Tag Archives: NYRB Classics

The Levant Trilogy (Books Two and Three) by Olivia Manning

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One of my informal reading aims for 2026 is to read Olivia Manning’s Levant Trilogy, which, together with her earlier Balkan Trilogy, forms The Fortunes of War, a superb, largely autobiographical series of novels based on the author’s experiences during the Second World War. Viewed as a whole, the series offers a unique insight into lives lived on the advancing edges of war as the Germans closed in on Eastern Europe and North Africa. Moreover, it also provides an acutely perceptive portrait of the early years of a fraught marriage unfolding against the backdrop of displacement and uncertainty. In these books, we meet Guy and Harriet Pringle as they embark on married life, firstly in Bucharest, where Guy is employed by the British Council as a University lecturer, then in Athens, and finally in Cairo, where he initially finds himself sidelined with fewer opportunities to put his teaching skills to good use. The Pringles are, of course, based on Manning and her husband, Reggie Smith, and the fictional couple’s movements across the Balkans and the Levant mirror those of the author and Smith.

While this post covers books two (The Battle Lost and Won) and three (The Sum of Things) in The Levant Trilogy, I’m going to keep major plot developments to a minimum to avoid spoilers. Instead, this piece is more about the characters, along with some thoughts on Manning’s themes. (I wrote about the first Levant book, The Danger Tree, back in January; so, if you need a refresher, just click on the link.)

As The Danger Tree ends, the Pringles are still in Cairo, but their marriage appears to be in more trouble than ever, with Guy continuing to put the emotional needs of his friends, acquaintances and students ahead of Harriet’s. Meanwhile, Guy wonders if Harriet would be better off in England, particularly as her physical health seems to be suffering in Egypt.

Developments come thick and fast in these novels, taking in adulterous affairs, chance encounters, dramatic separations, numerous close shaves, a murder in the ex-pat community, severe fevers that sometimes end in tragedy, and death in the desert conflict. At one point, a character is declared missing (presumed drowned) following a tragedy at sea, but to say any more would be a spoiler, I think.

While the Pringles remain the beating heart of Manning’s trilogies, we see less of Guy in books two and three of the Levant than in earlier instalments of the series, partly because Guy’s insensitivity over a personal matter prompts Harriet to strike out on her own. 

Dissatisfaction – chiefly Harriet’s – was eroding the Pringles’ marriage. Harriet had not enough to do, Guy too much. Feeling a need to justify his civilian status, he worked outside of normal hours at the Institute, organizing lectures, entertainments for troops and any other activity that could give him a sense of purpose. Harriet saw in his tireless bustle an attempt to escape a situation that did not exist. Even had he been free to join the army, his short sight would have failed him. He thought himself into guilt in order to justify his exertions, and his exertions saved him from facing obnoxious realities. (p. 241)

Harriet’s spur-of-the-moment travels take her to Syria and Palestine, where she demonstrates impressive levels of independence on limited resources while also seeing more of the Levant. Meanwhile, Guy continues to be Guy, throwing himself into his work, partly as a means of justifying his existence. (Again, it’s tempting to say more about the Pringles, but I’ll leave it there to avoid spoilers.)

Manning is especially adept at capturing the social circles in which Harriet and Guy move, including Dobson, the British Embassy official with a comfortable Garden City flat which becomes home to the Pringles, and Edwina Little, a bright young thing with a string of eligible suitors at her fingertips. In truth, Edwina is something of a gold-digger, setting her cap at Peter, an Irish peer stationed in Egypt with the army.

Perhaps sharpest of all is Manning’s portrayal of the wealthy and rather louche British ex-pats determined to carry on dining and drinking in the best restaurants in Cairo, irrespective of the war. Lady Angela Hooper, a good friend of Harriet’s, is a case in point. To the Pringles’ initial surprise. Angela begins a passionate affair with Bill Castlebar, a married poet and lecturer colleague of Guy’s. However, with his possessive wife, Mona, stranded in England, Castlebar is uninhibited by his married status and spends most afternoons closeted together with Angela in her room at Dobson’s Embassy flat. As Harriet reflects at one point:

She had seen common-place English couples who, at home, would have tolerated each other for a lifetime, here turning into self-dramatizing figures of tragedy, bored, lax, unmoral, complaining and, in the end, abandoning the partner in hand for another who was neither better nor worse than the first. Inconstancy was so much the rule among the British residents in Cairo, the place, she thought, was like a bureau of sexual exchange. (pp. 336–337)

As ever, the sense of place here is superb. Manning excels at portraying the cultural feel of her settings, and her depictions of the different pockets of Cairo are especially vivid.

The taxis had taken them past the Esbekiyah into Clot Bey where women stood in the shadows beneath the Italianate archers. From there they passed into streets so narrow that the pedestrians moved to the walls to enable the taxis to pass. No one, it seemed, needed sleep in this part of the city. Women looked out from every doorway. It was here that the squaddies came in search of entertainment and every café was alight to entice them in. Loudspeakers, hung over entrances, gave out the endless sagas relayed by Egyptian radio, while from indoors came the blare of nickelodeons or player pianos thumping out popular songs. (p. 230)

Of all the characters in this trilogy, Simon Boulderstone is the one who grows and develops the most over the course of the story. After arriving in Egypt as a new junior officer barely out of his teens, Simon must cope with the senseless loss of his brother, Hugo, who bled to death in the desert. Despite his recent marriage, Simon gives little thought to his new wife while in Egypt. (In truth, they only had days together before he had to leave for the war.) Instead, his mind turns to the attractive young socialite, Edwina Little, whom he still thinks of as Hugo’s girl. Now that Hugo has been killed in action, Simon wonders if he might stand a chance with Edwina himself, especially given the family resemblance…

As Simon drove back, Edwina was still on his mind. He tried to order her away but she stayed where she was, smiling down on him from the balcony. The desert to air was a sort of anaphrodisiac and he and the other men were detached from sex, yet he could not reject the romantic enchantment of love. (p. 262)

Simon’s story is a coming-of-age of sorts, one that requires him to face emotional and physical challenges in the most trying of circumstances. However, by the end of The Levant Trilogy, he is a new man, free of the burdens that have been holding him back for months.

She [Edwina] had been a fantasy of his adolescence but now he had not only reached his majority, he was verging on maturity. He had been the younger son, Hugo’s admirer and imitator, and Edwina’s attraction had lain not only in her beauty but the fact he had believed her to be Hugo’s girl. He had wanted to be Hugo and he had wanted Hugo’s girl, but now he was on his own. And Edwina had been no more Hugo’s girl then she could be his. (p. 538)

War has changed Simon beyond his wildest expectations. Now he wishes to stay in the army, preferably in the thick of the action. After all, what else can he do? The thought of home doesn’t appeal to him anymore. He knows he would feel out of place there because too much has happened for him to go back.

Thinking of his return to a wife he had almost forgotten, Simon wondered how he would fit into a world without war. He would have to begin again, decide on an occupation, accept responsibility for his own actions. What on earth would he do for a living? He had been trained for nothing but war. (p. 357)

As this wonderfully immersive series draws to a close, there are hints that Guy might be more conscious of Harriet’s emotional needs than he was before, but in practice, one wonders if his day-to-day behaviour will ever change. (Probably not!) Nevertheless, Manning absolutely succeeds in portraying both Pringles as complex, authentic and flawed individuals – just as we all are in life. I’ve loved spending time with these characters and will miss them greatly. Both trilogies are very highly recommended, especially for readers interested in this period.

The Levant Trilogy is published by NYRB Classics in the US and by W&N in the UK; personal copy.

Some of My Favourite Books from NYRB Classics

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One of the most interesting literary trends in recent years has been the success of various imprints specialising in reissues – lesser-known or neglected books given a new lease of life by publishers with a flair for curation. Virago Press and Persephone Books have been doing sterling work in this area for many years by focusing almost exclusively on female writers; but with Karen’s Read Indies event currently in full swing, I’d like to highlight another leading indie publisher in this sphere, NYRB Classics.

The NYRB Classics series, which began in 1999 with the publication of Richard Hughes’ A High Wind in Jamaica, now comprises over 500 titles from novels and short stories to memoirs, travel writing, literary criticism and poetry. Each title comes with an introduction or afterword from a leading writer to set the book in context. Clearly, a lot of work has gone into curating this list, which is still directed by the imprint’s founder, Edwin Frank. There are so many gems in this series that it would be impossible to mention them all, but here are some of my favourites.

A View of the Harbour by Elizabeth Taylor (1947)

One of Taylor’s most absorbing novels, A View of the Harbour is a beautifully crafted story of the complications of life, love and family relationships, all set within a sleepy, down-at-heel harbour town a year or two after the end of World War II. It’s a wonderful ensemble piece, packed full of flawed and damaged characters who live in the kind of watchful environment where virtually everyone knows everyone else’s business. Into this community comes Bertram Hemingway, a retired Naval Officer who intends to spend his time painting the local scenery – ideally a magnificent view of the harbour which he hopes to leave behind as a memento of his visit. Slowly but surely, Bertram comes into contact with virtually all of the town’s inhabitants, affecting their lives in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. Fans of Penelope Fitzgerald’s The Bookshop will likely enjoy this one!

Our Spoons Came from Woolworths by Barbara Comyns (1950)

One of my favourite novels featuring a highly distinctive female narrator – in this case, Sophia, a young woman who is looking back on her unhappy marriage to a rather feckless artist by the name of Charles. In writing this book, Comyns has drawn heavily on experiences from her own life. It is, by all accounts, a lightly fictionalised version of her first marriage, a relationship characterised by tensions over money worries and various infidelities on her husband’s part. Sophia and Charles’ hardscrabble bohemian lifestyle and North London flat are vividly evoked. Although it took me a couple of chapters to gel with Sophia’s unassuming conversational style, I really warmed to her character, particularly as the true horror of her story became apparent – her experiences of the insensitive nature of maternity care in 1930s London were especially disturbing to read. This is a wonderful book, by turns humorous, sad, shocking and heart-warming.

The Expendable Man by Dorothy B. Hughes (1963)

If I had to pick just one of these books as a must-read NYRB Classic, The Expendable Man would probably be it. A young doctor picks up a dishevelled teenage girl on a deserted highway while driving to a family wedding in Arizona. What could possibly go wrong? Well, pretty much everything, as it turns out, in this remarkably gripping novel set in 1960s America. There’s a crucial ‘reveal’ at a certain point in the story, something that might cause you to question some of your assumptions and maybe expose a few subconscious prejudices as well. The Expendable Man was a big hit with my book group, along with another of Hughes’ novels, the equally compelling In a Lonely Place, also reissued by NYRB.  

More Was Lost by Eleanor Perényi (1946)

This remarkable memoir by the American-born writer Eleanor Perényi deserves to be much better known. In essence, More Was Lost covers the early years of Eleanor’s marriage to Zsiga Perényi, a relatively poor Hungarian baron whom she meets while visiting Europe with her parents in 1937. Following the couple’s wedding, Eleanor moves to Zsiga’s charming but dilapidated estate on the shifting borders between Hungary and Czechoslovakia. It’s a gem of a book, both charming and poignant in its depiction of a vanishing and unstable world, all but destroyed by the ravages of war. There is a sense of lives being swept up in the devastating impact of broader events as the uncertainty of the political situation in  Europe begins to escalate. By turns beautiful, illuminating, elegiac and sad, it’s the type of book that feels expansive in scope but intimate in detail.

