[1] After some attempts at writing plays, at the age of 29, Fane published his first novel, Morning (1956), a description of a small boy’s childhood prior to being sent to boarding school.
John Betjeman wrote in The Daily Telegraph that Morning "seems to me to deserve to last for generations" and he chose it as one of his Books of the Year.
In The Observer Harold Nicolson also described it as "the work of a literary artist, beautifully written".
They were mostly novels, though his non-fiction books include Best Friends — an entertaining account of his friendships with Rachel and Lord David Cecil, Lady Cynthia Asquith, L. P. Hartley and others, and Memories of My Mother, an evocation of the life of Diana, Countess of Westmorland.
[citation needed] He reviewed for The Times Literary Supplement and in 1969 set up St George's Press with two partners, publishing 45 titles before it was wound up in 1991.