Catherine Cookson in general

A review on the life and works Dame Catherine Cookson 1906-1998 **The Author** Catherine Cookson is without doubt one of the best known names in modern English fiction. She wrote over 90 books for both adults and children. Whether you love or hate her writing style, it is a testament to her powers as a story teller that many of her books have been nominated for awards over the years and turned into television drama series and DVD's. The author was born Catherine Ann McMullen. She was born on June 20th 1906 at 5 Leam Lane, Tyne Dock, South Shields. When Catherine was born her unmarried mother, Kate Fawcett, returned to service. Catherine was ...  Read the complete review

I have to confess to not being one of the most avid readers of Dame Catherine Cookson’s books but I do appreciate her work and I believe her to be one of the twentieth centuries great ladies of literature. The young Katie McMullen was born illegitimate and into poverty in 1906, she was brought up by her grandmother Rose and step-grandfather John McMullen at 10, William Black Street, Jarrow, County Durham (now Tyne and Wear) and Kate Fawcett, who Catherine believed to be her sister was in fact her mother. Unlike many of our leading writers, Catherine started life with many disadvantages, she had only the minimum of education and from the age of ...  Read the complete review

I am studying for my GCSE’s and I absolutely adore English, especially creative and descriptive writing. I think that Catherine Cookson is an inspirational writer. So far I have only read ‘A Dinner of Herbs’ but I already want to read more. I find her writing style very enchanting and interesting. I understand that Cookson writes mainly about 19th Century England. This, in conjunction with the great way she writes about the lower and middle classes, makes a unique reading experience. She is one of my favourite writers as she tells the story of various women from their point of view. I find it most interesting how different life was for a woman ...  Read the complete review

I had always been proud of NOT reading a Catherine Cookson novel, putting them in the "trash novels" section along with Jackie Collins and Jilly Cooper. I expected her books to be sleazy, sexy, slushy and instantly forgettable, especially as she wrote so many - it seemed to me to be a case of quantity over quality. But then one day, I was browsing in the local library and read the blurb on the back of a novel called The Thursday Friend. It sounded interesting and turning it over, I was suprised to find it was written by Catherine Cookson ! I thought I would give it a try and began reading. I was pleasantly surprised ! It was not ...  Read the complete review

Catherine Cookson was a fabulous author, mainly of fiction, set in Newcastle. In the main the books are set in the 1900's and are about working class people. Most of the books center around the women of these times and the hardships they have to go through in their lives. Usually they are centered around a small community of people where the husbands have to go to work down the pits, the children die through poverty and the women are raped by the lord of the manor, and left with the results of that rape to bring up. These books are very emotionally charged and give an insight of what times were like in those days and as Catherine herself was brought up in Newcastle ...  Read the complete review