Cassandra at the Wedding by Dorothy Baker (1962)

One of the first NYRB Classics I read, and it remains a firm favourite. Baker’s novel revolves around Cassandra, a graduate student at Berkeley, who is heading home to her family’s ranch for her identical twin sister’s wedding, which she seems hell-bent on derailing. Cassandra is a fascinating yet very complex character – possibly one of the most complicated I have ever encountered in fiction. Yes, she’s intelligent and precise, and at times charming and loving, but she can also be domineering, manipulative, self-absorbed and cruel. Her thoughts and actions are full of contradictions, and there are instances when she tries to delude herself, possibly to avoid the truth. At heart, Cassandra is emotionally dependent on her twin, Judith, and deep down, her sister’s earlier departure to New York and imminent marriage to Jack feel like acts of betrayal. (Identity is a key theme here, particularly how it can limit our sense of self as well as define us.) And yet it’s very hard not to feel some sympathy for Cassandra despite her abominable behaviour. If you like complex characters with plenty of light and shade, this is the novel for you!

School for Love by Olivia Manning (1951)

Set in Jerusalem during the closing stages of World War II, this highly compelling coming-of-age story features a most distinctive character, quite unlike any other I’ve encountered, either in literature or in life itself. When Felix Latimater is orphaned following the death of his mother from typhoid, he is sent from Baghdad to Jerusalem to live with his late father’s adopted sister, the formidable Miss Bohun, until the war comes to an end. In Miss Bohun, Manning has created a fascinating individual who is sure to generate strong opinions either way. Is she a manipulative hypocrite, determined to seize any opportunity and exploit it for her own personal gain? Or is this woman simply deluded, acting on the belief that she is doing the morally upstanding thing in a changing and unstable world? You’ll have to read the book yourself to take a view…

Agostino by Alberto Moravia (tr. Michael F. Moore) (1944)

Another excellent novel about a young boy’s coming-of-age and loss of innocence – in this instance, the setting is an Italian seaside resort in the mid-1940s. Moravia’s protagonist is Agostino, a thirteen-year-old boy who is devoted to his widowed mother. When his mother falls into a dalliance with a handsome young man, Agostino feels uncomfortable and confused by her behaviour, emotions that quickly turn to revulsion as the summer unfolds. This short but powerful novel is full of strong, sometimes brutal imagery, with the murky, mysterious waters of the setting mirroring the cloudy undercurrent of emotions in Agostino’s mind. Ultimately, this is a story of a young boy’s transition from the innocence of boyhood to a new phase in his life. While this should be a happy and exciting time of discovery for Agostino, the summer is marked by a deep sense of pain and confusion. Another striking, evocative novella deserves to be much better known.

Grand Hotel by Vicki Baum (tr. Basil Creighton) (1929)

Set in the late 1920s, this engaging, cleverly constructed novel revolves around the experiences of six central characters as they cross parths in a Berlin hotel. There are moments of lightness and significant darkness here as Baum weaves her story together, moving from one figure to another with consummate ease – her sense of characterisation is remarkably vivid. At the centre of the novel is the idea that our lives can change direction in surprising ways through our interactions with others. We see fragments of these individuals’ lives as they come and go from the hotel. Some are on their way up and are altered for the better; others are on their way down and emerge much diminished. What appears to be chance and the luck of the draw may in fact turn out to be a case of cause and effect. In some ways, the hotel is a metaphor for life itself, complete with the great revolving door which governs our daily existence. All in all, it’s a wonderfully entertaining read.

A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr (1980)

A sublime, deeply affecting book about love, loss and the restorative power of art. Set in a small Yorkshire village in the heady summer of 1920, Carr’s novella is narrated by Tom Birkin, a young man still dealing with the effects of shell shock following the traumas of WWI. A Southerner by nature, Birkin has come to Oxgodby to restore a Medieval wall painting in the local church – much to the annoyance of the vicar, Reverend Keach, who resents the restorer’s presence in his domain. However, there is another purpose to Birkin’s visit: to find an escape or haven of sorts, an immersive distraction from the emotional scars of the past. Imbued with a strong sense of longing and nostalgia for an idyllic world, Carr’s novella also perfectly captures the ephemeral nature of time – the idea that our lives can turn on the tiniest of moments, the most fleeting of chances to be grasped before they are lost forever. In short, it’s a masterpiece in miniature, full of yearning and desire for times gone by. 

Do let me know your thoughts on these books if you’ve read any of them. Or maybe you have some favourite NYRB Classics of your own – if so, feel free to mention them in the comments below.

London novels – another ten favourites from my shelves

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Back in July, I put together a list of ten favourite novels set in London. It seemed to strike a chord with many of you, so much so that I thought I’d pick another ten, including some of the books recommended by readers when that post came out.

As in my previous list, many of these novels portray lives lived on the fringes of society, from lonely women isolated in spinsterhood or unfulfilling marriages to younger outsiders marginalised from the mainstream for one reason or another. There are some brighter, funnier novels here too, shot through with a sense of adventure. Here are my picks!

The Grand Babylon Hotel by Arnold Bennett (1902)

I loved this hugely enjoyable, fast-moving caper, set for the most part in a high-class London hotel. Fashioned on the Savoy in London, the Grand Babylon is expensive, exclusive and efficient, a model of discretion and quietude favoured by royalty and other dignitaries from the upper echelons of society. Newly arrived at the hotel are Theodore Racksole, a wealthy American magnate, and his daughter, Nella, a self-assured young woman full of initiative. Following a run-in with the haughty head waiter at dinner, Racksole buys the hotel, and within hours, strange things begin to happen, culminating in a sudden death.

What follows is a gripping sequence of escapades taking Theodore and Nella to the darkest corners of Ostend while also embroiling them in the romantic entanglements of a missing European prince. Along the way, there are kidnappings and disappearances, disguises and concealed identities, not to mention various political machinations afoot. There’s even time for a sprinkling of romance, adding greatly to the novel’s elegance and pleasures. In short, it’s a delightfully entertaining story imbued with glamour, suspense and a great deal of charm!

The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen (1938)

One of my favourite novels by this excellent writer. When both her parents die in fairly quick succession, sixteen-year-old Portia is sent to live with her half-brother, Thomas, and his wife, Anna, in their large house near London’s Regent’s Park. It was her late father’s wish that Portia should live with Thomas for a year, after which time she might move on to stay with an aunt. In truth, neither Thomas nor Anna is particularly keen to have Portia, although Thomas does feel some sense of duty towards the girl. Bowen is brilliant at capturing the sheer awkwardness and uncertainty of adolescence, particularly as Portia has very little understanding of how to behave around Anna, Thomas and their friends; her understanding of the workings of the adult mind is minimal.

Mostly left to her own devices, Portia falls in with Eddie is a selfish, uncaring young man with no real sense of integrity or responsibility. What follows is a very subtle exploration of the pain and confusion of adolescence, of how easy it is for an adult to toy with the emotions of a teenager, especially someone as vulnerable and as trusting as Portia. Bowen excels at capturing the central London setting with its cold, wintry days and brittle atmosphere – a reflection of the chilly mood in Thomas and Anna’s house.

The House Opposite by Barbara Noble (1943)

There is often something very compelling about fiction written and published during World War II, when the outcome of the conflict raging across Europe would still have been uncertain. Set during the turmoil of the London Blitz, Barbara Noble’s novel The House Opposite is one such book, a very absorbing character-driven story in which the tensions underpinning the lives of two families are contrasted with the mundanity, unpredictability and daily destruction unfolding across the city. Noble centres her story on two main protagonists: Elizabeth Simpson, a twenty-eight-year-old secretary living at home with her parents, and Owen Cathcart, an eighteen-year-old boy whose family live in the house opposite the Simpsons’, hence the novel’s title. Elizabeth and Owen don’t much like one another at first, but as the pair share fire-watching duties on Sunday nights, a tentative friendship develops, opening their eyes to the realities around them.

Noble excels is in her portrayal of London during the Blitz, and the novel is peppered with vivid descriptions of the sights, sounds and smells of a city under attack. The images she paints of landscapes devastated by a combination of bombings and the resultant fires, are especially evocative. It’s a thoughtful and absorbing read, ideally suited to lovers of home-front stories from World War II.

Our Spoons Came from Woolworths by Barbra Comyns (1950)

One of my favourite novels featuring a highly distinctive female narrator – in this case, Sophia, a young woman who is looking back on her unhappy marriage to a rather feckless artist by the name of Charles. In writing this book, Comyns has drawn heavily on experiences from her own life. It is, by all accounts, a lightly fictionalised version of her first marriage, a relationship characterised by tensions over money worries and various infidelities on her husband’s part. Sophia and Charles’ hardscrabble bohemian lifestyle and North London flat are vividly evoked. Although it took me a couple of chapters to gel with Sophia’s unassuming conversational style, I really warmed to her character, particularly as the true horror of her story became apparent – her experiences of the insensitive nature of maternity care in 1930s London were especially disturbing to read. This is a wonderful book, by turns humorous, sad, shocking and heart-warming.

Under the Net by Iris Murdoch (1954)

My first experience of Iris Murdoch’s fiction but hopefully not my last. Under the Net – Murdoch’s debut novel – is a subtly clever blend of the picaresque and the philosophical, all set within the bohemian milieu of London and Paris in the early 1950s. The novel is narrated by Jake Donaghue, an impoverished hack who scrapes a living by translating mediocre French novels into English when in need of some ready cash. As the story opens, Jake arrives back in London following a trip to France to discover that he is being thrown out of the flat where he has been living virtually rent-free for the past couple of years. Thus, Jake must find a new place to live, a quest that sets off a sequence of misadventures, chance encounters and close shaves, all of which shape his outlook on life in subtly different ways.

This novel is witty, engaging and fast-paced, with the humour in particular coming as a complete surprise. Along the way, the action takes in various scuffles, the theft of a manuscript, a break-in, a kidnap and a spontaneous night-time dip in the Thames. There’s also some glorious writing about London here, very atmospheric and evocative; on one level it’s all tremendous fun. Nevertheless, debate and self-reflection play their parts too. Central to the novel is the exploration of one of Wittgenstein’s theories, the idea that our deepest emotions remain trapped ‘under the net’ of language, inaccessible to others despite our best efforts to express them through dialogue or the written word. I loved this novel and hope to read more Murdoch very soon!

The Ballad of Peckham Rye by Muriel Spark (1960)

The gloriously off-kilter world of Muriel Spark continues to be a source of fascination for me – she’s a writer whose intense, imaginative visions seem playful and  distinctive. The Girls of Slender Means featured in my first ‘London novels’ post, but this time I’ve chosen The Ballad of Peckham Rye, in which the mercurial, malevolent Dougal Douglas brings chaos into the lives of everyone he encounters. Spark makes excellent use of dialogue here to move the story along, and the setting – a South London borough in the 1960s – is captured to a T. It’s the sort of community where everyone is desperate to know everyone else’s business, and the pubs and shops bristle with gossip and rumour. There’s a touch of the dark arts about this novella with its slyly manipulative protagonist, who always strikes me as an older incarnation of Timothy Gedge from William Trevor’s brilliant novel The Children of Dynmouth.

Turtle Diary by Russell Hoban (1975)

First published in 1975 and now well established as a modern classic, Turtle Diary is a charming, piercingly perceptive exploration of different facets of loneliness and the fear of stepping outside one’s comfort zone in the maelstrom of middle age. The novel’s premise seems at once both simple and eccentric – and yet, it all works remarkably well.

