The Complete Mapp & Lucia: Volume One

Lucia Rising is not a novel in itself; it's the compilation of the first three Lucia novels. The second compilation (novels 4 - 6) is called Lucia Victrix. Maybe I'm a dope; it took me a while to figure this out! My grandmother and mother have always raved about "the Lucia novels" and reread them again and again. Naturally, I was curious! Rather than Austen, I'd compare these to a very gentle version of P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves novels. Same time period, same class system, same loony characters. I found that I devoured the first three, but trying to read all six in succession? It began to get a little overwhelming... For one thing, Lucia and Mapp, the principal characters, are simply not nice people. Yes, their endless schemes to best each other are amusing, but after hundreds and hundreds of pages their actual characters are no more developed than they were in the first chapters. Having said this, it's an authentic picture of a time and place, and I found myself wishing I could spend an evening with these people (not much more!)

For me, there is nothing quite like E.F. Benson's 'Lucia' series, except perhaps for the novels of the great Jane Austen herself. Benson is truly a social satirist of Austen's calibre (and I give this praise as an absolute Worshipper of Austen, so it's not lightly given). Benson's characters, living, as they do, lives of comfort & ease in quiet, picturesque English villages, during a historical period of relative peace, manage to get up to the most exciting and riveting, but at the same time, completely polite and respectable social adventures, and display to the reader their own little vanities and self-deceits in the most wonderful ways. I think I'm on my third reading of the books now (having acquired them about 5 years ago) and I still enjoy them immensely. I can't imagine any fan of Jane Austen not also totally 'getting' Benson's Lucia & Miss Mapp books. Benson rocks!!