''Secret Lives'' is a 1932

comedy novel A comic novel is a novel-length work of humorous fiction. Many well-known authors have written comic novels, including P. G. Wodehouse, Henry Fielding, Mark Twain, and John Kennedy Toole. Comic novels are often defined by the author's literary ...

by the British writer E. F. Benson, best known as the author of the

Mapp and Lucia ''Mapp and Lucia'' is a 1931 comic novel written by E. F. Benson. It is the fourth of six novels in the popular Mapp and Lucia series, about idle women in the 1920s and their struggle for social dominance over their small communities. It bring ...

series.Palmer & Lloyd p.195 The structure is broadly similar to that series, featuring two strong-willed women battling for social supremacy in the fictitious Durham Square in

Edwardian The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history spanned the reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victori ...

London. Margaret Mantrip is the queen bee of a

garden square A garden square is a type of communal garden in an urban area wholly or substantially surrounded by buildings; commonly, it continues to be applied to public and private parks formed after such a garden becomes accessible to the public at large. T ...

in London, reigning over the various inhabitants. When Susan Leg, a mysterious new resident arrives, it threatens to upset her carefully-ordered world. Little known to her is the fact that the newcomer is secretly the author of a series of trashy but bestselling novels under the pen name Rudolph Da Vinci.

References

Bibliography

* Masters, Brian. ''The Life of E.F. Benson''. Chatto & Windus, 1991. * Palmer, Geoffrey & Lloyd, Noel. ''E.F. Benson - As He Was''. Lennard, 1988. * Reilly, John M. ''Twentieth Century Crime & Mystery Writers''. Springer, 2015. 1932 British novels British comedy novels Novels set in London Novels by E. F. Benson Hodder & Stoughton books Novels set in the 1900s Novels about writers {{1930s-comedy-novel-stub