Divorced bookseller William G. lives in a London boarding house run by a landlady, Mrs Inchcliffe – a far cry from his former life in Hampstead as a husband and father with a job in advertising. While his work at the bookshop brings William into contact with the smart ladies of West London, his personal life is a desert – dry, lonely and painfully directionless.

Also feeling lost is Neaera H., a writer and illustrator of children’s books who works from home with nothing but a water beetle for company. Middle-aged and unmarried, Neaera is adrift in a sea of loneliness, lacking a clear purpose or direction as she struggles with writer’s block. When the novel opens, these two individuals are unaware of one another, but as Hoban’s narrative unfolds, their lives become inextricably entwined, setting up the premise for this marvellous story. An unexpected gem tinged with sadness.

Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym (1977)

First published in the late ‘70s, at the height of Pym’s well-documented renaissance, Quartet in Autumn is a quietly poignant novel about loneliness, ageing and the passing of time – how sometimes we can feel left behind as the world changes around us. The story follows four work colleagues in their sixties (two of whom are spinsters) as they deal with retirement from their roles as clerical workers in a London office. Pym brings some lovely touches of gentle humour to this bittersweet gem, and the loneliness of life in a big city is sensitively evoked. 

As is often the case with Pym, it’s the small things that prove to be the most revealing, hinting at trouble brewing or secrets yet to be revealed. As the novel draws to a close, the group come together in a time of crisis, reaching out to one another in ways they have not managed to do before. For two of the quartet at least, there are decisions about their futures to be made, showing us that life still holds choices and new possibilities in the autumn of our years.

A Private View by Anita Brookner (1994)

This superb novel is somewhat different from Brookner’s trademark stories of unmarried women living quiet, unfulfilled lives while waiting for their unattainable lovers to make fleeting appearances before disappearing into the night. In this instance, Brookner turns her gaze towards the aptly named George Bland, a quiet, respectable, recently retired man in his mid-sixties, living a dull, highly ordered existence in a comfortable London flat. In many respects, he is the male equivalent of Brookner’s archetypal spinsters – a man adrift, marking time in a narrow life on the periphery, while the excitement and passion take place elsewhere.

As the novel unfolds, Brookner explores what can happen when such a life is disrupted, raising the tantalising possibility that it might veer off course. With Brookner’s A Private View, the catalyst for the potential derailment is the arrival of an alluring, infuriating young woman, who takes up residence in the flat opposite George’s. Every time I read another Brooker, I find a new favourite, and this proved no exception to the trend!

Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson  (2021)

This gorgeous, lyrical novella – which focuses on two central protagonists, one male, one female, both black and in their early twenties – is at once both a tender love story and a searing insight into what it feels to be young, black and male in contemporary South London. Nelson writes beautifully about the sensation of a relationship progressing from friendship to love, how our innermost feelings can be exhilarating yet also expose a noticeable sense of vulnerability. The story is imbued with a wonderful combination of intimacy and immediacy, a feeling that fits so naturally with the novella’s intertwined themes.

Nelson is particularly strong when it comes to conveying the experience of inhabiting a black body, that sense of being stared at but not seen – certainly not as a human being with emotions and feelings. What really comes across here is the fear young black men experience on a daily basis, and the South London setting forms a key part of this. Will today be a day when they are stopped and searched? Will today be a day of confrontation? Will today be the day they lose their life? It’s a story for our times, an exploration of love, creativity and the need to be seen, especially in a world where fear and prejudice seem ever-present.

Do let me know your thoughts on these books if you’ve read any of them or are thinking of doing so. Or maybe you have some favourite London novels of your own – if so, feel free to mention them in the comments below, especially those from the 20th century.

The Levant Trilogy (Book One: The Danger Tree) by Olivia Manning

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Five years ago, I read and loved Olivia Manning’s Balkan Trilogy, a superb series of largely autobiographical novels based on the author’s experiences of a life lived on the advancing edges of turmoil as the Germans closed in on Eastern Europe during World War II. The trilogy is also an acutely perceptive portrait of the early years of a fraught marriage unfolding against the backdrop of displacement and uncertainty. In these books, we meet Guy and Harriet Pringle as they embark on married life, firstly in Bucharest, where Guy is employed by the British Council as a University lecturer, and then in Athens, where he finds himself sidelined with fewer opportunities to put his teaching skills to good use. The Pringles are, of course, based on Manning and her husband, Reggie Smith, and the fictional couple’s movements across the Balkans mirror those of the author and Smith.

The final book in The Balkan Trilogy ends with the Pringles sailing from Athens to Alexandria in Egypt, after been forced to flee Greece as the Germans approached. From there, The Danger Tree (the first book in The Levant series) picks up the couple’s story in Cairo, where their lives seem just as precarious and unsettled as before. Allied Government officials and assorted hangers-on from Eastern Europe appear to have come to Cairo to ‘live off the charity of the British government’. Consequently, the city is abuzz with the friendships, rivalries and scandals that occupy the refugees while they await the next development in the ongoing war.

As in Athens, Guy finds himself out of favour with the British Council’s teaching operation in Cairo, now headed up by Colin Gracey, an odious man with a disdainful air. Consequently, Guy finds himself packed off to the outskirts of Alexandria – practically in the desert – to teach English to business students. There are one or two talented pupils in his cohort, but once again, his skills are grossly underutilised due to personal clashes with the higher-ups. Meanwhile, Harriet stays in a cheap pension in Cairo, eking out a living with a clerical role at the American Embassy, where she is acutely conscious of her position as an outsider, even amongst other Allies.

The Pringles see one another at weekends once the working week is through, but the situation is far from ideal. Moreover, as the Germans make inroads into Egypt, there is a genuine risk of Guy being cut off in Alexandria if Rommel chooses to annexe it. Consequently, Harriet travels to the city with the aim of persuading Guy to return to Cairo, but without success.

As before, tension in the Pringles’ marriage is a major focus of this novel, with Guy continuing to prioritise the needs of his students, friends and assorted acquaintances over those of Harriet. Idealistic, naïve and scholarly by nature, Guy persists in throwing himself into his work, partly to provide a sense of purpose and status, even though he is aware of having been sidelined by Gracey. Harriet is unsure whether Guy’s optimism and lack of concern about the war come from his inability to recognise reality, or a refusal to flee from its threat. Nevertheless, despite her personal frustrations with the state of their marriage, Harriet is fully conscious of how this situation is affecting Guy.

‘…He’s stuck at that commercial college, wasting his talents. He’s not allowed to leave the Organization and Gracey can’t, or won’t, give him a job worthy of him. Other men are at war, so he must take what comes to him. He cannot protest, except that his behaviour is protest. He must either howl against his life or treat it as a joke.’ As she spoke, protest rose in her, too. ‘This is what they’ve done to him – Gracey, Pinkrose and the rest of them. He believes that right and virtue, if persisted in, must prevail, yet he knows he’s been defeated by people for whom the whole of life is a dishonest game.’ (p. 113)

But when Gracey is sacked from his role for fleeing from Cairo to the relative safety of Palestine, Guy gets a lucky break. In short, he is appointed as head of the teaching unit in the capital, enabling him and Harriet to move to a room in Garden City, a more desirable area of Cairo. Their new home is a flat share with the British diplomat, Dobson; an attractive and much sought-after socialite, Edwina; and a moody chap named Percy, who seems to resent the Pringles’ presence. Harriet hopes to become good friends with Edwina, but despite her pleasant manner, Edwina is more interested in her own social life than getting to know the new flatmates. Instead, Harriet is taken up by Angela Hooper, a wealthy married woman who has recently separated from her husband following the death of their child.

Alongside the ups and downs of the Pringles’ lives, Manning also introduces another thread to her story of developments in Egypt, that of twenty-year-old Simon Bouldestone, a junior officer in the British army who has come to the country to fight. And it is here that Manning’s narrative extends to areas beyond her own personal experiences to great effect. She is particularly insightful on the realities of war in the desert, when long stretches of travelling or conducting routine patrols can be suddenly interrupted by intense bursts of conflict.

The enemy seemed to be on the alert. Repeated gun flashes dotted the German positions and the men, who were in close order, instinctively kept closer than need be as they marched into no-man’s-land. The moon had set and they moved by starlight. There was little to see and Simon thought it unlikely that anyone had seen them, yet, a few hundred yards from their objective, a flare went up from the hill-top, blanching the desert and revealing the two close-knit platoons. Immediately there was uproar. Red and yellow tracer bullets, like deadly fireworks, passed overhead and machine-guns kept up their mad, virulent rattle. (pp. 154–155)

The heady mix of heat, boredom, fear and uncertainty, punctuated by the adrenaline rush of battle, the anger towards of the enemy, and the dreadful smell of death, is brilliantly conveyed here.

These two storylines briefly intersect in Cairo when Simon meets Harriet and Edwina, whom he believes to be his brother’s girlfriend – connections that seem set to be developed further in the next two books.

A little like her contemporary Elizabeth Taylor, Manning is remarkably adept at sketching memorable secondary characters with economy and precision. Early in the novel, we are reintroduced to Professor Pinkrose, a pompous visiting lecturer whom the Pringles reencounter in Egypt.  

Harriet watched Pinkrose with a smile, quizzical and mildly scornful, while Pinkrose’s small, stony eyes quivered with self-concern. She had known him first in Bucharest where, sent out to give a lecture, he had arrived as the Germans were infiltrating the country and had been abandoned then just as he was abandoned now. He was, she thought, like some heavy object, a suitcase or parcel, an impediment that his friends put down when they wanted to cut and run. (pp. 29–30)

Manning also shows herself to be sceptical of the alleged wisdom of colonialism by questioning the prevailing view that the British are somehow morally, culturally and socially superior to other nationals.

They [the British] arrived in Egypt, fresh and innocent, imbued with the creed in which they had been brought up. They believed that the British Empire was the greatest force for good the world had ever known. They expected gratitude from the Egyptians and were pained to find themselves barely tolerated.

[Harriet:] ‘What have we done here, except make money? I suppose a few rich Egyptians have got richer by supporting us, but the real people of the country, the peasants and the backstreet poor, are just as diseased, underfed and wretched as they ever were.’

Aware of his own ignorance, Simon did not argue but changed course. ‘Surely they’re glad to have us here to protect them?’

‘They don’t think we’re protecting them. They think we’re making a use of them. And so we are. We’re protecting the Suez Canal and the route to India and Clifford’s oil company.’ (p. 24)

As ever with Manning, the settings are vividly evoked. From the bustling streets of Cairo to the great expanse and oppressive heat of the desert, she captures these locations with a painter’s eye for an atmospheric scene.

The main streets impressed and unnerved him [Simon]. The pavements were crowded and cars hooted for any reason, or no reason at all. Here the Egyptians wore European dress, the women as well as the men, but among them there were those other Egyptians whom he had seen flapping their slippers round the station. The men came here to sell, the women to beg. And everywhere there were British troops, the marooned men who had nothing to do but wander the streets, shuffling and grumbling, with no money and nowhere to go. (pp. 14–15)

At various points in the novel, rumours about the relative vulnerability of Cairo swirl around the city, leading Harriet to wonder whether she and Guy will need to flee again. However, as this instalment in Manning’s broader story draws to a close, the Pringles’ marriage appears to be in more trouble than ever as Harriet finds herself questioning her husband’s fidelity, while Guy wonders whether she would be better off in England. Once again, Manning offers us an excellent insight into Guy’s character, particularly his lack of understanding of Harriet’s need for love and affection.

