; not a mystery per se, as
the identity of the murderer seems to be widely known, but a look at the
trouble caused by suspicion. The Iron Age (1927) seems to have to do
with a woman trying to save her son from a career as an ironmonger. Perilous
Seas (1928) has Ruritanian elements, stemming from a young wife's
adventures making nice with the king of a Balkan State in order to further
her husband's career, only to have said king fall in love with her—just on
the eve of a revolution. And The Fairway (1929) deals with the
fortunes of several men and woman in the industrial North of England. Later,
Wedgwood published two non-fiction works, Northumberland & Durham
(1932) and Fenland Rivers (1936). Joseph Conrad’s story
collection Within the Tides (1915) was dedicated to Wedgwood and her
husband Ralph, who was knighted for his work as a railway administrator.
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WEEDON, ELIZABETH (dates
unknown)
1920s
Author of a single girls' school story, Geraldine's
Rival (1927).
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Weekes, A.
Boyson
see WEEKES, A[GNES].
R[USSELL].
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WEEKES, A[GNES]. R[USSELL].
(1880 – 26 Sept 1940)
(aka Anthony Pryde [with Rose Kirkpatrick Weekes], aka A. Boyson
Weekes)
1900s – 1940s
Sister of Rose WEEKES. The sisters wrote 19 novels together, and Agnes wrote
14 novels on her own. Titles include Yarborough
the Premier (1904), Faith
Unfaithful (1910), The Tragic
Prince (1912), Spanish Sunlight
(1925), The Rowforest Plot (1927), The Secret Room (1929), Esmé's Sons (1930), The Story of Leland Gay (1932), and Revel's Wife (1940). One early novel, Prisoners of War (1899), was published
under her A. Boyson Weekes pseudonym, perhaps with an unknown collaborator. I
wrote a bit about Clairefontaine (1941) here.
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WEEKES, R[OSE]. K[IRKPATRICK].
(4 Jul 1874 – 10 Feb 1956)
(aka Anthony Pryde [with Agnes Russell Weekes)
1900s – 1940s
Sister of Agnes WEEKES. The sisters wrote 19 novels together, and Rose wrote
10 novels on her own. Rose's novels include Love in Chief (1904), The
Fall of the Cards (1905), The
Laurensons (1913), Fellow Prisoners
(1911), Seaborne of the Bonnet Shop
(1914), B 14 (1920), Sea Nymph (1927), and Mignonette (1930). I wrote a bit about
Clairefontaine (1941) here.
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Weigall, C.E.C.
see HORN, KATE
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WELLER,
MARY [ELIZABETH PHYLLIS] (8 Oct 1912 – 23 Apr 2000)
(aka Ramsay
Bell [with Agnes Rosemary COOPER], aka Phyllis Waite)
1930s – 1940s
Author or co-author of nine novels under her two pseudonyms. As Phyllis
Waite, she published Challenge to
Candia (1937), Dear Lady Disdain
(1938), Interlude for Rapture
(1939), Journey Into Love (1940),
and My Heart in Him (1942). As
Ramsay Bell, she co-wrote, with Agnes Rosemary COOPER, Dragon Under Ground (1937), described as "a pleasantly told
yet thrilling tale of Christmas adventure," To Joanna (1938), Dangerous
Promise (1939), and The Lake of
Ghosts (1940), set in the Apennines with an archaeologist heroine.
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WELLESLEY-SMITH,
FRANCES [AMY] (6 Oct 1874 – 2 Jan 1962)
(née Granger,
aka Frances Braybrooke, aka Cicely Colpitts)
1930s – 1950s
Author of nearly 100 novels for Mills & Boon under her two pseudonyms in
less than 20 years, including No Path
of Flowers (1938), Glamorous Folly
(1939), Anne Finds Reality (1940), Any Girl's Man (1942), You're So Entrancing (1943), Barter Her Heart (1944), Riding a Bubble (1947), The Price of Make-Believe (1952), and Shackled with Cobwebs (1955).
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WELLS,
AMY CATHERINE (8 Jul 1872 – 6 Oct 1927)
(née Robbins)
1920s
Artist and short story author,
wife of H. G. Wells, who, following her death, collected her stories and
poetry into the volume The Book of
Catherine Wells (1928), which included some tales of the supernatural.
