 The work was an immediate critical and popular success . The satire was heightened by Gibbons 's mockery of purple prose , whereby she marked the most florid and overwritten passages of the book with asterisks , " for the reader 's <unk> and mirth " . One critic found it hard to accept that so well @-@ developed a parody was the work of a scarcely known woman writer , and speculated that " Stella Gibbons " was a pen @-@ name for Evelyn Waugh . Gibbons suddenly found herself in demand in literary circles and from fellow writers , raised to a celebrity status that she found distasteful . She acquired an agent , who advised her that she could confidently expect a regular and comfortable income as a novelist . This assurance prompted her , at the end of 1932 , to resign her position with The Lady and to embark on a full @-@ time writing career . 