He [Guy] found it difficult to accept that his own behaviour could be at fault. And if it were, he did not see how it could be changed. It was, as it always had been, rational, so, if she were troubled, then some agency beyond them – sickness, the summer heat, the distance from England – must be affecting her. For his part, he was reasonable, charitable, honest, hard-working, as generous as his means allowed, and he had been tolerant when she picked up with some young officer in Greece. What more could be expected of him? Yet, seeing her afresh, he realized how fragile she had become. She was thin by nature but now her loss of weight made her look ill. Worse than that, he felt about her the malaise of a deep-seated discontent. That she was unhappy concerned him, yet what could he do about it? He had more than enough to do as it was… (pp. 192–193)

So, in summary then, this is another immersive, richly imagined instalment in Manning’s ambitious sequence about lives lived on the edge of WW2. The novel is imbued with a profound sense of loss – a loss of stability, of innocence, of opportunities, of spontaneity and fun – and most poignantly of all, the loss of life itself for those unfortunate enough to become the casualties of war.

The Levant Trilogy is published by NYRB Classics in the US and by W&N is the UK; personal copy.

Memories: From Moscow to the Black Sea by Teffi (tr. R Chandler, E Chandler AM Jackson & I Steinberg)

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Born in St. Petersburg in 1872, Teffi (Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya) went on to become a celebrated writer in early 20th-century Russia, publishing poems, short stories, satirical sketches and plays to great acclaim. In the autumn of 1918, with the Russian Civil War intensifying around her, Teffi was persuaded to leave Moscow for a short series of public readings in Kiev and Odessa. The trip was due to last around a month, offering Teffi a brief respite from the uncertainties swirling around Moscow as the Bolsheviks closed in. Events, however, swiftly intervened, forcing Teffi and many of her fellow writers and creatives to move south, shuttling them from one Russian city to another as the advancing Bolsheviks nipped at their heels.

Memories is Teffi’s deeply moving account of that whirlwind time – a series of fraught departures, anxious journeys and brief regroupings in new cities, culminating in a trip across the Black Sea to Constantinople, which marked the beginning of Teffi’s new life as an émigré. Sadly, she was never to return to Russia again, eventually settling in Paris, where she lived for many years.

While Teffi supported socialism and the 1905 revolution, her sympathies did not extend to the Bolsheviks, and her disdain for Lenin was clear to see. In Memories, Teffi brings her trademark wit, humour and humanity to some of the uncertainties and tragedies of the Russian Civil War. Her insights are often sharp, spiky and satirical. However, these humorous notes only serve to accentuate the chaos, bewilderment and fear unfolding around her during that time.

The book opens in Moscow with brief preparations for her literary trip, which she will undertake with another writer, two actresses and their respective impresarios. Naturally, travel permits must be secured – easier said than done under the circumstances! – but the group is soon on its way, travelling by train, and then by caravan, towards Kiev. Unsurprisingly, there are various unscheduled stops and close shaves along the way, all recounted in Teffi’s incisive style.

On her arrival in Kiev, Teffi finds the conditions much improved. Food is plentiful, other writers and colleagues duly arrive, and the cultural community starts to regroup. New journals are quickly established, giving Teffi and her fellow writers fresh outlets for their work. However, all too soon, the mood in the city begins to dampen as the Bolsheviks edge closer, setting the pattern for the months that will follow. Everywhere Teffi goes during her travels, she witnesses a similar dynamic. Following their arrival in a new city, refugees such as Teffi try to rebuild cultural and social structures, only to be displaced once again as the war catches up with them.  

Now the talk is of Odessa, and Teffi – along with many others in her situation – prepares to leave Kiev. And it is here that Teffi’s account becomes particularly disturbing to read, capturing as it does the true horror of the situation as it unfolds.

The crush at the station was unimaginable. Troop trains were occupying nearly all the lines. We didn’t know whether they were just arriving or just departing. They probably didn’t even know themselves.

Everyone looked bewildered, resentful, and tired.

With some difficulty we made our way to our allocated train car. It was third class, which seemed to mean three tiers of sleeping boards. Our cases were thrown in after us.

The train stood at the station for a long time. Official and unofficial departure times had all long come and gone. We were on the second track and there were trains full of soldiers on either side of us. We could hear yells and shots. Through the gaps between cars we could see people rushing about in panic. (p. 106)

Suspicions and rumours are rife, accentuated by reports of the dead and the wounded, which only add to the travellers’ fears. In fact, at one point, it is thought that the Bolsheviks might be lying in wait for them a few miles down the tracks.

Something Teffi does particularly well here is to communicate the uncertainty of the situation and how quickly this becomes the ‘new normal’ for those seeking safety. For instance, the sense of not knowing whether a train will depart for its destination – or if it will be stopped and attacked en route – is vividly conveyed. There are various instances when journeys are interrupted by officials or soldiers, some of whom wish to be entertained by Teffi and her fellow artists, while others prove more mercenary.

We stopped many times. At dark stations or in the middle of nowhere, where there was more yelling and shooting and dancing pinpoints of light.

Soldiers with bayonets appeared in the doorways.

“Officers! To the end of the car!”

There were no officers in our car.

I remember seeing people running beside the track, past our windows. Breathless soldiers stormed into the car and stabbed under the benches with their bayonets.

And nobody knew what was going on, and nobody asked. Everyone sat quietly with their eyes closed, as if they were dozing, as if to show that they did not consider any of this to be in the least out of the ordinary. (p. 107)

Despite these anxieties, Teffi’s spirit remains resolute, and she proves herself remarkably resilient in the face of adversity. There are brighter moments too, especially on arrival at a new destination, such as Odessa, which has managed to maintain a lively nightlife despite the presence of criminal gangs.

But we were not easily deterred. All night long, the theaters, clubs, and restaurants remained crowded with people. Fabulous sums were lost at cards.

In the morning, stupefied by wine, gambling, and cigar smoke, bankers and sugar manufacturers would emerge from these clubs and blink their puffy eyelids at the sun. Shadowy figures from Moldavanka [a poor part of Odessa with a reputation for criminality] would be hanging about in doorways, sifting the piles of nutshells and sausage skins for scraps and leftovers. Their eyes hungry and sullen, they would stand and watch as the revelers walked away. (p. 110)

Unsurprisingly, the tone darkens somewhat as Teffi is forced further south. Before long, Odessa also becomes unstable, prompting her to move again. But now she and her friends have run out of land; only the sea remains ahead of them.

Now that something had been arranged, I realized just how much I wanted to leave. Now that I could gather my thoughts, I felt frightened. I could see what life would be like for me if I stayed. It wasn’t death itself that I was afraid of. I was afraid of maddened faces, of lanterns being shone in my eyes, of blind mindless rage. I was afraid of cold, of hunger, of darkness, a rifle butts banging on parquet floors. I was afraid of screams, of weeping, of gunshots, of the deaths of others. I was tired of it all. I wanted no more of it. I had had enough. (p. 134)

In this instance, however, Teffi’s flight proves more tenuous to arrange as promises of a safe passage out of the city fall through when so-called friends leave her stranded. Luckily, though, an acquaintance comes to her rescue, and they leave on a largely crewless ship bound for Sevastopol, with all the passengers mucking in together in lieu of the crew.

Ever alert to the absurdity of the situations in which she finds herself, Teffi deploys her trademark wit to great effect here. In this scene, while searching for a spoon with which to eat her dinner, she comes across an officious young woman who looks ‘like a pike’.

“Here on this ship, we have no nobility, no tips, and no money. Everyone has to work and everyone receives the same rations. I saw you trying to employ money in order to obtain privileges. I’m ready to bear witness to all I have seen and heard. I shall go to the captain and tell him everything.”

She spun round and flew out of the kitchen.

Not only was I a depraved criminal but I was also, for all my depravity, still in need of a spoon. (pp. 161–162)

Teffi has a wonderfully distinctive eye for detail in the most unnerving of circumstances. For instance, she observes that the duration of a woman’s life as a refugee can be measured by the condition of her sealskin coat, the de rigueur item of clothing of the day. Not only was it warm, it was valuable, too.

I saw sealskin coats in Kiev and in Odessa, still looking new, their fur all smooth and glossy. Then in Novorossiisk, worn thin around the edges and with bald patches down the sides and on the elbows. In Constantinople—with grubby collars and cuffs folded back in shame. And, last of all, in Paris, from 1920 until 1922. By 1920 the fur had worn away completely, right down to the shiny black leather. The coat had been shortened to the knee and the collar and cuffs were now made from some new kind of fur, something blacker and oilier—a foreign substitute. (p. 64)

As this shattering account draws to a close, we find Teffi in Novorossiisk, where the only viable option open to her is to cross the Black Sea to Constantinople, signalling the start of her new life as an émigré.

My memories of those first days in Novorossiisk still lie behind a curtain of gray dust. They are still being whirled about by stifling whirlwind—just as scraps of this and splinters of that, just as debris and rubbish of every kind, just as people themselves were whirled this way and that way, left and right, over the mountains or into the sea. Soulless and mindless, with the cruelty of an elemental force, this whirlwind determined our fate. (p. 204)

It’s a poignant ending, particularly as we now know she would never return to her homeland – the country she loved so dearly despite the conflict that ripped it apart.

In some respects, Memories is an elegy to the resilience of the Russian people, thousands of whom journeyed across the country during this brutal era in Soviet history. It also vividly captures the cultural milieu in which Teffi circulated at the time, touching on their hopes and dreams, concerns and preoccupations in evocative, poetic prose. Recommended reading for anyone interested in this period of history.

Memories: From Moscow to the Black Sea is published by NYRB Classics (USA) and Pushkin Press (UK); translated by Robert & Elizabeth Chandler, Anne Marie Jackson and Irina Steinberg.

(I read this book for Kim’s #NYRBWomen25 project, more details here.)

My Books of the Year, 2025 – Part 2

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As in previous years, I’ve spread my Books of the Year across two posts. Part 1, published on Tuesday, highlighted my favourites from the first half of the reading year (roughly speaking), while Part 2 features the standout reads from the second half of 2025. Apologies, but I couldn’t bear to leave any of them out, even though it means a total of twenty-six books for the year as a whole.

So, to cut to the chase, here are my favourite reads from mid-2025 onwards, most of which were first published in the 20th century. Alongside the titles featured in Part 1, these are the books I loved, the books that have stayed with me, the books I’m most likely to recommend to other readers. I’ve summarised each book in this post, but in each instance, you can find my full review by clicking on the relevant title.

(Not pictured: A Land in Winter, read on audio)

Brother of the More Famous Jack by Barbara Trapido (1982)

Brother… is a coming-of-age novel, and a superb one at that, partly due to Trapido’s prose, which is sharp, lively and flecked with dry wit. Our narrator is Katherine Browne, a bright, impressionable young woman, ready to break away from her prim, suburban upbringing in North London at the age of eighteen. Happily, I found her voice utterly engaging from the start. The novel follows Katherine as she moves to London, where she is taken under the wings of her ebullient philosophy professor and his bohemian family. Love, heartache and a spell in Italy duly follow, with more heartbreak hovering on the horizon.

In summary, it’s a captivating and insightful novel about first love, heartache, disillusionment and growing up – as moving and unsentimental as it is funny and charming. Trapido also touches on motherhood, grief and depression in the narrative, weaving together wry humour and genuine poignancy to excellent effect.

