Precious Bane

Mary Gladys Webb (1881-1927) was an English romance novelist and poet of the early 20th century, whose work is set chiefly in the Shropshire countryside and among Shropshire characters and people whom she knew. Her novels have been successfully dramatized, most notably the film Gone to Earth in 1950 by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger based on the novel of the same title. The novels are thought to have inspired the famous parody Cold Comfort Farm (1932) by Stella Gibbons.

"The book opens with one of those simple sentences which haunt the mind until the curiosity has been satisfied . . . It strikes a note which never fails throughout; it opens with a beauty which is justified to the last sentence." —Hilda Addison"On some bookshelves, we feel sure, Precious Bane will find almost a hallowed place." —The New York Times Book Review"Mary Webb need fear no comparison with any writer who has attempted to capture the soul of nature in words." —John Buchan"Webb was a great mystic and a master of both "inscape" and landscape. Any dull afternoon in London is lifted by being transported to the Mary Webb country of the Shropshire hills and the Welsh borderland." —Mail on Sunday