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WELLS,
NANNIE (ANNIE) KATHARIN (KATHARINE) (29 Oct 1875 – 18 Mar 1963)
(née Smith)
Scottish author known mainly for her poetry and for
her biography George Gordon, Lord
Byron: A Scottish Genius (1962). She also published a single novel, Diverse Roads (1932).
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WEMYSS, MRS. GEORGE (14 Jan 1868
– 15 Mar 1954)
(pseudonym of Mary Constance Elphinstone Wemyss, née Lutyens)
1900s – 1920s
Sister of architect Edwin Lutyens and aunt of Mary LUTYENS. Author of a dozen
works of fiction, mostly for adults though often focused on children and
childhood. Things We Thought Of
(1902) and All About All of Us
(1911) are, according to OCEF,
memoirs of her own childhood written, as the books' subtitles say, "from
a child's point of view." Her novels include The Professional Aunt (1910), People
of Popham (1911), A Lost Interest
(1912), Priscilla (1912), Grannie for Granted (1914), Jaunty in Charge (1915), Impossible People (1918), and Oranges and Lemons (1919). Her last
two publications—How We Stole an Uncle
and How We Kept Shop (1926) and Tubby
and the Others (1926)—were children's fiction, each volume containing two
stories.
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WENDON, EDITH A. (dates unknown)
1930s
Untraced author of three girls' school stories, including The Girl from the Backwoods (1932), The Golden Girl (1935), and The Schoolgirl Pilot (1936). Sims
& Clare report that her work shows the influence of Angela Brazil. John
Herrrington found two possibilities for her in legal records—an Edith Anna
Wendon (née Siefried), 5 Dec 1901 – 1980, and an Edith Alice Wendon (married
name Blay), 14 May 1912 – 2004—but we've been unable to confirm which is the
author.
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WENTWORTH, PATRICIA (10 Nov 1878
– 28 Jan 1961)
(pseudonym of Dora Amy Elles, married names Dillon and Turnbull)
1910s – 1960s
Author of nearly 70 novels, most of them mysteries. She began by publishing
several historical romances, including A
Marriage Under the Terror (1910) and The
Devil's Wind (1912), before becoming a prolific and popular mystery
writer. Her most successful works were the 32 mysteries featuring her
spinster detective Miss Maud Silver, a dowdy, middle-aged,
perenially-knitting, former governess with a mind like a steel trap. The character
would seem to owe much to Agatha Christie's Miss Marple except for the fact
that the first Miss Silver novel, The
Red Lacquer Case (1924), predated the first appearance of Miss Marple by
more than three years. Several of the mysteries, including The Chinese Shawl (1943), The Clock Strikes Twelve (1944), Miss Silver Deals With Death (1944,
aka Miss Silver Intervenes), The Key (1944), and The Traveller Returns (1945, aka She Came Back), feature World War II
in the background, and The Case of
William Smith (1948) includes a returning soldier with amnesia. Early in
her career and for some time after beginning the Miss Silver series,
Wentworth also wrote numerous stand-alone mysteries, such as The Annam Jewel (1923), The Dower House Mystery (1925), Will-o'-the-Wisp (1928), Nothing Venture (1932), Hole and Corner (1936), and Mr. Zero (1938). Unlike many Golden
Age mystery writers, Wentworth's often feature prominent romantic
subplots—young girls in peril who fall in love with their rescuers. Many of
her lesser-known mysteries have been reprinted by Dean Street Press.
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WENTWORTH-JAMES, GERTIE
(GERTRUDE) DE S[OILLEUX]. (1874 – 22 Apr 1933)
(née Webster)
1900s – 1920s
Author of more than 50 "smartly witty novels, self-consciously
progressive especially about sex" (OCEF).
Titles include Red Love (1908), Pink Purity (1909), Scarlet Kiss: The Story of a Degenerate
Woman Who Drifted (1910), Green
Grapes (1918), and A Bargain Bride
(1929). Her late novel The Television
Girl (1928) (published some 20 years before television as we know it
became widely-known) may be of interest as an early futuristic novel. Sadly,
the year following her death her husband of nearly 30 years committed
suicide.
