Monica Le Doux Edwards (nee Newton) was born on 8 November 1912 in Belper, Derbyshire.  One of four children, her father, the Revd Harry Newton was a vicar.  In 1927 he accepted the living of Rye Harbour, in East Sussex.  Although her brothers and sister were educated (her brothers with a tutor and her sister at boarding school), Monica initially was not, and she took full advantage of her school-free state; roaming the marsh and befriending the fishermen and villagers, who later became part of her Romney Marsh series

In 1933, Monica married Bill Edwards, and in 1947 they and their two children, Shelley and Sean, moved to Pitlands Farm in Surrey, which Monica bought at an auction when her attention was perhaps more on the book she was reading at the time.  The house was neglected:  “There’s no water, no light, no drains, no bathroom, and the Other Place is at the bottom of the garden,” and the land was not a great deal better.   In The Unsought Farm Monica describes how they slowly reclaimed the land and made the house habitable.  The farm, re-named Punchbowl Farm, was to provide the inspiration for the Punchbowl Farm series.  Unlike a lot of Monica fans, I far prefer the Punchbowl Farm series, probably because they were closer to my own experience.  Like Lindsey, I wanted things to remain the same.  I was devastated when my grandparents sold off for housing the small field and stables where we had played for days on end as children; though I could see why they felt they had to.  

The books form two series:  the Punchbowl Farm series about the  Thornton family and Romney Marsh, featuring Tamzin and her friends Rissa, Roger and Meryon.  The books are not really pony books:  they don’t follow the usual pony book format focusing on looking after the pony, schooling it and going in for gymkhanas.  The ponies are often integral to the story:  Cascade, for example, performs an heroic role in Storm Ahead, and the ponies are used to help patrol the boundaries in No Entry, but the real interest of the stories is in how the characters react to the events going on around them.  Monica Edwards never patronised her characters or her readers; she understood the tensions that happen in a family, and between friends, and set them brilliantly in the settings she obviously loved.

The majority of Monica Edwards’ books were published by Collins.  Many of the Punchbowl Farm and Romney Marsh books were also published by Armada, who abridged some (but not all) of the stories.  Storm Ahead and The White Riders were published by Puffin.  There were also Children’s Book Club editions of some titles, and John Goodchild published (revised) editions.  On a more hopeful note for those of us who have yet to find all the books, Girls Gone By are planning to reprint all of Monica Edwards’ works.  I stock these, as well of course as the original books and paperbacks.

The series are: