The Motor Car Dumpy Book

“These are the kind of clothes you wear when you go moting if you are a man.”

“These are the kind of clothes you wear when you go moting if you are a woman. ”

“This is the magistrate who fines you £20 if you have been driving too fast. It is best not to drive too fast.”

The Motor Car Dumpy Book, by T.W.H. Crosland

Betty Wales

I’ve spent the past week writing the first draft of my thesis, which is why I haven’t updated. But although I may stop writing here, I never stop reading, and one of the things that made working on my thesis the most difficult was that I became completely absorbed in reading the first few Betty Wales books.

I had a very strong sense of déjà vu all the way through the first half of Betty Wales, Freshman and then again through the second half of Betty Wales, Sophomore, and I’m still not sure whether I’ve read them before or whether it’s just because these college girl books are all so much alike. My best guess so far is that the beginning of Freshman uses a number of incidents that appear in lots of similar books, and that I did at some point — probably about six years ago — read Sophomore.