Books: No Harm at All

COUNTY CHRONICLE (311 pp.)—Angela Thirkell—Knopf ($3.50).

"My most remarkable 'fan' letter," confesses British Novelist Angela Thirkell, "was from an old lady of 79 who said she was tired of reading my books, so would I stop writing them?" Deaf to this honest plea, Novelist Thirkell has gone forging on, hammering out (since 1933) at least one, sometimes two, novels a year. "And after all," as a lady-novelist character in Novelist Thirkell's latest one observes, "no one can say my books . . . do any harm and anyway they are all exactly alike."

As all Thirkell fans know, the main element of likeness...