Amongst Women by John McGahern (1990)

Ostensibly the story of Moran, an ageing, tyrannical father, whose wife and daughters both love and fear him, this novel can also be seen as a reflection of the deeply conservative nature of Irish society during much of the 20th century, a world dominated by stifling patriarchal power structures in which women were kept firmly in their place. Beautifully constructed in simple, unadorned prose, McGahern has written a superb character study here – a minor masterpiece with an immersive sense of place. I adored this subtle novel, which feels so well suited to fans of William Trevor, Colm Tóibín, Claire Keegan and Dierdre Madden, all of whom have an innate ability to see into the hearts and minds of their characters with insight and precision, laying bare their deepest preoccupations and insecurities for the reader to see.

Palladian by Elizabeth Taylor (1947)

First published in 1946, Palladian is something of an outlier in Elizabeth Taylor’s oeuvre. On one level, it is the story of a recently orphaned eighteen-year-old girl, Cassandra Dashwood, whose headmistress finds her a position as a governess following the death of her father. Young, naive and something of a romantic, Cassandra quickly determines to fall in love with her new employer, Marion Vanbrugh, a rather closeted, effeminate widower who, in the wake of WW2, seems disconnected from the harsh realities of British life. So far, so Jane Eyre, albeit a 20th-century version.

However, beyond this initial set-up, darker preoccupations emerge. Decay, disintegration and self-destruction seem to be Taylor’s major themes here, from the crumbling façade, interiors and statues that characterise Copthorne Manor, the Vanbrugh’s jaded estate, to the self-loathing, bitterness and angst exhibited by various family members and their acquaintances. As ever with Taylor, the characterisation is sharp and insightful – from the main protagonists to the supporting players, everyone is brilliantly sketched. Interestingly, this book has really grown in my mind since I re-read it earlier this year. A surprisingly enduring novel, which demonstrates that even a ‘lesser’ Taylor is streets ahead of many other writers’ best.

A Woman by Sibilla Aleramo, 1906 (tr. Erica Segre and Simon Carnell)

What a phenomenal book this is, an autobiographical feminist novel first published in Italian in 1906, under a pseudonym due to its radical content! Touching on similar themes to Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s seminal text The Yellow Wallpaper and Alba de Cespedes’ startling confessional novel Forbidden Notebook, in which a woman explores the right to her own existence in light of the demands of marriage and motherhood, Aleramo’s A Woman reads like a howl from the past, a cry of anguish for liberty, independence and intellectual fulfilment in an oppressive world.

In passionate, emotive prose, Aleramo lays bare the horrific realities of life for a young Italian woman trapped in a brutal, patriarchal society, in which a married woman is considered her husband’s property to do with as he pleases. I found it a vital, propulsive read, an early example of feminist autofiction that deserves to be widely read. Annie Ernaux fans should be rushing to pick this up!

Love in a Fallen City by Eileen Chang, 1943-7 (tr. Karen S. Kingsbury, 2007 & Eileen Chang, 1996)

In this insightful, exquisitely written collection of four novellas and two short stories, Chang exposes the traditional social mores at play in 1940s Shanghai and Hong Kong, complete with all the cruelties, restrictions and hypocrisies these unwritten rules dictate. Born into an aristocratic family in Shanghai in 1920, Chang was raised by her deeply traditional father, an opium addict, and her more progressive mother, a woman of ‘sophisticated…and cosmopolitan tastes’, partly developed during time spent as a student in the UK. Her family background and formative experiences enabled Chang to straddle different cultures and see the world from different angles.

In her precision, attention to detail and scalpel-like dissection of the complexities of human behaviour and social mores, Chang reminds me of Edith Wharton, another female writer whose characters often find themselves trapped between two worlds: one driven by personal needs and desires, another by societal conventions and moral codes. There are other similarities too, not least an interest in their characters’ inner lives, often closed to outside observers, but vividly alive inside. Both writers are also adept at combining psychological acuity with a strong sense of cultural place, all cloaked in precise, elegant prose. Highly recommended for fans of this style.

A Note in Music by Rosamond Lehmann (1930)

An exquisitely observed exploration of two loveless, unfulfilling marriages and the shifts in dynamics that occur when two captivating visitors enter their stagnant world. Set in an unnamed provincial town during the interwar years, A Note… features two couples, Grace and Tom Fairfax and their friends, Norah and Gerald MacKay, all of whom are discontented in their different ways. Into this troubled world comes Hugh Miller, a bright, sensitive, passionate young man who charms everyone he meets, and his sophisticated, liberated sister, Clare.

Something that Lehmann does particularly well here is to illustrate how inner lives can be altered in subtle but highly significant ways, even when outwardly everything remains broadly the same. By the end of the year, Hugh and Clare will have departed, leaving the Fairfaxes and MacKays to carry on with their lives largely as before. Nevertheless, internally, the tectonic plates have shifted, opening up new levels of understanding and appreciation between Grace & Tom – and between Norah & Gerald. Early middle age is a tricky period for many of us, a time when the optimism, rapture and ambitions of youth may have given way to routine, resignation and a lack of fulfilment. Lehmann writes beautifully about these challenges, showing us how new understandings can be reached in the present, even if the past can never be recaptured.

A Private View by Anita Brookner (1994)

This superb novel is somewhat different from Brookner’s trademark stories of unmarried women living quiet, unfulfilled lives while waiting for their unattainable lovers to make fleeting appearances before disappearing into the night. In this instance, Brookner turns her gaze towards the aptly named George Bland, a quiet, respectable, recently retired man in his mid-sixties living a dull, highly ordered existence in a comfortable London flat. In many respects, he is the male equivalent of Brookner’s archetypal spinsters – a man adrift, living a narrow life on the periphery, while all the excitement and passion seems to be taking place elsewhere.

As the novel unfolds, Brookner explores what can happen when such a life is disrupted, raising the tantalising possibility that it might veer off course. With Brookner’s A Private View, the catalyst for the potential derailment is the arrival of an alluring, infuriating young woman, who takes up residence in the flat opposite George’s. Every time I read another Brooker, I find a new favourite, and this was no exception to the trend!

The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller (2024)

A moving, elegantly crafted novel that goes deep into character, Miller’s latest takes place in the winter of 1962-63, one of the coldest British winters on record, when temperatures plummeted, blizzards swept in and rivers began to freeze over. It’s an atmospheric backdrop for this story of two marriages, in which the author gives us access to the inner world of each of his main characters – their hopes and dreams, their preoccupations and fears.

As this slow-burning novel unfolds, Miller excels at reflecting the bleak, desolate landscapes of the brittle West Country winter in the emotional isolation felt by his four protagonists – a troubled, hard-to penetrate GP and his lonely, pregnant wife, plus an ambitious, educated farmer and his flighty partner, a former dancer in a Bristol nightclub. Each figure is preoccupied and adrift in their own individual way, raising the possibility that either of these marriages could easily fracture, should the hand of fate twist one way instead of the other. It’s a beautifully written book, very much in tune with the 20th-century writers I love.

The Juniper Tree by Barbara Comyns (1985)

Regular readers of this blog are probably aware of my fondness for Barbara Comyns – a startlingly original writer with a very distinctive style. Her novels have a strange, slightly off-kilter feel, frequently blending surreal imagery and touches of dark, deadpan humour with the harsh realities of life. This wry sense of the absurd is one of Comyns’ trademarks, cleverly tempering the darkness with a captivating lightness of touch. There’s often a sadness in her narratives too, a sense of poignancy or melancholy that runs through the text. First published in 1985, The Juniper Tree is very much in this vein.

In short, it’s a clever, dreamlike reimagining of the Grimms’ fairy tale of the same name – in fact, the novella’s epigraph is a rhyme taken directly from that classic story. Ostensibly set in London in the late 20th century, Comyns’ spin on The Juniper Tree reads like a timeless dark fable, weaving together the innocence and savagery that characterise many of this author’s best books. While much of what happens here is rooted in reality, Comyns invests her narrative with a surreal, otherworldly quality, tilting the familiar into something slightly off-kilter. Right from the very start, the reader is unsettled, sensing perhaps the tragedy to come…

Crooked Cross by Sally Carson (1934)

For a novel first published in 1934, Sally Carson’s Crooked Cross feels remarkably timely, charting, as it does, the rise of Nazism in the early 1930s, the falling apart of a country’s fundamental codes of decency and the moral fortitude required to stand against persecution. Recently republished by Persephone Books, the book makes chilling reading in 2025, a time when far-right extremism, hate speech and inhumane discrimination against various groups continue to increase.

Carson was a frequent visitor to Bavaria in the early 1930s, and her insights into what was happening there fed into Crooked Cross. In some respects, she was writing in real time, sounding a warning alarm on the pernicious rise of fascism and its grip on the nation. By scrutinising the broader political developments spreading across Germany through the lens of the Klugers, an ordinary middle-class family living in the fictional town of Kranach, close to the Austrian border, Carson illustrated the allure of the fascist movement, particularly for disaffected young men. Lacking the structure and focus of regular work, these men saw the Nazi Party as providing many of the things that had been lacking in their lives, from stability, status, power and responsibility to purpose, direction and a reason to exist. Moreover, the movement gave young Germans a convenient scapegoat – i.e. the Jews – to blame for everything that had been denied them in the lean post-WW1 years. A brilliant, terrifying, immersive novel that deserves to be widely read – it’s also an excellent combination of the personal and political, just the type of book I love.

Lady L. by Romain Gary (1958)

Published in English in 1958 and subsequently translated into French by the author himself, Lady L. was my first experience of Romain Gary’s fiction, but hopefully not my last. What a delightful novella this turned out to be – an elegant story of love, long-held secrets and railing against the conventional establishment, in which the pull of personal desires is pitted against political principles and beliefs! It reads like a work of 19th-century French fiction, which fans of du Maupassant, Flaubert and Louise de Vilmorin’s Madame de__ will likely enjoy.

In short, this charming picaresque tale takes the reader from the slum districts of Paris to the upper echelons of French society, with a story involving spectacular robberies, betrayal, capture, escape, reunion and unexpected marriages, all topped off by a surprising denouement. I’m delighted to see this back in print, courtesy of the Penguin Archive series.

The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington (1974 or ‘76)

Born in Lancashire in 1917, Leonora Carrington is perhaps now best known as a surrealist artist; however, during her career, she also wrote novels, short stories, a play and a memoir, all infused with her dreamlike, idiosyncratic worldview. First published in English in the mid-1970s but reputedly completed in 1950, The Hearing Trumpet is as unconventional as one might expect from this visionary creative – a surreal, subversive, wildly imaginative novella that challenges traditional patriarchal and ageist societal structures, turning them neatly on their heads in thrilling fashion. It is, by turns, hilarious, surprising, esoteric and poignant – a wonderful sui generis work that defies categorisation.

The novella is narrated by Marian Leatherby, a ninety-two-year-old woman who lives in Mexico with her family, who, in turn, consider her somewhat burdensome and eccentric. Before long, Marian is packed off to a care home, which turns out to be more sinister than it appears at first sight. Much is made of the seemingly ‘eccentric’ nature of elderly women here, a label often attached to marginalised individuals to explain away their unconventional qualities. Carrington, however, was well aware of the revolutionary potential of women who looked at the world differently, and as the novella unfolds, eccentricity is portrayed in a positive, liberating light as a rebellious force for good.

The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett (1896)

First published in 1896 and recently reissued as part of the Penguin Archive series, The Country of the Pointed Firs is a classic example of literary regionalism, a genre of writing in which the local setting, landscape, history, community and customs are centre stage. Through a series of evocative vignettes, Jewett conveys a rich picture of everyday life in the fictional small-town community of Dunnet Landing on the east coast of Maine. It’s a gem of a book – reflective, affecting and beautifully crafted.

