Babbacombe's

Beth Carson has just left school and is starting her first position at Babbacombe's, a department store, where she is determined to remember her place. Her early days there go awkwardly. She trips over a young man's dog, and a few days later she finds herself stuck in a lift with the same man, whom she scolds before realising he is David Babbacombe, the idle son of the store's wealthy owner. Her careless words turn out to matter more than she could have guessed, since they set him on a different course.

Around this central pairing, the story fills out a lively cast of supporting characters and a believable family setting. It also offers a close look at how a department store runs behind the counters, including the presence of a store detective. The tone mixes humour with a slowly developing and unexpected romance.

This novel, first published in 1941, is the sixth of twelve romances that Noel Streatfeild wrote under the pseudonym Susan Scarlett. Streatfeild is better known as the author of children's books such as Ballet Shoes. The Susan Scarlett novels went out of print for decades before Greyladies Books rediscovered them in the early 2010s. Dean Street Press and Furrowed Middlebrow are now reissuing all twelve.