From The Persephone Quarterly Winter 2004 No. 24

‘I enjoyed The Casino: unusually with short stories, I found it best to read them one after another, this way you got the feel of the author’s style and themes, and felt an underlying link between the stories.’ DN, Dover

‘‘Tea with Mr Rochester is the FIND, your best and most wonderful book. “Little Willow”: so much breathing room, beauty, lovely flow/movement; a mere aperçu, and so rich and full it blew me away. And Operation Heartbreak – what a lovely honey of a book, beautifully written and structured, devastating irony organic to every previous word.  In short I loved it. Such fine prose too.’ TM, Rhode Island

‘The World that was Ours is a fantastic book. It should be compulsory reading for everybody, and I am astonished that it was ever out of print.’  CG, London N1

‘My first Persephone purchase was of Miss Pettigrew and The Children who Lived in a Barn.  Was it because they were my first that they remain top favourites?  I did wonder, until I wallowed in my first Dorothy Whipple and, surely the acid test, did not want to get to the end. So I eked out my pleasure by buying only one Dorothy Whipple in my next threesome, and today have ordered the third. Alas, I thought, that am I to do when I have that one too? The answer, of course, it to order another Persephone trio at decent intervals, tranquil in the knowledge that I shall find more gems.’ PH, Maldon

‘I was in my early twenties when I first read The Village and it has been one of my “comfort reading” books ever since. Although I live far from the Home Counties village where it is apparently set, everything rang perfectly true – I could appreciate the background to the story, empathise with Margaret and recognise the attitudes of the people in the village. Dipping into my well-read copy once again I am reminded of all the pleasures that are in store for those lucky people who are now going to read it for the first time. It’s a wonderful piece of social history – and a good story as well.’ SR, Powys

‘Just to say that I have immensely enjoyed all the Persephone books I have ordered but for me the most exceptional, moving and original one is Manja: I do hope many people are discovering this wonderful book; I shall be ordering some more copies for Christmas presents. Of course I know and love Eva Ibbotson's children's books, so was interested to discover that the author of Manja was her mother. I get pretty desperate looking for something worth reading among current British authors and always ends up turning to Persephone!’ JK, London NW1

‘This morning I visited Westminster Cathedral, Bricks and Mortar in hand, and looked at it with fresh eyes, Martin Lovell’s eyes (pp82-3), discovering an infinity of things I had missed before. I love the book, because of the many descriptions of buildings in London, England, and abroad (I shall heed his instructions on how to look at a village church, pp94-5) and also because of the wonderful use of language and imagery.’ DT, London EC2

‘I particularly enjoyed Mollie Panter-Downes’s Minnie’s Room – I ordered it because I had so much enjoyed the wartime stories and thought this collection was, if anything, even better – the stories were so sharply but delicately drawn, with a haunting sense of the loss not just of a way of life but of youth and hope.’ RR, Co. Wicklow

‘As so many other Persephone enthusiasts I thought Hilda Bernstein’s brave account of her family’s life in South Africa was outstanding – I am full of admiration for her.’ JP, Colchester