Gibbons, Stella (Dorothea) (1902–1989)

English journalist and novelist. Her Cold Comfort Farm (1932) is a classic parody of the regional novel, in particular the works of Mary Webb. She followed this with a series of other successful novels.

She was born in London, studied journalism at University College there, and worked for ten years in Fleet Street. Cold Comfort Farm, her first novel, won the Femina Vie Heureuse prize. Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm appeared in 1940, and Conferences at Cold Comfort Farm in 1949. Many of her later novels are set in London. They include Bassett (1934), Miss Linsey and Pa (1936), The Matchmaker (1949), The Wolves Were in the Sledge (1964), and The Snow Woman (1969). Beside the Pearly Water (1954) is a collection of short stories and her Collected Poems appeared in 1950.