Downton Abbeyesque: Books
Annotation:Weldon's novel takes us inside an aristocratic household in the last months of the 19th century. It is a time of social upheaval and for the Earl and Countess of Dilberne – a shortage of money. Weldon wrote the pilot episode of Upstairs Downstairs, which Downton Abbey is modeled on.
Annotation:"Witty, beguiling and enthralling” writes Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes of this novel. When 18-year-old Grace Campbell arrives in London in 1914, she’s unable to find a position as an office secretary. She takes a job as a housemaid at Number 35, Park Lane, where she is quickly caught up in lives of its privileged inhabitants.
Annotation:One late spring evening in 1912, in the kitchens at Sterne, preparations begin for an elegant supper party in honor of Emerald Torrington's twentieth birthday. But only a few miles away, a dreadful accident propels a crowd of mysterious and not altogether savory survivors to seek shelter at the ramshackle manor-and the household is thrown into confusion and mischief.
Annotation:While on a visit to his lover’s home in 1913, a dashing young poet pens a poem to his lover’s sister. The poem elevates his reputation after his wartime death and myths evolve about his life until a modern day biographer threatens to reveal the truth.
Annotation:A battlefield nurse during World War I, Bess Crawford, returning to London for a well-earned Christmas leave, finds her holiday fraught with mystery and murder when she agrees to help a bruised and battered woman return to her small village in Sussex.
Annotation:Tells the story behind Highclere Castle, the setting for Downton Abbey, and the life of one of its most famous inhabitants, Lady Almina, the 5th Countess of Carnarvon.
Annotation:In his second novel, the Downton Abbey creator examines the lives of the debutantes and young aristocrats of 1960s England 40 years on.
Annotation:Set in England between the wars, this is the story of an aristocratic family, a house, a mysterious death and a way of life that vanished forever, told in flashback by a woman who witnessed it all and kept a secret for decades.
Annotation:2004. A high society comedy of manners from Downton Abbey writer/creator Julian Fellowes.
Annotation:1968.
Annotation:1953. "The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there" begins Hartley's classic novel recounting the memories of a man in his sixties, looking back on the summer of 1900, when he turned 13 at a grand country house in Norfolk.
Annotation:1949. Love in a Cold Climate is Mitford's classic novel about the English upper class.
Annotation:1945.
Annotation:1913. Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes cites this 1913 Wharton novel as an influence on “Downton”. It tells the story of Midwestern girl Undine Spragg, and her attempts to ascend in society.
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