Foreign lady not starting books in a blissful state? (8)
I believe the answer is:
ignorant
'in a blissful state?' is the definition.
('ignorance is a bliss')
'foreign lady not starting books' is the wordplay.
'foreign lady' becomes 'signora' (Italian equivalent to Mrs).
'not starting' means to remove the first letter.
'books' becomes 'NT' (New Testament).
'signora' with its first letter removed is 'ignora'.
'ignora'+'nt'='IGNORANT'
(Other definitions for ignorant that I've seen before include "Discourteous" , "without a clue" , "Ill-mannered" , "Illiterate - unaware" , "Unlearned, lacking knowledge" .)