Open Heart

Catherine Wells (1872–1927), born Amy Catherine Robbins, worked as a teacher and studied at Tutorial College, Holborn where she met and later married H.G. Wells. She is regarded as a great supporter of her husband's literary outpourings, while quietly creating her own stories, long-neglected until now.Emelyne Godfrey, PhD, is Chairperson of the H.G. Wells Society. She is author of Femininity, Crime and Self-Defence in Victorian Literature and Society (2012). In 2014 she edited The Convert, the first suffragette novel, originally published in 1907. Most recently, she was editor of Utopias and Dystopias in the Fiction of H.G. Wells and William Morris (2016).Patrick Parrinder is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Reading and President of the H.G. Wells Society. He is the author of many books on H.G. Wells, science fiction and modern literature and is General Editor of the 12-volume Oxford History of the Novel in English (2011–24).

'Her fiction and poems are fascinating, and nearly all contain an element of fantasy or otherworldliness that would have set them apart from most other stories written at the time. In 'The Last Fairy', Catherine reveals her humour, often present, as an ancient fairy wreaks havoc in a town due to her inability to remember the spells she once knew. [...] Beautiful descriptions of nature suffuse the stories, reflecting Catherine's passion for flowers and gardening. [...] The unfinished novella, The Open Heart, is in fact a philosophical discourse on fidelity in love and marriage, the limitations of organised religion, the rights of women and societal constrains in general, all topics also close to the heart of Catherine's husband. The fantastical setting - a huge and beautiful uninhabited palace where the ship-wrecked female narrator is the only human - brings to mind the hauntingly beautiful setting of Susannah Clarke's novel Piranesi (2020). Overall, this volume reveals Catherine Wells to have been a modern, forgiving, capable woman, very much in control of a life that she made work for her. She was also, clearly, a talented writer who deserves her moment in the spotlight.