Reading Madeleine: Mrs Robert Henrey, authoress

The foundation of her success was the homely relationship she had with her readers. Women and men bought or borrowed her books for 40+ years, participating vicariously in her life story like today's followers of social media channels, envying her, copying her, admiring her. Yet few  of her fans knew that her stories were written with her husband, a Fleet Street columnist with a fondness for Marcel Proust. Together they created their alter ego 'Madeleine', a figurehead of femininity whose encounters with people and places wove a social tapestry depicting aspects of London and Europe in the mid 20th century. Poverty in Clichy and Soho, the strange interwar years, the Blitz in a tiny Mayfair flat, the making of a famous movie, life on a small Normandy farm, high society, humble folk, trips and cruises, fashion, women's journalism... All is grist to Madeleine's mill and all is truth thanks to the telling, even when it is partly made up.