Central to the story is Jewett’s narrator, an unnamed female writer (possibly Jewett herself) who has come to Dunnet Landing for the summer to work on her writing. Through her landlady, Mrs Todd, who has lived in the area since her birth, the narrator is drawn into the lives of the local inhabitants – their stories and histories, preoccupations, and concerns. Something Jewett does particularly well here is to capture the traditional rhythms and rituals of life in this coastal community, the importance of female friendships and shared stories, resilience and independence, occasional family gatherings and reunions, nature and landscape. In short, it’s a gorgeous paean to ordinary lives well lived, where small acts of kindness and generosity brighten the spirits, easing some of the difficulties humanity must face.

So that’s it for my Books of the Year, 2025! Do let me know your thoughts on my choices – I’d love to hear your views.

Thanks so much to everyone who has read, commented or engaged with my thoughts on books over the past year. I really do appreciate it.

All that remains is to wish you all the very best for the festive season and the year ahead. Here’s to another great year of reading and more book chat in 2026!

The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington

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Born in Lancashire in 1917, Leonora Carrington is perhaps now best known as a surrealist artist; in 2024, one of her artworks sold for $28.5 million. During her career, however, she also wrote novels, short stories, a play and a memoir, all infused with her dreamlike, idiosyncratic worldview. First published in English in 1976 but reputedly completed in 1950, The Hearing Trumpet is as unconventional as one might expect from this visionary creative – a surreal, subversive, wildly imaginative novella that challenges traditional patriarchal and ageist societal structures, turning them neatly on their heads in thrilling fashion. It is, by turns, hilarious, surprising, esoteric and poignant – a wonderful sui generis work that defies categorisation.

The novella is narrated by Marian Leatherby, a ninety-two-year-old woman who lives in Mexico with her suggestible son, Galahad, his uncaring wife, Muriel, and their insensitive grown-up son, Robert. Despite being toothless and rather deaf, Marian remains sharp of mind while also enjoying her cats, hens and visits to Carmella, her delightfully resourceful friend.

“You never know,” said Carmella. “People under seventy and over seven are very unreliable if they are not cats. You can’t be too careful…” (p.9)

Marian is, in short, a wonderful creation, a character whose voice I found beguiling from the start.

Humanity is very strange and I don’t pretend to understand anything, however why worship something that only sends you plagues and massacres? and why was Eve blamed for everything? (p. 26)

When Marian is given a hearing trumpet as a gift, she soon becomes aware of the family’s plans to move her into a care home, much to her displeasure.

“Remember, Galahad,” added Muriel, “these old people do not have feelings like you or I. She [Marian] would be much happier in an institution where there’s proper help to take care of her. They are very well organized today. This place I told you about out in Santa Brigida is run by the Well of Light Brotherhood and they are financed by a prominent American Cereal company (Bouncing Breakfast Cereals Co.). It is all very efficiently organized and reasonably inexpensive.” (p. 15)

Before long, Galahad is positioning the institution as a kind of holiday for Marian, complete with company of her own age, a range of interesting pastimes, and trained staff to prevent her from getting lonely. Not that Marian is ever actually lonely; rather, she values her solitude and a degree of independence.

“You are going away on a nice holiday, Mother. You are going to enjoy it very much.”

“My dear Galahad, don’t tell me such silly lies. You are sending me away to a home for senile females because you all think I am a repulsive old bag and I dare say you are right from your own point of view.”

He stood mouthing at me, looking as if I had picked a live goat out of my bonnet. (p.23)

Presided over by the tyrannical Dr Gambit and his equally dictatorial wife, the Well of Light Brotherhood ‘care home’ is suitably surreal – a castle-like complex, in which the ten elderly residents, all female, live in individual huts, each one fashioned into a peculiar shape. There are Swiss chalets, toadstools, railway carriages and a boot – a birthday cake, complete with candle, also deserves a mention here for brio alone. However, despite these quirky, almost welcoming touches, the establishment is run as a kind of self-improvement cult that blends religious teachings with New Age Spirituality.

Dr. Gambit believes Marian exhibits a range of ‘impurities’ which must be addressed and eliminated for her to embrace the institute’s doctrines. These include ‘Greed, Insincerity, Egoism, Laziness, and Vanity. At the top of the list Greed, signifying a dominating passion.’ However, as Georgina, a fellow resident observes:

“Gambit is a kind of Sanctified Psychologist,” said Georgina. “The result is Holy Reason, like Freudian table turning. Quite frightful and as phoney as Hell. If one could only get out of this dump he would cease to be important, being the only male around, you know. It is really too crashingly awful all these women. The place creeps with ovaries until one wants to scream. We might as well be living in a bee hive.” (p. 42)

As the story plays out, Marian and her fellow inmates must find ways to resist and subvert the strict regime imposed on them by the Gambits, an adventure that harks back to an earlier time when a resourceful Abbess embarked on a dangerous quest to restore the Holy Grail to its rightful owner, the Goddess Venus. It’s a surreal, fantastical romp, like a wild, extraordinary dream sequence that unfolds before our eyes.

They saw Rosalinda and the Bishop inhaling Musc de Madelaine and by some process of enfleurage becoming so saturated with the vapours of the ointment that they were surrounded by a pale blue cloud or aura which apparently acted as a volatile element on solid bodies. Thus the Bishop and Abbess were wafted into the air and were suspended, levitating, over the open crate of Turkish delight with which they were both gorged. Modesty forbids a full account of the disgusting acrobatics which were then performed in midair. (pp. 97–98)

Back in the novella’s present day, all manner of strange motifs and occurrences come to light at the care home, from the portrait of a nun who appears to be winking at Marian to the production of poisoned fudge and an unintentional murder.

Much is made of the seemingly ‘eccentric’ nature of elderly women here, a label often attached to marginalised individuals to explain away their unconventional qualities. Carrington, however, was well aware of the revolutionary potential of women who looked at the world differently. Here, eccentricity is portrayed as a positive, liberating, rebellious force for good, enabling Marian, Carmella and the other elderly inhabitants of the Gambits’ draconian institute to challenge the oppressive doctrines which, alongside other longstanding conservative structures, have kept these women in check.

“…we have absolutely no intention of letting ourselves be intimidated by your beastly routine ever again. Although freedom has come to us somewhat late in life, we have no intention of throwing it away again. Many of us have passed our lives with domineering and peevish husbands. When we were finally delivered of these, we were chivvied around by our sons and daughters who not only no longer loved us, but considered us a burden and objects of ridicule and shame. Do you imagine in your wildest dreams that now we have tasted freedom we are going to let ourselves be pushed around once more by you and your leering mate? (p. 152)

Historically, patriarchal societies have sought to dismiss and oppress elderly women, preventing them from creating a fuss or being bothersome to others. Consequently, these women have often found themselves marginalised and stripped of any agency or influence. Even now, many are barely tolerated, often consigned to care homes away from their families. Carrington too was no stranger to incarceration, having spent time in a mental hospital in Madrid following a nervous breakdown in the early 1940s. The Hearing Trumpet, however, is a striking riposte to this archaic thinking, a glorious celebration of the liberation to be found when these stifling constraints are challenged, opening a door to a new world of possibilities. It’s a wonderfully empowering story, skilfully illustrating how new, more fulfilling realities can be created in the face of resistance.

Highly recommended, especially for fans of Angela Carter, Barbara Comyns and Olga Tokarczuk. In fact, the latter has written the afterword to the NYRB Classics edition, which also comes with a beautiful series of illustrations by Leonora’s son, Pablo Weisz Carrington. (Personal copy.)

The Juniper Tree by Barbara Comyns

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Regular readers of this blog are probably aware of my fondness for Barbara Comyns – a startlingly original writer with a very distinctive style. Her novels have a strange, slightly off-kilter feel, frequently blending surreal imagery and touches of dark, deadpan humour with the harsh realities of life. This wry sense of the absurd is one of Comyns’ trademarks, cleverly tempering the darkness with a captivating lightness of touch. There’s often a sadness in her narratives too, a sense of poignancy or melancholy that runs through the text.

First published in 1985 and reissued by NYRB Classics in 2018, The Juniper Tree is very much in this vein. In short, it’s a clever, dreamlike reimagining of the Grimms’ fairy tale of the same name – in fact, the novella’s epigraph is a rhyme taken directly from that classic story.

My mother, she killed me,

My father he ate me,

My sister, little Marlinchen,

Gathered together my bones,

Tied them in a silken handkerchief,

Laid them beneath the juniper tree.

Kywitt, Kywitt, what a beautiful bird I am.

While Comyns’ novella works perfectly well as a standalone piece, I think it’s well worth taking the time to read the original tale before diving into this reimagining. Luckily, it’s freely available online and very quick to read.

Ostensibly set in London in the late 20th century, Comyns’ spin on The Juniper Tree reads like a timeless dark fable, weaving together the innocence and savagery that characterise many of this author’s best books. While much of what happens here is rooted in reality, Comyns invests her narrative with a surreal, otherworldly quality, tilting the familiar into something slightly off-kilter. Right from the very start, the reader is unsettled, sensing perhaps the tragedy to come.

Quite soon after I left Richmond station I turned into a quiet street where the snow was almost undisturbed and, climbing higher, I came to a road that appeared to be deserted. Then I noticed a beautiful fair woman standing in the courtyard outside her house like a statue, standing there so still. As I drew nearer I saw that her hands were moving. She was paring an apple out there in the snow and as I passed, looking at her out of the sides of my eyes, the knife slipped and suddenly there was blood on the snow. She turned and went into her house before I could offer to help. (p. 5)

The novella is narrated by Bella Winter, a down-on-her-luck single mother with a mixed-race daughter, Marline, also known as Tommy. (Tommy’s father – a black man Bella slept with some years ago at a party – is no longer on the scene; in fact, he was so fleeting a presence that Bella doesn’t even know his name.)

As the story opens, Bella is homeless and in need of a job, two problems she quickly solves by landing a role taking care of an antiques shop, Mary Meadows Antiques, in Twickenham. The job comes with accompanying rooms, which Bella and Tommy move into, soon making them snug and homely. While Mary Meadows does most of the buying (initially, at least), Bella is given quite a lot of freedom to manage the shop, taking to it like a duck to water and displaying the stock to its best advantage. As she settles into the role, Bella also starts purchasing items to sell, proving herself adept at spotting profitable pieces. As ever, Comyns’ skills with character sketches are evident here, especially in the introduction of Mary into the story.

Mary was small, with curly black hair nearly as curly as Tommy’s. Her teeth were small and pointed rather as an animal’s, indeed she resembled an animal with her delicate boned face with its merry expression, perhaps a squirrel. She was a darter, darting into the shop with her arms filled with parcels, often wrapped in newspaper. She would pour out a few half-finished sentences, laugh, wave to an acquaintance passing the window, rush to the door and with the handle in her little paw-like hand, she would give last minute instructions: “Think it has a haircrack; reduce the price if you have to…” (p. 8)

It soon becomes clear that Bella’s past life has been turbulent. Her abusive ex-boyfriend, Stephen, blamed Bella for a car accident they were involved in, which left Bella with a disfiguring scar on one side of her face. While the scar has faded over time, Bella still feels self-conscious about it, especially when her confidence is low.

Following some trouble within her family, Bella is now estranged from her mother, who is completely unaware of little Tommy’s existence. As such, Bella is delighted when a cultured married couple, Gertrude and Bernard Forbes, take an interest in her and Tommy. (In fact, Gertrude is the statuesque lady Bella saw peeling an apple in the snow as she left Richmond station during her search for work.) In a slightly sinister touch, Gertrude, who is of German origin, sometimes refers to Tommy as ‘Marlinchen’, calling to mind the rhyme from the Grimm Brothers’ tale.

