It is no wonder that, when E.F. Benson decided to further the adventures of his divine Emmeline "Lucia" Lucas, he brought her to the town of Tilling. For here, in the first (pre-Lucia) Tilling novel, everything is absurd and hilarious in equal measure. Indeed, Lucia so o'erwhelms the measure in the later books that it is worth settling in to Miss Mapp to recall how perfect Benson's comic creations are, from the doughty title character to "quaint" (read: queer) Irene, the entire town ready to burst into a frenzy over the hoarding of corned beef or the origin of a recipe for "red currant fool".

My comic ideal. ( )

3.5* rounded up for this audiobook edition.

It has been decades since I read the Mapp & Lucia series and I had forgotten much this entry (2nd in publication order but 3rd in the omnibus). I found Miss Mapp meaner than I remembered but the book funnier (so often the way in satires that the nastier characters are the source of most of the humor).

Nadia May does a marvellous narration so I am glad to have listened to this rather than read my Kindle edition. ( )

Miss Mapp takes advantage of the fortuitous placement of her house to keep an eye on the comings and goings of Tilling. She has a couple of rivals for pacesetter, and she takes advantage of every opportunity to one-up her rivals. She is a proud woman, and will manipulate the truth without a twinge of conscience in order to save face. Occasionally she suspects that her neighbors see through her ruses, but her suspicions are fleeting.

I alternated between the Project Gutenberg ebook and the Librivox recording so that I could listen while I finished a knitting project. I don’t often do that, but it worked OK with this book. I didn’t find any of the characters sympathetic, but I enjoyed the book anyway. It’s really well done. The chapters are episodic, yet they serve a larger story arc. ( )

Reason read: British Author, June
A fun read about a group of people from a small town who life a social life playing bridge, golf, and gossiping and trying to one up each other. ( )

Very well written, quite hilarious tale of a small town (based on Rye), the gossip, feuds, put-downs and efforts at one-upmanship by its residents.
Queen of them is Miss Mapp, who spends her time spying on the neighbours and finding out their every doing- sometimes quite incorrectly.
Benson's turns of phrase are just superb: as the servants hasten to discuss their betters' antics : "She gleaned the information that Mrs Dominic's employer (for master he could not be called) had gone off in a great hurry to the station.."
Superb. ( )