Mollie Panter-Downes

Mary Patricia "Mollie" Panter-Downes (25 August 1906 – 22 January 1997) was a British novelist and columnist for The New Yorker. Aged sixteen, she wrote The Shoreless Sea which became a bestseller and was serialised in The Daily Mirror. Her second novel The Chase was published in 1925.

Early life and education
Panter-Downes was born to Major Edward Martin Panter-Downes (died 1914 at Mons) and Marie Kathleen Cowley, who was of Irish origin.

Career
In 1922, aged sixteen, Panter-Downes wrote The Shoreless Sea which became a bestseller; eight editions were published in 1923 and 1924, and the book was serialised in The Daily Mirror. Her second novel The Chase was published in 1925.

In 1938, Panter-Downes began writing for The New Yorker, first a series of short stories, and from September 1939, a column entitled Letter from London, which she wrote until 1984. The collected columns were later published as Letters from England (1940) and London War Notes (1972).

Panter-Downes visited Ootacamund, in India, and wrote about the town, known to all as Ooty, in her New Yorker columns. This material was later published as Ooty Preserved.

Death
Panter-Downes married Clare Robinson in 1927 and the couple moved to Surrey.

She died in Compton, Surrey, aged 90.

Selected works

 * The Shoreless Sea (1923)
 * The Chase (1925)
 * Storm Bird (1929)
 * My Husband Simon (1931)
 * One Fine Day (1947)
 * Minnie's Room (short stories collected between 1947–1965)
 * Good Evening, Mrs Craven (short stories collected between 1938–1944)
 * Ooty Preserved: A Victorian Hill Station in India (1967)
 * At The Pines (later life of Swinburne) (1971)

Republished by Persephone Books
The last short story in Minnie's Room, called "The Empty Place" and written in 1965, has a character called Harry Potter.
 * London War Notes (wartime letters written for The New Yorker) Republished in 2014 by Persephone Books
 * Minnie's Room (Short stories collected between 1947–1965) Republished in 2002 by Persephone Books
 * Good Evening, Mrs Craven (short stories collected between 1938–1944) Republished in 1999 by Persephone Books