{2014 TBR Pile Challenge Review} COLD COMFORT FARM by Stella Gibbons

ISBN #: 978-0143039594

Page Count: 256

Copyright: March 28, 2006

Publisher: Penguin Classics

Book Summary:

(Taken from Goodreads)

Winner of the 1933 Femina Vie Heureuse Prize, COLD COMFORT FARM is a wickedly funny portrait of British rural life in the 1930s.

Flora Poste, a recently orphaned socialite, moves in with her country relatives, the gloomy Starkadders of Cold Comfort Farm, and becomes enmeshed in a web of violent emotions, despair, and scheming, until Flora manages to set things right.

Mandy's Review:

Flora Poste is one determined lady. Once she sets her mind to a task, she doesn't let up until she accomplishes her goal. I admire her doggedness and determination because she's set out to make the Starkadders' lives better. How could you not cheer on someone out to do good for someone else?

Many challenges face Flora when she arrives at Cold Comfort Farm, but her biggest challenge is Aunt Ada Doom. The woman uses guilt, fear, and intimidation to keep her family on the farm so she's not alone. Only one person can leave the farm on a regular basis and that's only so he can deposit the money from the farm into the bank. Is Flora going to be stubborn enough to make the needed changes on the farm or will she succumb to the heaviness of the family's traditions.

I was somewhat hesitant when I began this book. I will admit that I don't always "get" British humor and, while I didn't find much very humorous in this book, I did enjoy it immensely. There was one conversation that I wish I could have "overheard" between Flora and Aunt Ada, but it was kept secret. I'm sure part of it was to keep the reader in wonder over how Flora accomplished what she did, but part of me wonders if the author wrote it that way because even she didn't know what Flora could say to Aunt Ada in order to make her do what she did.

I am curious about the subsequent books in this series and may be purchasing them to continue reading Flora's story. I think you should as well (or, at least, borrow them from your local library).