A review by kmg365
The Provincial Lady Goes Further by E.M. Delafield

3.0

I wish I liked this series more. I'm an inveterate Britophile, and even I can't help seeing the nameless voice of these books as a snob. She does engage in a fair bit of self-deprecation, which helps. Still, it's difficult to empathize with someone whose biggest problem is finding and keeping good domestic help. At one point, she mentions how nice it would be to be rich. Her husband doesn't appear to do anything, other than eat, read the newspaper, and grumble about everything. Perhaps if he sought gainful employment, his wife wouldn't have to earn all the income and worry about her frequent overdrafts at the bank. I can't reconcile the purchase of a flat in London, sending two children to boarding school, and vacations at the seaside in France with poverty, which the author frequently pleads.

Despite this obviously being meant as humorous, I did not laugh at all. It was more a matter of recognizing a punch line, and thinking “Yeah, I understand why other women of her time and socioeconomic stature might find that funny.”

Despite this, I will most likely read the third in the series, if only to see if she ever earns enough with her writing to buy all the dresses she wants.