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WEST, REBECCA (21 Dec 1892 – 15
Mar 1983)
(pseudonym of Cicily Isabel Andrews, née Fairfield)
1910s – 1980s
Journalist, travel writer, critic, and author of
nine novels (plus three more left incomplete at her death and published
posthumously). Nearly as famous in her lifetime for her journalism (Harry
Truman reportedly called her “the world’s best reporter”) and her affairs
with prominent men (H. G. Wells, Lord Beaverbrook, Charlie Chaplin) as for
her literary pursuits, West’s work has achieved greater prominence in recent
years. Her first novel, The Return of
the Soldier (1918), about a man with shellshock struggling to remember
both his wife and his former lover, is an important novel of World War I. Her
later autobiographical bestseller, The
Fountain Overflows (1957), about her early family life, has also received
attention after being reprinted by New York Review Books Classics. Two
sequels to Fountain, intended to
form a trilogy, appeared posthumously—This
Real Night (1984) and the incomplete Cousin
Rosamund (1985). Her other novels are The
Judge (1922), Harriet Hume
(1929), The Thinking Reed (1936), The Vassall Affair (1963), and The Birds Fall Down (1966), as well as
Sunflower (1986), another
unfinished novel written in the 1920s and dealing autobiographically with her
affairs with Wells and Beaverbrook. West's classic nonfiction work, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon (1941), is
a massive exploration of the history and culture of the Balkans. Her other
non-fiction includes The Meaning of
Treason (1949), focused on Brits who worked for Germany during World War
II, including William Joyce (aka Lord Haw-Haw), and A Train of Powder (1955), which features her accounts of the
Nuremberg trials.
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WESTLAKE, VERONICA (dates
unknown)
1950s
Unidentified author (possibly a pseudonym) of four children's titles, all
with some pony content, including The Ten-Pound
Pony (1953), The Intruders
(1954), The Unwilling Adventurers
(1955), and The Mug's Game (1956).
Jane Badger Books wrote about them here, and Pony Mad Book Lovers discussed them here.
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Westmacott, Mary
see CHRISTIE, AGATHA
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WESTMARLAND, ETHEL LOUISA (20
Nov 1903 – 12 Mar 1995)
(aka Christine Courtney, aka Ellen Elliott)
1950s – 1970s
Author of about 20 volumes of children's fiction under her two pseudonyms.
Titles include Quartette at Barnham
Corners (1951), Gordons at
Gullcliff (1953), Judy Began It
(1954), Miracle for Marigold
(1957), The Dresden Shepherdess
(1960), The Seventh Thistle (1963),
Jane and the Pink Flamingo (1963), The Riddle of the Crooked Sailor
(1964), The Secret Tenant (1968),
and three books about a heroine named Susan. She was not, however, the Ellen
Elliott who published several romance novels in the late 1960s and early
1970s; that author was actually an American, Neil Elliott, whose brilliant
obituary can be read here. [Thank you to his daughter, Victoria Stagg Elliott, for sharing this
information.]
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WESTRUP, MARGARET (1 Aug 1875 –
27 Apr 1922)
(married name Stacey)
1900s – 1920s
Author of more than a dozen works of fiction for
adults and children, including The
Greater Mischief (1907), Phyllis in
Middlewych (1911), Tide Marks
(1913), The Moulding Loft (1917), The Fog and the Fan (1920), and The Blue Hat (1921).
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WESTWOOD, A[NNIE]. M[CDOUGALL].
(1887 – 9 Mar 1972)
(née Paulin)
1930s, 1950s
Author four novels in the 1930s—The
Flying Firs (1930), Elfinstorm
(1931), Quinlan (1933), and To What Purpose? (1936)—at least some
of which appear to be adventure stories with Indian settings. In the 1950s
she returned with five children's titles: Ali
Baba and the Lonely Leopard (1951, with Jack Westwood), The Riddle of Kittiwake Rock (1956), Dundi Shah, Beloved Prince (1959), Trouble at Kittiwake Rock (1960), and Jungle Picnic (1960).
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WESTWOOD,
DORIS [GERTRUDE] (16 Oct 1893 – 6 Feb 1987)
1930s
Author of four novels—Starr Bladon
(1930), The Hair Shirt (1932), An April Day (1934), and Humble Servant (1936)—the latter two,
at least, making use of a Siegfried Sassoon-like character. Oddly, one
Sassoon biographer says she had an affair with Sassoon, another that they
never met, but Humble Servant
features its Sassoon character falling in love with the heroine and then
being assassinated…
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WEVILL, LILIAN FRANCEYS (28 Apr
1870 – 7 Jul 1959)
1900s – 1910s
Author of two early school stories—Betty's
First Term (1908) and Betty's Next
Term (1912)—praised by Sims & Clare for their low-key realism and
convincing characters.
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