Soon, Bella and Tommy are spending their weekends at the Forbes’ comfortable house in Richmond, picnicking under the juniper tree in the beautiful garden and generally hanging out. All is sweetness and light, especially as Gertrude is expecting a baby, a much longed-for child to complete their little family.

Near the cherry tree in a wild corner, there was something Gertrude called the juniper tree, although it was really a very large bush. She said it had berries that she enjoyed eating. I believe they are used in the making of gin, she laughed, but I like them. There was a bench where Gertrude used to sit under her tree, watching the birds, and she said that if she were worried about anything, the worries went away. The old greyhound, who followed us, lay down by the seat as if it were a place she was very used to. (p. 31)

Bernard, too, seems captivated by Bella, introducing her to various composers and other artistic works, almost as a form of education. Nevertheless, not everything in this seemingly idyllic picture is rosy; a sense of darkness is rarely far away, lurking in the background, making its presence felt every now and again. For instance, Bella’s last picnic with Gertrude before the baby’s birth is especially unsettling with Comyns introducing those hints of savagery she draws on so brilliantly.

We had our last picnic under the juniper tree. Gertrude ignoring the food I’d arranged on the table but almost greedily gulping down the last of the juniper berries that grew on the shady side of the tree—the berries so blue and poisonous-looking, and smelling strange too. I’d seen her do this before; but this time she was snatching at the fruit with her long white hands and putting several in her mouth at once, and her lips became stained and her dress all spattered with the needle-leaves. I wished Bernard were there to control her. (p. 66)

With her childlike, matter-of-fact tone of voice, Bella is an innocent, battered and bruised by the selfish, self-centred men she has had the misfortune to encounter in the past. As the story unfolds, we see her being taken advantage of once again when Bernard becomes increasingly dependent on her help. All too soon, Bella finds herself facing a choice, one that may require her to give up the job at the antiques shop, a role she truly loves…

I’ll leave it there in terms of the plot; to reveal anything else would spoil it, I think. Once again, Comyns proves herself adept at gently leading us by the hand – a tone that fairy tales and fables draw on so successfully – only to pull the rug from under our feet when we’re not quite expecting it. That creeping sense of dread is never far away, and we hope against hope that any tragedies will be averted.

While Comyns doesn’t follow the Grimms’ fairy tale to the letter, she does succeed in crafting a very compelling reimagining here, taking the elements that interest her while leaving some of the more horrific developments aside. I particularly like how the novella raises the theme of mental illness – still very much a taboo subject in 1985 – highlighting how stress and depression can prompt us to make ill-judged, irrational decisions in the heat of the moment. Nevertheless, some readers might find the storyline shocking, despite the glimmers of hope at the end.

Barbara Comyns may not be to every reader’s taste, but she is a true original with a unique view of the world’s cruelties. A highly imaginative writer who deserves to be widely read, even though she is apt to unnerve us in the most beguiling of ways.  

(I read this for Kim McNeill’s NYRBWomen25 project, although my post is a little late!)

Spinsters in literature – some recommendations for #SpinsterSeptember

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If you follow Nora (Pear Jelly) on Bluesky or Instagram, you’ll know that she’s been gearing up to host #SpinsterSeptember, a brilliant reading event showcasing books featuring spinsters, from the classic figures found in 20th-century lit to the more modern incarnations we might see in books today. Last year, I posted some spinster recommendations (including Lolly Willowes, The Slaves of Solitude and Some Tame Gazelle), and they proved so popular that I’ve pulled out another ten suggestions from my review archive to highlight in today’s post. Three of these books also feature in Nora’s recent list of recommendations, posted on Instagram, but I couldn’t resist including them here, especially as they are personal favourites.

So, to cut to the chase, here are some more of my favourite books featuring spinsters, mostly old and one fairly new.

Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym

No self-respecting list of spinster lit would be complete without something by Barbara Pym, one of the most perceptive authors on the challenges facing spinsters as they navigate daily life. First published in 1977, at the height of Pym’s well-documented renaissance, Quartet in Autumn is a quietly poignant novel about loneliness, ageing and the passing of time – how sometimes we can feel left behind as the world changes around us. The story follows four work colleagues in their sixties (two of whom are spinsters) as they deal with retirement from their roles as clerical workers in a London office. Pym brings some lovely touches of gentle humour to this bittersweet gem, showing us that life can still offer new possibilities in the autumn of our years.

Black Narcissus by Rumer Godden

This is a glorious book – an evocative story of nuns, misguided actions and, perhaps most significantly of all, repressed female desire. A small group of Anglican nuns (all spinsters) set out to establish a new convent high up in the Himalayan mountains, a place steeped in beauty and mystery. As the weeks go by, the Sisters begin to fall under the setting’s spell, surrounded by the heady atmosphere of disruption and beauty. Consequently, each Sister becomes obsessed with a particular passion, causing them to neglect their spirituality in favour of more personal desires. Tensions – both sexual and otherwise – abound in this sensual novel, steeped in lush visual imagery. In creating Black Narcissus, Godden has given us a rich exploration of the tensions between competing desires, one that also touches on the follies of colonialism in subtle and memorable ways. Highly recommended, even for devoted fans of the Powell and Pressburger film, such as myself!

Sheep’s Clothing by Celia Dale

Three years ago, Daunt Books kickstarted a Celia Dale revival with their reissue of A Helping Hand, an icily compelling tale of greed and deception, stealthily executed amidst carefully orchestrated conversations and kindly cups of tea. A year later, they followed it up with Sheep’s Clothing, another excellent reissue in a very similar vein. Here, the central protagonist is Grace, a merciless, well-organised con woman in her early sixties with a track record of larceny. As a trained nurse with experience of care homes, Grace is well versed in the habits and behaviours of the elderly – qualities that have enabled her to develop a seemingly watertight plan for fleecing some of society’s most vulnerable individuals, typically frail old women living alone. To enact her plan, our spinster Grace teams up with Janice, a passive, malleable young woman she met in Holloway prison. Together, the two women trick their victims in a cruel, callous way, worming their way into people’s homes by posing as Social Services. One of the most sinister, malevolent portrayals of a spinster you’re likely to encounter – all the more terrifying for its grounding in normality.

Rhine Journey by Ann Schlee

Set in Rhenish Prussia in 1851, this sublime Booker-shortlisted novel tells the story of an unmarried woman’s emotional awakening during a boat trip along the Rhine. Originally published in 1981, it’s an ideal summer read, quivering with latent energy just waiting to be unleashed. Schlee’s protagonist is Charlotte Morrison, an acquiescent, mild-mannered spinster, financially independent but emotionally tied to her brother, Charles, a sanctimonious Church of England preacher, and his demanding wife, Marion. During the boat trip down the Rhine, Charlotte is assailed by vivid, transgressive dreams that blur the margins between reality and fantasy, reawakening emotions and desires long since buried in the past. This gorgeous, richly imagined novel is as precise and compelling in its psychological acuity as it is in its portrayal of a vanished world. One for fans of Black Narcissus, A Passage to India and Lolly Willowes, to name but a few.

Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner

Like Pym, Anita Brookner is another quintessential writer of spinster lit, and Hotel du Lac is a classic of the genre. As this perceptive novel opens, Edith Hope – an unmarried writer of romantic fiction – has just been packed off by her respectable, interfering friends to the Hotel du Lac, a rather austere establishment of high repute in the Swiss countryside. Right from the start, it’s clear that Edith has been banished from her sector of society, sent away to reflect on her misdemeanours, to ‘become herself again’ following some undisclosed scandal. (The reason for Edith’s exile is eventually revealed, but not until the last third of the book.) Central to the novel is the question of what kind of life thirty-nine-year-old Edith can carve out for herself, a dilemma that throws up various points for debate. Will she return to her solitary existence at home, complete with its small pleasures and its sense of freedom and independence? Or will she agree to compromise, to marry for social acceptability if not love? You’ll have to read the book itself to find out…

A Green Equinox by Elizabeth Mavor

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1973, Elizabeth Mavor’s marvellous novel A Green Equinox captivated me from its opening pages. It’s a rich exploration of female sexuality and love in all its various manifestations, from the passionate and the sensual to the companionable and spiritual, not to mention the intellectual. In a quote on the cover of my Virago edition, the novelist Charlotte Mendelson calls it ‘funny and brave and moving and absolutely bonkers’ – a description that captures the novel’s untethered spirit to a T. I adored this erudite, unpredictable book, which revolves around an unconventional love triangle of sorts, with the marvellously named Hero Kinoull, an unmarried antiquarian bookseller, placed tantalisingly at its centre. (While Hero’s exact age doesn’t seem to be specified, I think she’s entering the realm of middle age, so hopefully this qualifies as spinster lit.)

Turtle Diary by Russell Hoban

First published in 1975 and now well established as a modern classic, Turtle Diary is a charming, piercingly perceptive exploration of different facets of loneliness and the fear of stepping outside one’s comfort zone in the maelstrom of middle age. The novel’s premise seems at once both simple and eccentric – and yet, it all works remarkably well. Divorced bookseller William G. lives in a London boarding house run by landlady, Mrs Inchcliffe – a far cry from his former life in Hampstead as a husband and father with a job in advertising. While his work at the bookshop brings William into contact with the smart ladies of West London, his personal life is a desert – dry, lonely and painfully directionless. Also feeling lost is Neaera H., a writer and illustrator of children’s books who works from home with nothing but a water beetle for company. Unmarried, middle-aged and living alone, Neaera is adrift in a sea of loneliness, lacking a clear purpose or direction as she struggles with writer’s block. As the novel opens, these two individuals are unaware of one another, but as Hoban’s narrative unfolds, their lives become inextricably entwined, setting up the premise for this marvellous story. An unexpected gem tinged with sadness.

The Driver’s Seat by Muriel Spark

This is a challenging book to summarise in just a few sentences, particularly given the twisted nature of the narrative. (I’m not even going to try to describe the plot!) As the novella opens, we encounter Lise – the unmarried central character in this twisted story – shopping for new clothes for a forthcoming holiday. Right from the very start, there is an anxious, unsettling tone to the narrative, one that mirrors Lise’s erratic behaviour when a sales assistant tries to identify something suitable for her. Spark’s descriptions of Lise are gloriously off-kilter, portraying her in a manner that suggests a frenetic energy and a buttoned-up quality to her personality all at once. There are mentions of an illness in her past – quite possibly related to her mental well-being, as her neurotic behaviour has been noted at work. Once again, Spark has crafted an unforgettable story that disturbs as much as it intrigues, leaving the reader both unsettled and fascinated by her somewhat distorted view of the world. She is a remarkable writer – uncompromising in terms of vision, style and the execution of her art. Utterly brilliant and completely bonkers all at once – a book that will likely divide opinion, which always makes things interesting!

The Misses Mallett by E. H. Young

In this delightful, thoroughly absorbing novel, E. H. Young tells the story of these three sisters, who, along with their spirited niece, twenty-one-year-old Henrietta, are the Misses Malletts of the book’s title. Spinsters Caroline and Sophia Mallett live in Radstowe with their beautiful, younger stepsister, Rose. At thirty-one, Rose is too young to be considered a fully-fledged spinster, but if nothing changes for the better, she might well become one. In short, it is a novel about love and the tension between sense and sensibility – or, put more simply, between the head and the heart. Young invites us to draw comparisons between the situations of unmarried women at three different stages of the lifecycle – from Henrietta at twenty-one and Rose at thirty-one to Caroline and Sophia in middle age. For Caroline and Sophia (both accomplished flirts in their youth), the days for romance have passed, while for Henrietta, they are yet to come. Rose, on the other hand, lies somewhere in the middle of this spectrum, caught between the anticipation of youth and the resignation of confirmed spinsterhood with everything this entails.

