H.E. Bates

Author Information
H.E. Bates's Latest Book

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  • Bibliography:
    40 Books (1 Series)
  • First Book:
    June 1972
  • Latest Book:
    January 2022
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Full Series List in Order

The Larkins

A Breath of French Air (Dec-2006)
When the Green Woods Laugh (Dec-2006)

Book List in Order: 40 titles

  • Seven by Five

  • A Little of What You Fancy

    The Larkin family’s rich spirit is tested when Pop has a heart attack in this series finale by the author of The Darling Buds of May. Pop Larkin enjoys the finer things in life, like good food and drink, but too much of it leads him to a mild heart...

  • Love for Lydia

    'An honest and skillfully told love story' - New York Times

    Lydia - shy, sheltered, beautiful and just nineteen - glides into Evensford one wintry day, stirring up feeling amongst the town's young men. But it is the young Mr Ri...

  • The Grapes of Paradise

  • Fair Stood the Wind for France

    When John Franklin brings his plane down into Occupied France at the height of the Second World War, there are two things in his mind: the safety of his crew, and his own badly injured arm. It is a stroke of unbelievable luck when the family of a Fre...

  • The Jacaranda Tree

    This is H. E. Bates’s acclaimed novel about Burma. During World War II, a small English community are forced to flee when Japanese forces invade Burma. Paterson, the manager of a rice mill, organizes the evacuation and takes with him his Burmese mi...

  • The Purple Plain

  • Country Tales

  • The Happy Countryman



  • A Month by the Lake and Other Stories

  • A Party for the Girls: Six Stories

    The six long stories of A Party for the Girls present H.E. Bates at his finest. A crack shot at understated tragedy, Bates is perhaps at his best with comedy and character––consider the opening line of the title story: ̶...

  • Elephant's Nest in a Rhubarb Tree and Other Stories

    "Readers who have discovered the delights of the British master storyteller H.E. Bates in A Month by the Lake and A Party for the Girls (published by New Directions in 1987 and 1988) will welcome this third collection, Elephant''s Nest in a Rhubarb...

  • The Darling Buds of May

    The rich spirit of an English junk dealer and his family is challenged by the arrival of the tax collector in this humorous and heartwarming classic. Beneath the sunny, cloudless skies of Kent, the Larkin household -- Pop, Ma, and their six children ...

  • Feast of July

    Now the basis for a major motion picture from the producers of Howard's End and The Remains of the Day--a brooding, suspenseful novel of sensuality and vengenance, set amid the fields and villages of 19th century England. Bella Ford, jilted by her un...

  • The Fallow Land

  • My Uncle Silas

    The deeds and misdeeds of Uncle Silas, the rural reprobate, were renowned in the short stories H E Bates published in the 1930s.In this collection the stories are presented in full, accompanied by the original drawings by Edward Ardizzone that perfec...

  • A Moment In Time

  • A Breath of French Air

    The Larkins

    The Larkins travel to France for some sun and relaxation -- only to be met with disaster -- in this comic classic by the author of The Darling Buds of May. At summer’s end, rain clouds hovering over Kent have some in the Larkin household feeling un...

  • When the Green Woods Laugh

    The Larkins

    A rural British family gets new neighbors -- and new troubles -- in this comic classic by the author of The Darling Buds of May. Gore Court is a run-down country house that junk dealer Pop Larkin intends to convert into a bungalow for his daughter an...



  • Love in a Wych Elm and Other Stories

    Kent, the "Garden of England,"provides the rustic setting for these poignant stories from the creator of The Darling Buds of May. Graham Greene liked to compare H. E. Bates with Chekhov, greatest of short story writers, thinking Bates the best writ...

  • Best of H.E. Bates

  • Castle in the Air

    Visiting his aunt's pub is normally a waiting game, sitting outside to avoid the musty smell of beer and bacca. But when old Smiler takes a seat beside him, sucking in pint after pint through his gingery whiskers, a whole new world of battles and bon...

  • Day's End and Other Stories

    Day's End and Other Stories, H. E. Bates's first short story collection published in 1928 when he was just 23, depicts the rural lives of quirky characters cast in his distinctive, beautifully drawn style.

    Each story has a youthful...

  • The Watercress Girl

    Stories about children are not always for children. In "The Watercress Girl," H. E. Bates masterfully depicts a childhood which, by proxy, reveals the mystifying world of the adult. Through a series of short, lyrical stories, the complexities of the ...

  • The Woman Who Had Imagination

    The Woman Who Had Imagination, H.E. Bates's fourth volume of stories, first published in 1934 (Jonathan Cape), is a fascinating collection of contrasts. The stories combine elements of realism and poetry, beauty and ugliness, tenderness and irony...

  • Seven Tales and Alexander

    Seven Tales and Alexander beautifully captures a spectrum of emotions from innocent childhood and early adolescence, to those of simple-hearted and uninquiring old age. On its original release in 1929 (The Scholartis Press), The New Statesman observe...

  • The Wedding Party

    The Wedding Party, first published in 1965 (Michael Joseph), is a collection of short stories evoking both the dark and light, and the comedy and tragedy in human nature. Bates employs a deceptive delicateness of touch in his descriptions and charact...

  • The Daffodil Sky

    The Daffodil Sky, first published in 1955 (Michael Joseph), mixes eclectic characters travelling to foreign lands with poetic treatments of rural life in Bates's Northamptonshire.

    'A Place in the Heart' is set in Asia against a...

  • Oh! To Be in England

    The arrival of a French guest heralds christenings and chaos for the Larkin clan in this comic classic by the author of The Darling Buds of May. When Mademoiselle Dupont, the hotel manager from the Larkins’ frightful French holiday, announces she i...



  • The Country of White Clover

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  • A Crown of Wild Myrtle

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  • Cruise of the Breadwinner

    • / General Fiction
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    The Cruise of the Breadwinner is an adventure at sea, following Snowy as he comes of age through a shower of sea-spray and bullets. The youngest crew member on a coastal patrol boat, he longs for action as his sharp eyes pick out distant plane battl...

  • The Flying Goat

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    The Flying Goat (Jonathan Cape, 1939) features sixteen diverse stories from slapstick sketches to portraits of marital tension; one Uncle Silas tale; and three that hark back to Bates's boyhood roots.

    'A Funny Thing' is an esca...

  • Four Beauties

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  • A House of Women

    • / General Fiction
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    While the late author did not have the evocative imagery of Mary Webbhis British contemporary in the earlier part of this centurythere is a haunting moodiness to this novel set in rural England. Tom Jeffery, the scion of a wealthy farm family, falls ...

  • Nature of Love

    • / General Fiction
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    The Nature of Love (Michael Joseph, 1953) was Bates's first published collection of novellas.

    It contains three stories, different in weight but similar in texture, drawing from rural landscapes and the sensitive, poignant studies of t...

  • The Scarlet Sword

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  • Spella-Ho

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  • The Stories of Flying Officer 'X'

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  • The Two Sisters

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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

H.E. Bates has published 40 books.

H.E. Bates does not have a new book coming out soon. The latest book, Oh! To Be in England, was published in January 2022.

The first book by H.E. Bates, Seven by Five, was published in June 1972.

Yes. H.E. Bates has 1 series.
Author Series
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