Rumer Godden Books in Order

A small group of sisters open a school and dispensary in a former palace high in the Himalayas. Isolation, beauty, and buried desire slowly turn their mission into a tense psychological drama.

On the banks of a river in Bengal, Harriet feels childhood slipping away as family life, death, and first love change the world around her. It is tender, atmospheric, and quietly shattering.

At a London ballet school, the formidable Madame Holbein prepares a major recital. Young dancers, backstage strain, and Ilse's steady faith reveal the discipline and emotional cost behind beauty.

On a remote tropical island ruled by Mr. van Loomis, his daughter Charis begins to question the closed world around her when outsiders arrive. It is a tense story of power, desire, and freedom.

A brave little mouse wants more than crumbs and corners for her family. Her search for a better life becomes a small but adventurous tale about risk, change, and unexpected happiness.

Emily feels free in India despite her mother's suffocating control. When the death of her beloved dog cracks the family's brittle respectability, private grievances erupt into open conflict.

A bold little mouse tries to improve life for her family by finding a better place to live. Godden turns ordinary domestic dangers into a lively miniature adventure.

Pocket doll Impunity Jane loves adventure with Gideon and his gang far more than quiet life in a dolls' house. But because she belongs to someone else, every escapade risks losing the life she wants.

In bomb-scarred South London, Lovejoy Mason plants cornflowers in a ruined churchyard and draws other children, and wary adults, into her dream. It is a tender story about beauty and belonging.

Godden's brief life of Andersen follows the poor Danish boy who became one of the world's great storytellers. It is an accessible portrait of ambition, loneliness, and imagination.

Young Elizabeth is always in trouble and never measures up beside the other children. Then an old family doll seems to lend her courage, and everyday failures start to feel a little less final.

This collection brings together stories and poems shaped by India, its places, rhythms, and creatures. It is varied in form, but the atmosphere is unmistakably Godden's.

When their mother falls ill on holiday in France, a group of siblings are left in a faded hotel with too much freedom. One hot summer brings desire, deceit, and a sharp end to innocence.

A doll named Holly longs to be chosen for Christmas, while orphaned Ivy longs for a real home. Their wishes move toward each other in a warm, quietly magical holiday story.

Sophie settles in a flower-filled Kashmir valley with her two children, hoping for a quiet life. Instead, village rivalries and one servant's desperate plotting build toward disaster.

Candy Floss belongs at a fairground coconut shy with Jack, Nuts the dog, and Cocoa the horse. When a spoiled girl steals her, the little doll must face a new life far from the people who love her.

Centered on a country house and the Quin family who own it, this novel moves across generations of memory, love, and disappointment. The house itself feels like the keeper of everything they cannot forget.

Godden retells the old story of Saint Jerome and the wounded lion that becomes his companion. It is a gentle tale about kindness, trust, and the bond between a saint and a wild creature.

Drawing on her years in Kashmir, Godden writes a memoir-like account of mountain life, hardship, and inner resolve. It captures a difficult, beautiful period when she was remaking her life with her daughters.

The Plantagenet doll family finally gets the home they long for, but the arrival of proud Marchpane unsettles everything. A classic doll story about belonging, jealousy, and the secret dramas of playrooms.

Nona and Belinda are wary of the new girl next door, but the lonely Japanese doll in her window pulls them closer. A story of friendship, jealousy, and the homes children build for one another.

Abandoned by their mother, siblings Michael and Debbie flee to Italy to bring her back from her lover's villa. Their campaign becomes a fierce struggle over love, loyalty, and growing up.

In a Welsh seaside town, a doll who longs for adventure crosses paths with Bertrand, an unhappy French boy sent away from home. Their meeting gives this doll story a wistful pull between freedom and belonging.

An unhappy woman reaches toward the freedom she imagines in a nearby gypsy camp, only to bring trouble with her. This early novel is sharp about desire, class, and the damage hidden inside romantic fantasy.

Written with her sister Jon, this memoir recreates their childhood in colonial India with sharp, affectionate detail. It is less a straight autobiography than a vivid return to place, family, and memory.

Gregory and Janet love their Ukrainian housekeeper, Marta, and worry when they sense how unhappy she is. Their search for a kitchen icon becomes a child-sized mission of loyalty, art, and compassion.

Published in Britain as Swans and Turtles, this is a collection of stories threaded by loss, memory, and sudden turns of feeling. Godden moves easily between sharp observation and quiet melancholy.

Written with Olga Manders, this cookbook mixes practical recipes with the personality of an experienced household cook. Its appeal lies as much in kitchen know-how as in the dishes themselves.

A London house holds several generations of one family, with past, present, and future folding into one another. Godden turns memory and time into an intimate family drama.

Successful Philippa Talbot leaves secular London life for a Benedictine abbey, where the hidden richness and strain of enclosed religious life slowly come into view. It is a humane, absorbing novel about vocation and community.

In Cyprus, a village boy and his little donkey are caught up in the tensions of a divided island and the presence of UN troops. Godden keeps the focus close, mixing danger with warmth and humor.

In old Calcutta, the Lemarchant sisters grow up in poverty inside a decaying mansion full of memory and unease. Romance, prejudice, and ghostly atmosphere shape this early novel of Anglo-Indian life.

Godden's book presents Bible stories through the visual tradition of Raphael's sacred art. It offers a compact introduction to major scriptural scenes, with image and story closely linked.

