author
Bessie Marchant
1862–1941
A prolific English writer of girls' adventure fiction, she filled her stories with brave young heroines, far-flung settings, and a strong sense of independence. Her books were hugely popular with young readers in the late Victorian and early 20th-century years.
6 Audiobooks
A Countess from Canada: A Story of Life in the Backwoods
by Bessie Marchant
The Youngest Sister: A Tale of Manitoba
by Bessie Marchant
A Canadian Farm Mystery; Or, Pam the Pioneer
by Bessie Marchant
Daughters of the Dominion: A Story of the Canadian Frontier
by Bessie Marchant
By Honour Bound: A School Story for Girls
by Bessie Marchant
The Adventurous Seven: Their Hazardous Undertaking
by Bessie Marchant
About the author
Born in Petham, Kent, in 1862, Bessie Marchant became one of the most popular British writers of adventure stories for girls. She wrote under the name Bessie Marchant, and sometimes as Bessie Marchant Comfort or Mrs. J. A. Comfort.
Her fiction stood out for giving girls the kinds of daring, globe-spanning adventures more often reserved for boys' books of the period. Although her stories traveled widely across Canada, the Americas, and other distant settings, reference sources note that she appears not to have traveled abroad herself.
Marchant published well over 100 books, with some sources putting the total above 150, and her work remained widely read for decades. She died in 1941, leaving behind a large body of energetic, imaginative children's fiction that helped open up the adventure genre to young female readers.