Tag Archives: Short Stories

New York books – some favourites from my shelves

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Following the popularity of previous posts on my favourite London novels (which you can find here and here), I thought it might be fun to do something similar for New York, a location with an atmosphere all of its own. This time, I’m expanding things a little by also including a couple of non-fiction choices: Vivian Gornick’s The Odd Woman and the City, surely one of the most vivid and evocative books ever written about this bustling metropolis, and Olivia Laing’s The Lonely City, a thoughtful meditation on what it means to feel lonely and exposed in a fast-moving city. Naturally, New York has changed radically over the past hundred years, but hopefully these books will give you a flavour of this fascinating place and its diverse inhabitants. Here are my picks!

The New York Stories of Edith Wharton

A fabulous collection of Edith Wharton’s New York stories, published by NYRB Classics. The twenty pieces included here span the period from 1891 to 1934, virtually the whole of Wharton’s career as a writer. Several are in the style of her much-loved society novels, exploring the tensions between restraint and passion, sincerity and hypocrisy, respectability and disgrace. In short, they are sharp, nuanced and incisive. Here we see life as it was in the upper echelons of New York society, with its traditional social mores and codes, frequently suppressing freedom of action in favour of compliance and conformity.

Autres Temps…, one of the standouts here, explores the social scandal surrounding divorce, particularly in the late 19th century. Interestingly, the story also illustrates how attitudes were beginning to change, highlighting the contrast between Old New York and a younger, more liberal society starting to emerge.

Also worthy of a mention is A Journey, in which a respectable woman is escorting her husband home to New York following a spell in warmer climes. The husband is chronically ill and unlikely to recover, but for now appears to be well enough to make the trip. With the train journey underway, the wife proceeds to reflect on the past. There is a sense that the couple’s marriage has deteriorated in line with (or possibly even ahead of) the husband’s decline in health, such is the extent of the change in his character. This superb story is steeped in mood and emotion, giving it the feel of a nightmare or hallucination. Wharton excels in her portrayal of a woman on the edge, with the rhythm of her prose mirroring the relentless momentum of the train as it hurtles onwards to its final destination. A tour de force in miniature with some very memorable imagery.

The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick

First published in 2015 and reissued by Daunt Books in 2025, The Odd Woman and the City is Gornick’s ode to New York, a book that captures the rhythms and idiosyncrasies of this vibrant metropolis in sharp, insightful prose. Presented as a sequence of beguiling vignettes, the book 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 relationships other writers enjoy with major cities also feature briefly. The vignettes are not grouped chronologically or by topic; rather, Gornick moves seamlessly backwards and forwards in time and from one theme to the next, sharing insights and confidences on a variety of different subjects as she goes. In fact, the book’s rhythm – vibrant, fast-moving and constantly changing in nature – reflects the city’s character itself.

There is so much insight, honesty and intelligence in these snippets, and Gornick is a delightful companion – smart, curious and ever-observant. If, like me, you enjoy exploring cities on foot, soaking up the atmosphere of the urban streets, you will likely love this book.

Ex-Wife by Ursula Parrott

When Ex-Wife was published anonymously in 1929, it quickly became a literary sensation, selling 100,000 copies in its first year. Its author, Ursula Parrott, worked as a newspaper reporter in New York in the 1920s, and her experiences of divorce and life as an ex-wife inspired this novel, which I found thoroughly captivating to read.

In short, Ex-Wife is an evocative portrayal of the lives of bright working women in the Roaring Twenties as they navigate the challenges of open marriages, societal double standards, independence and career advancement. While much has changed since the book first caused such a stir, many of its themes remain relevant. In Patricia, Parrott has created a candid, vulnerable, utterly charming narrator, an intelligent young woman who lives in the moment, willing to embrace the freedoms of a changing society while also craving love and a degree of stability.

The novel also paints a wonderfully evocative portrait of New York in the Jazz Age era, a world of Martinis, Manhattans and glamorous dresses, lunch at the Algonquin, evenings at speakeasies and nights at the Harlem dance halls. Highly recommended, a very modern novel for its time.  

Ladies’ Lunch and Other Stories by Lore Segal

The Austrian-American writer Lore Segal, who sadly passed away in late 2024, was born into a middle-class Jewish family in Vienna in 1928. Ten years later, she was evacuated to Britain in the first wave of the Kindertransport rescue mission and placed with a sequence of English foster families for the early part of the Second World War. Unsurprisingly, some of these experiences have inspired Segal’s body of work, including novels, short story collections, children’s books and pieces for The New Yorker.