Homesick Nona is sent from India to England and feels out of place in her relatives' house. Two Japanese dolls help her build a home, and slowly find one for herself too.

Kizzy Lovell has only her gran and horse until loss leaves her alone in a hostile English village. Godden turns her fight for dignity and belonging into a moving story about grief and prejudice.

In this retelling of a traditional tale, a poor old woman is rewarded for an act of kindness, then tested by the wishes that follow. It is funny, brisk, and sly about greed.

A young girl and her pony gradually befriend the grim Mr. McFadden on the Scottish border. What begins as a moody Halloween story becomes a warm tale about loneliness, fear, and unexpected kindness.

Summoned from school in England to their father's house in Delhi, Una and her sister enter a world of class rules, family strain, and dangerous feeling. Una's awakening is bound up with India itself.

Tibby knows a secret hidden in the grand house where her mother works, but saying it aloud could change everything. With Noble the rocking horse waiting upstairs, this is a suspenseful story about silence and courage.

When Cat has four kittens, the problem is not love but where each one will belong. A simple, tender animal story about finding the right homes.

This non-fiction picture book traces the Pekingese through history, legend, and art. Godden turns the breed's long story into something lively, affectionate, and easy to follow.

In Paris, a convent reaches out to women from a nearby prison and the city's sex trade. Godden writes about repentance and mercy without losing sight of fear, shame, and ordinary human need.

Godden brings the Mughal princess Gulbadan Begum to life in a short historical portrait. It is a graceful introduction to court life, family power, and one woman's place inside imperial history.

This is the US title of A Fugue in Time, Godden's layered novel about a London house and the family lives gathered inside it. Past, present, and future flow together in one intimate story.

Set in India in the last days of the Raj, this short novel tells the true-based story of a neglected racehorse and the people around him. It is part animal story, part portrait of a changing world.

A peaceful, luck-bringing dragon faces trouble when a new lord decides old arrangements must end. This witty fairy-tale quarrel becomes a battle of stubbornness and common sense.

This collection gathers four doll stories, Impunity Jane, The Fairy Doll, The Story of Holly and Ivy, and Candy Floss. It is a good way into Godden's miniature world of wishes, mishaps, and loyalty.

A humble potter stumbles into fame when he accidentally captures the tiger terrorizing his village. Godden retells the Indian folktale with humor and a sharp eye for luck, fear, and bragging.

This is another title for The Dolls' House, the story of the Plantagenet dolls, sensible Tottie, and proud Marchpane. Behind the playroom setting lies a sharp, memorable tale about love, status, and home.

This volume pairs Mouse House and The Mousewife, two mouse adventures about bold small creatures trying to change their fortunes. It is a neat entry point into Godden's gentler animal stories.

Doone Penny, the youngest child in a crowded London family, discovers he was born to dance. His fight to follow ballet, despite family doubts and class limits, makes for a moving coming-of-age story.

Godden tells the story behind the Beatrix Potter Ballet and the world of Potter's characters on stage. It works as a small backstage history as well as a tribute to the original tales.

In the first volume of her memoirs, Godden writes about childhood, India, her dance school, marriage, and the years up to the mid-1940s. The tone is vivid, candid, and full of place.

This second memoir follows Godden through later adulthood, writing life, belief, and the homes that shaped her. It reads like a continuation of her life story told through places as much as events.

A child and a carved Chinese guardian lion become the center of a quietly magical story about fear, comfort, and imagination. Godden keeps it small in scale, but full of feeling.

Written with Jon Godden, this collection returns to India in stories marked by memory, atmosphere, and human oddity. The sisters' shared material gives the book a strong sense of place.

Co-written with Jon Godden, this collection brings together stories about family strain, moral choice, and the fragile ways people care for one another. The title hints at the book's emotional range.

At Patna Hall on India's Coromandel coast, honeymooners, political operatives, tourists, servants, and locals collide over the course of one charged week. The hotel setting lets Godden mix comedy, atmosphere, and sudden danger.

Spoiled Keiko is sent to the country to stay with her great-grandparents and cousin, where slower rhythms begin to work on her. It is a gentle story about family, beauty, and growing into better habits.

Orphaned Lottie wins a place at a top ballet school just as her love for a puppy makes leaving home almost unbearable. Godden balances ambition, friendship, and homesickness with real tenderness.

Pippa joins a British ballet company visiting Venice and is swept into art, music, admiration, and romantic confusion. The city glows, but the book stays alert to how quickly innocence can be tested.

This anthology gathers short religious and devotional poems chosen for reflection and rereading. It is a compact, meditative selection rather than a single-author work.

A little chair passes through five generations of children, holding their bodies and their stories. It is a quiet book about family continuity, memory, and the objects that outlast us.

This anthology gathers poems for schools and young readers across the span of a day. Godden's selection is broad, musical, and meant to be read aloud.

In her last novel, Godden returns to India with a story that sets practical British habits against local belief and mystery. The result is a sly, late-career book about culture, ego, and the limits of control.

Premlata's family is too poor to celebrate Diwali after selling their lamps for food. Her effort to bring light back into the house turns this into a hopeful story about ingenuity, love, and festival joy.

This is the later title of The Diddakoi. Kizzy, orphaned and mistrusted, must survive grief and prejudice in an English village while holding on to her own sense of self.

This omnibus collects seven of Godden's best-loved doll stories, including The Fairy Doll, The Story of Holly and Ivy, Doll's House, Miss Happiness and Miss Flower, Little Plum, Impunity Jane, and Candy Floss.