{"product_id":"9781912766185","title":"Business As Usual : 14","description":"\u003cp\u003eAuthor(s): Oliver, Jane, \u003cbr\u003e Binding: Paperback, \u003cbr\u003e Date of Publication: 23\/03\/2020,\u003cbr\u003e Pagination: 266 pages,\u003cbr\u003e Series: Handheld Classics, \u003cbr\u003eImprint: Handheld Press,\u003cbr\u003e Published By: Handheld Press,\u003cbr\u003e Book Classification: Classic fiction (pre c 1945), Romance\u003cbr\u003e ISBN13\\EAN\\SKU: 9781912766185\u003cbr\u003e Description: \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eBusiness As Usual by Jane Oliver and Ann Stafford was first published in 1933. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIt's a delightful illustrated novel in letters from Hilary Fane, an Edinburgh girl fresh out of university who is determined to support herself by her own earnings in London for a year, despite the mutterings of her surgeon fiancee. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eAfter a nervous beginning looking for a job while her savings rapidly diminish, she finds work as a typist in the London department store of Everyman's (a very thin disguise for Selfridges), and rises rapidly through the ranks to work in the library, where she has to enforce modernising systems on her entrenched and frosty colleagues.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eBusiness as Usual is charming: light, intelligent, heart-warming, funny, and entertaining. It's deeply interesting as a record of the history of shopping in the 1930s, and also fascinating for its unflinching descriptions of social conditions, poverty and illegitimacy. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e'Jane Oliver' was the pen-name of Helen Evans (1903-1970).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eFormerly Clemence Dane's secretary, she developed a writing career, and wrote many successful novels with Ann Stafford (the pen-name of Ann Pedlar, also known as Joan Blair). Business as Usual was their first joint novel. Jane became a pilot and married the author John Llewellyn Rhys, who was killed in the war.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eShe founded the Llewellyn Rhys Prize in his memory. She later lived in Hampshire near Ann Pedlar, and cared for her in illness until her death.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":37039027945625,"sku":"9781912766185","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0423\/0240\/6809\/products\/9781912766185.jpg?v=1604773723","url":"https:\/\/winstonebooks.pro\/products\/9781912766185","provider":"Winstone's Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}