Christmas with Miss Read: Christmas at Fairacre, A Country Christmas

Description

CHRISTMAS AT FAIRACRE From an unexpected visitor on Christmas Eve in 'The Christmas Mouse' to an unwelcome change of plan in 'No Holly for Miss Quinn', Miss Read recounts some of the traditional Christmas events where often, despite the most careful planning, things do not always go as expected. In his charming collection of Christmas stories Miss Read describes the season's events with great tenderness and nostalgia. A COUNTRY CHRISTMAS From the poignant story of 'The White Robin' and the intriguing tale of 'The Fairacre Ghost' to the rural festivities recounted in 'Tales from a Village School', Miss Read's wry wit and light touch is the perfect antidote to long winter evenings.

Miss Read, or in real life Dora Saint, was a teacher by profession who started writing after the second world war, beginning with light essays written for Punch> and other journals. She then wrote on educational and country matters and worked as a scriptwriter for the BBC. Miss Read was married to a schoolmaster for sixty-four years until his death in 2004, and they had one daughter. Miss Read was awarded an MBE in the 1998 New Year Honours list for her services to literature, She was the author of many immensely popular books, including two autobiographical works, but it was her novels of English rural life for which she was best known. The first of these, Village School, was published in 1955, and Miss Read continued to write about the fictional villages of Fairacre and Thrush Green for many years. She lived near Newbury in Berkshire until her death in 2012.

An affectionate, humorous and gently charming chronicle...sometimes funny, sometimes touching, always appealing--NEW YORK TIMES Her books avoid sentimentality and have an asperity like the tartness of a good apple--SUNDAY TELEGRAPH MAGAZINE Here you'll find delicious wit, quirky characters, the colourful intrigues of daily life, and certainly love and laughter... delightful--Jan Karon Miss Read so understands and loves the country and can write to tenderly and humorously about the minutiae of village life without distortion or sentimentality--TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT