Lucy Lethbridge (born

Hammersmith Hammersmith is a district of West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It is the administrative centre of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, and identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London. ...

, London) is a British author of non-fiction books for children and adults.

Career

Lethbridge is the author of a history of the largest single occupation in 20th century Great Britain: ''Servants: A Downstairs View of Twentieth Century Britain'' (Bloomsbury, March 2013). She examines the difficult and changing relationships between employers and domestic workers in the 19th and 20th centuries. Servants in the 19th and 20th century were found in all but the very poorest houses, ranging from a single "skivvy" in a poor household, to country houses whose staff numbered in the hundreds. Lethbridge has drawn from a wide range of both oral and written accounts to create a book that is "empathetic, wide-ranging and well-written". Drawing on the same research, Lethbridge has also published ''Spit and Polish: Old-Fashioned Ways to Banish Dirt, Dust and Decay''> and ''Mind your manors : tried-and-true British household cleaning tips''. Both how-to books contain traditional household hints and by-gone tricks for looking after homes. These range from the useful to the ridiculous and sometimes the revolting (e.g. "hang the skin of a freshly killed bear in your bedroom.") Lethbridge has collaborated on a number of history books for children in the "Who was..." series from Short Books, Inc. ''Ada Lovelace, the Computer Wizard of Victorian Britain'', won the

Blue Peter Book Award The Blue Peter Book Awards were a set of literary awards for children's books conferred by the BBC television programme '' Blue Peter''. They were inaugurated in 2000 for books published in 1999. The Awards have been managed by reading charity, ...

for non-fiction in 2002. Other titles include ''Annie Oakley : sharpshooter of the Wild West'', ''Henry Smith : his life & legacy'', ''Florence Nightingale'', ''St. Francis of Assisi : the patron saint of animals'', and '' Napoleon''. Lethbridge writes for magazines including ''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the w ...

,'' ''

The Sunday Telegraph ''The Sunday Telegraph'' is a British broadsheet newspaper, founded in February 1961 and published by the Telegraph Media Group, a division of Press Holdings. It is the sister paper of ''The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', kn ...

'', ''

The Independent on Sunday ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publishe ...

'' and ''

The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication i ...

''. She preceded Sue Gaisford as the Literary Editor of ''

The Tablet ''The Tablet'' is a Catholic international weekly review published in London. Brendan Walsh, previously literary editor and then acting editor, was appointed editor in July 2017. History ''The Tablet'' was launched in 1840 by a Quaker convert ...

'' and has been a London correspondent for ''

ARTnews ''ARTnews'' is an American visual-arts magazine, based in New York City. It covers art from ancient to contemporary times. ARTnews is the oldest and most widely distributed art magazine in the world. It has a readership of 180,000 in 124 countri ...

'' in New York. She has been the literary editor of ''

The Catholic Herald The ''Catholic Herald'' is a London-based Roman Catholic monthly newspaper and starting December 2014 a magazine, published in the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland and, formerly, the United States. It reports a total circulation of abo ...

'', and has edited the collection ''A Deep but Dazzling Darkness: An Anthology of personal experiences of God'' with Selina O'Grady.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lethbridge, Lucy 1963 births Living people Children's non-fiction writers British children's writers British historians