Bride of May by Janetta Walters

The Unequal Marriage by Vasili Pukirev: The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow 

Title: Bride of May

Author: Janetta Walters

Publisher: Abbott and Spicer 

Source book: The Two Mrs Abbotts by DE Stevenson (Miss Buncle #3)

The Two Mrs Abbotts is the third in the Miss Bunkle series but it isn’t Miss Buncle (now Mrs Arthur Abbott) who is writing books here. It’s Janetta Walters (nom de plume of Jane Watt), a romantic novelist. Quite a lot of DE Stevenson’s characters enjoy Janetta Walters’ books, but unfortunately Arthur Abbott, her publisher, is not so keen. However, he has to admit her books are very successful.

As well as Bride of May, Janetta Walters writes Her Loving Heart, Her Prince at Last, and Love Triumphant which is finished by her sister Helen Walters. Halfway through writing Love Triumphant, Janetta has an artistic crisis and stops writing altogether. Hence the book being finished by her sister. 

Oh dear what dreadful titles! Mind you, lots of people do read books with titles like this even now, and I’m sure they did in 1943 when The Two Mrs Abbotts was first published.

Anyway Janetta marries a gentleman farmer and is thinking of writing historical novels instead. She appears in four different novels by DE Stevenson.

The Wedding Party by Henri Rousseau: thanks to Musée de l’Orangerie, Paris