Thea

Margaret Kathleen Avern was born on 10 August 1906 in Caversham, Berkshire, England, UK. She was educated at St. Helen's School, Northwood, Middlesex, and in Dresden. On 1937, she married Richard Maddocks, who died on 1970. Published since 1947, she is the only novelist to win four Romantic Novel of the Year Award by the Romantic Novelists' Association for her novels Larksbrook (1962), The Silver Answer (1965), Thea (1970), and The Moon is Square (1976). In 1977, she wrote her autobiography: An Unlessoned Girl. Margaret Maddocks comments: "Any writer must find it difficult to assess her own work honestly and objectively, so I can only say that I hope my books may be considered as well-written. They appear to be popular among all age groups in the nine countries where they have been published. This is probably because the reader can believe in the characters and the plot holds the interest to the end. They tend to cheer rather than depress."