The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick

Presented as a sequence of beguiling vignettes, this captivating non-fiction book is Gornick’s ode to New York, capturing the rhythms and idiosyncrasies of this vibrant metropolis in sharp, insightful prose. If, like me, you enjoy exploring cities on foot, soaking up the atmosphere of the urban streets, you will likely love this one. First published in 2015 and recently reissued by the marvellous Daunt Books, The Odd Woman and the City delves into Gornick’s reflections on friendship, romantic love, childhood memories, ageing, navigating life alone in a busy city and the kaleidoscopic nature of New York itself. The book’s title is a nod to George Gissing’s 1893 novel The Odd Women, which explores the challenges faced by surplus (i.e. unmarried) women in carving out meaningful lives and identities for themselves in 19th–century London. In some respects, Gornick is a modern-day spinster equivalent of Gissing’s Odd Women as she finds contentment in living alone, defined by her own identity and relationship to the city rather than being bound to a husband or lover. Nevertheless, the absence of romantic love can still tear at her heart…

Do let me know what you think of these books if you’ve read some of them already or if you’re considering reading any of them in the future. Perhaps you have a favourite book or two featuring a spinster? Or maybe you’ll be joining #SpinsterSeptember with something in mind. Please feel free to mention them in the comments below.

Jasmine Tea and other stories by Eileen Chang (tr. Karen S. Kingsbury and Eileen Chang)

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The critically acclaimed novelist, essayist and screenwriter Eileen Chang was one of the greatest chroniclers of Chinese life in the 20th century. In Love in a Fallen City, an insightful, exquisitely written collection of four novellas and two short stories, Chang exposes the traditional social mores at play in 1940s Shanghai and Hong Kong, complete with all the cruelties, restrictions and hypocrisies these unwritten rules dictate.

As the author’s biography in my NYRB Classics edition suggests, Chang’s family background enabled her to view this world from different angles. Born into an aristocratic family in Shanghai in 1920, Chang was raised by her deeply traditional father, an opium addict, and her more progressive mother, a woman of ‘sophisticated…and cosmopolitan tastes’ partly developed during time spent as a student in the UK. Following her parents’ divorce in 1930, Chang lived with her father and stepmother but then fled their home after suffering extensive abuse. A period of study in Hong Kong duly followed, exposing her to a more Western culture. Nevertheless, when the Japanese attacked the city in December 1941, Chang was forced to return to occupied Shanghai, where she published these early stories and novellas in a volume entitled Romances.

These formative experiences, gained by straddling different cultures, almost certainly contributed to Chang’s scathing views of societal constraints in China at the time. In her precision, attention to detail and scalpel-like dissection of the complexities of human behaviour and social mores, Chang reminds me of Edith Wharton, another female writer whose characters often find themselves trapped between two worlds: one driven by personal needs and desires, another dictated by societal conventions and moral codes. There are other similarities too, not least an interest in their characters’ inner lives, often closed to outside observers, but vividly alive inside. Both writers are also adept at combining psychological acuity with a strong sense of cultural place, all cloaked in precise, elegant prose.

I loved this striking, evocative collection of stories – my first experience of Chang’s writing, but hopefully not my last. This review covers two novellas (Aloeswood Incense and The Golden Cangue) and a short story (Jasmine Tea) from the collection, with thoughts on the others, including Love in a Fallen City, to follow in a separate post.

The collection opens with Aloeswood Incense, which charts a young girl’s initiation into the realities of Chinese society in stark detail. At sixteen, Weilong covertly arranges to stay with her glamorous aunt, Madame Liang, to continue her schooling in Hong Kong. Weilong’s family, who have long since cut ties with Madame Liang due to her scandalous past as a Concubine, are moving back to their home city of Shanghai, believing their daughter will be boarding at her Hong Kong school.

The car door opened and a small, slender woman in Western clothes stepped out. She [Madame Liang] was dressed all in black, with a green veil hanging from her black straw hat. Pinned to the veil, an emerald spider the size of a fingernail flashed in the sunlight and climbed up her cheek. When it gleamed it looked like a trembling teardrop that was just about to fall; when it darkened it looked like a green mole. (p. 12)

At first, Weilong is led to believe that Madame Liang wishes her to play the piano at various social gatherings in return for her board; however, as the young girl is drawn into a world of glamorous parties, elegant clothes, gossipy servants and flirtatious behaviour, she soon becomes a pawn in Madame Liang’s liaisons, there to attract handsome young men for her aunt to feast upon.

Madame Liang was extremely picky about the young men who pursued Weilong, more severe even than the imperial household when it is choosing a royal son-in-law. If the lucky half dozen who were in the running grew excessively ardent in their pursuit, Madame Liang simply took the precious goods off the shelf: none of the suitors would be allowed to go near her niece. Then, when she had permitted one of them to get close, she swooped in with a dexterous display of charm, and recruited him for her own purposes. (p. 33)

As this evocative story unfolds, Weilong learns that falling in love in such surroundings is fraught with complications, especially when the man in question has various romantic entanglements, both past and present, to his name. She also learns the nuances of a woman’s reputation, all of which have an impact on the options available to her.

“For a woman, there’s nothing more important than her reputation,” she said in a low voice. “When I use the word ‘reputation,’ I mean something a bit different from a fusty old scholar’s idea. These days, people who are even a little bit modern don’t care that much about chastity. When a young lady goes out and mixes at banquets and parties, there’s bound to be a certain amount of gossip. That kind of talk, the more it spreads, the more it stirs up interest, the more it increases your prestige. It certainly won’t harm your future. The one thing that must be avoided at all cost is this: to love someone who doesn’t love you, or who loves you and drops you. A woman’s bones can’t withstand a fall like that!” (pp. 64–65)

Like many of Chang’s stories, Aloeswood Incense is candid, vivid and beautifully observed, an unsentimental insight into the realities of love.

In Jasmine Tea, Chang shows us what can happen when love between a husband and wife doesn’t exist. Into this vacuum comes a raft of negative feelings, from bitterness and hatred to envy and jealousy. The story focuses on Chuanqing, a solitary student who lives with his taciturn, abusive father and equally dismissive stepmother. Chuanqing knows little about his deceased mother, Biluo, only that she hadn’t loved his father, whose hatred of Biluo was plain to see. 

As for Biluo’s life after her marriage—Chuanqing couldn’t bear to imagine it. She wasn’t a bird in a cage. A bird in a cage, when the cage is opened, can still fly away. She was a bird embroidered onto a screen—a white bird in clouds of gold stitched onto a screen of melancholy purple satin. The years passed; the bird’s feathers darkened, mildewed and were eaten by moths, but the bird stayed on the screen even in death. (p. 92)

When his wife died, Chuanqing’s father turned his vitriol towards their son, fostering a culture of bitterness and abuse. One day, on mulling over a dreamlike vision of his mother from the past, Chuanqing begins to piece together a clearer picture of her life. There are signs that Biluo had been in love with someone else back then. Had another man captured her heart before or during her marriage to Chuanqing’s father? Rumours and cryptic remarks within the family seems to support this…

The more Chuanqing thinks about these fragments from the past, the more convinced he becomes that his mother was in love with Professor Yan, who now teaches his literature class. To complicate matters further, Yan is also the father of Chuanqing’s female classmate, Danzhu, the only person who tries to befriend Chuanqing at school.  

As a result of all this, Chuanqing becomes increasingly obsessed with various what-if scenarios, largely driven by thoughts of what might have happened if his mother and Professor Yan had married. Would he and Danzhu be siblings now? Maybe he or she wouldn’t even exist?

As this startling story draws to a close, we see how poisonous and destructive these emotions can be, especially when left to fester in a heartless environment. Chang pulls no punches here, leaving the reader shocked by the brutality of Chuanqing’s actions. It’s a merciless story that chilled me to the bone…

The Golden Cangue (translated by Chang herself) paints a similarly bleak picture. Set in the early 20th century, the story centres on Second Mistress Ch’i-ch’iao, a woman from a low-class family who marries into a higher social class. In short, her husband has a significant disability, coupled with a chronic illness, which had made it challenging to find a wife from his own social sphere. While Ch’i-ch’iao has gained a degree of financial security from the match, she is reviled by her husband’s relatives, making her bitter, outspoken and hot-tempered.

As this intricate story unfurls, we see how this spitefulness poisons not only Ch’i-ch’iao’s life, but those of her children, too. The son’s wife turns out to be rather senseless and naïve, prompting Ch’i-ch’iao to find a concubine to keep her son entertained. The daughter, meanwhile, finds it difficult to secure a suitable match – and when she does find someone appropriate, the thought of introducing him to her mother scuppers any plans for marriage.

The novella’s title, The Golden Cangue, refers to a highly restrictive yoke placed over the neck and shoulders as a form of corporal punishment and public humiliation, used in China until the early 20th century. The metaphor here is plain to see, signalling the oppressive life Ch’i-ch’iao has been confined to for thirty years. It was not uncommon for people wearing cangues to starve to death due to difficulties in feeding themselves with the yoke. While Ch’i-ch’iao doesn’t die of hunger, we do see how her life is eroded through bitterness, causing any compassion to wither and die.

Ch’i-ch’iao lay half asleep on the opium couch. For thirty years now she had worn a golden cangue. She had used its heavy edges to chop down several people; those that did not die were half killed.  (p. 233-234)

Through Chang’s mastery of the dynamics at play here, we see how Ch’i-ch’iao taints her children’s lives with bitterness and poison. As this merciless, beautifully written novella draws to a close, we are left in no doubt that Ch’i-ch’iao is aware that everyone despises her. It’s a cautionary tale in an unforgiving world.

Chang uses imagery very effectively in these stories, from the lush red azaleas, a recurring motif signalling dangerous passions and desires, to cool, elegant moonlight, synonymous with covert activities and illicit trysts.

Still, inside that wall, spring was only puttering about. When it flashed into flame, it could leap out, scorching everything. Already, beyond the wall, a roar of wild azaleas was blooming across the hill, the fiery red stomping through brittle grass, blazing down the mountainside. (p. 7)

Moreover, she has a gimlet eye for detail, enlivening her stories with jewel-like observations. There is some gorgeous descriptive writing here, painterly in style.

The garden was like a gold-lacquered serving tray lifted high amid the wild hills: one row of carefully pruned evergreens; two beds of fine, well-spaced English roses—the whole arrangement severely perfect, not a hair out of place, as if the tray had been deftly adorned with a lavish painting in the fine-line style. (p. 7)

It was a humid spring evening, and the Hong Kong hills are famous for their fog. The white Liang mansion was melting viciously into the white mist, leaving only the greenish gleam of the lamplight shining through square after square of the green windowpanes, like ice cubes in peppermint schnapps. (p. 25)

In these candid, exquisitely written stories, Chang lays bare the traditional social mores at play in 1940s Shanghai and Hong Kong, complete with all the cruelties, constraints and hypocrisies these unwritten codes dictate. Her precision and phycological acuity are top-notch, highlighting the tensions between progressive Western-influenced ideas and traditional, patriarchal power structures in glittering prose.

Very highly recommended indeed. I’ll be back with some thoughts on the remaining novellas/stories in this collection, hopefully next month.