Published in 2023, Ladies’ Lunch and Other Stories comprises sixteen poignant stories/vignettes, including six previously unpublished pieces, some of which seem autobiographical in style. The collection begins with a sequence of nine stories in which five elderly ladies have lunch together every month – the ‘Ladies’ Lunch’ referred to in the book’s title. During these gatherings, which have been taking place in New York for over thirty years, Ruth, Bridget, Farah, Lotte and Bessie reminisce and share anecdotes, often touching on the challenges of ageing, the loss of friendship, family and independence, alongside other related concerns.

On the surface, these vignettes might seem deceptively slight and sketchy; however, the more we read, the more glimpses into the characters’ histories are revealed. Hints of loss, displacement, dislocation and isolation emerge, adding more flesh to the bones. Segal invests these ‘Ladies Lunch’ stories with a lovely blend of warmth, wit, wisdom and compassion, while her ear for dialogue adds sharpness to the mix.

Family Happiness by Laurie Colwin

Back in 2020, during one of the COVID lockdowns, I received a lovely handwritten letter from Dorian (at Eiger, Mönch & Jungfrau), which contained a personalised recommendation for the writer Laurie Colwin. In his letter, Dorian described Colwin’s books as being very New Yorkey: wry rather than funny, bittersweet but not sentimental, and Jewish, albeit in a low-key kind of way. He made them sound right up my street; a little Woody Allen-ish in style, back in the days when his films were good. In particular, Dorian mentioned Colwin’s 1982 novel Family Happiness, a beautifully observed story of familial obligations and our need to feel loved and valued, especially by those we are closest to.

Central to the novel is Polly, relatively happily married with two children and an interesting job. However, her kindness and accepting nature mean that she is taken for granted by her family. Everything is thrown into sharp relief when Polly meets and falls in love with Lincoln Bennett, a talented painter who values her for who she is, not for what she can do for those around her. Complications and questions soon ensue in this wry, acutely observed novel.  

The Lonely City by Olivia Laing

This is a terrific read – a compassionate, multifaceted discourse on what it means to feel lonely and exposed in a fast-moving city, a place that feels at once both alienating and alive. At the time of writing this book, Laing was living in New York, recently separated from her former partner, an experience that had left her feeling somewhat adrift and alone. During the months that followed, Laing found herself drawn to the work of several visual and creative artists who captured something of the inner loneliness of NYC, a sense of urban isolation or alienation.  

Through a combination of investigation, cultural commentary and memoir, Laing explores the nature of loneliness, how it manifests itself both in the creative arts and in our lives. While this is clearly a very personal and well-researched book, the author uses this wealth of information very carefully, weaving it seamlessly into the body of the text in a way that feels thoughtful and engaging. It’s a fascinating book, beautifully written and constructed – a contemporary classic in the making.

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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 New York books of your own – if so, feel free to mention them in the comments below, especially those from the 20th century. (I’m saving some for a second post of this topic, hopefully later this year!)

Mr Wrong by Elizabeth Jane Howard

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While Elizabeth Jane Howard is best known for her multigenerational family epic, The Cazalet Chronicles, in 1975, she published a collection of short stories, Mr Wrong, which demonstrates a darker, more chilling side to her range. Of the nine pieces included here, two are effectively ghost stories, expertly channelling the unnerving atmosphere one expects from this type of tale. Several others feature sinister or unsettling elements, showcasing Howard’s ability to mine the more disquieting aspects of human nature, especially where sexual relationships are involved. I loved this collection of evocative, beautifully written stories and hope to find a place for it in my 2026 highlights – it really is that good!

The volume opens strongly with the titular Mr Wrong, one of the best and most memorable pieces featured here. Central to this story is Meg, a young, somewhat uncertain girl from the north who has come to London to find her feet. Having landed a job in an antiques shop, Meg buys a second-hand MG, which she will use to travel up the M1 to visit her family at weekends. However, the trouble starts one Friday night when Meg hears a disturbing noise coming from the back of the car.

She awoke very suddenly with a feeling of extreme fear. It was not from a dream; she was sitting in the driver’s seat, cramped, and with rain blowing in through the open window, but something else was very wrong. A sound – or noises, alarming in themselves, but, in her circumstances, frighteningly out of place. She shut her window except for an inch at the top. This made things worse. What sounded like heavy, laboured, stertorous, even painful breathing was coming, she quickly realized, from the back of the car. (p. 6)

As this chilling story unfolds, Meg decides to offer a lift to a desolate-looking girl she spots en route – the weather is horrendous, and the girl looks cold, exhausted and wet through. However, things take a decidedly sinister turn when the girl enters the car, and the source of those odd sounds from earlier is ultimately revealed. This brilliant, thoroughly unnerving story will have you checking the back seat of your car for unexpected intruders, especially when driving at night…Another chilling standout is Three Miles Up, in which a fractious holiday literally veers into unchartered territory when a mysterious but seemingly innocent young woman joins two men on their boat trip along a canal. The less said about the plot of this deliciously creepy story, the better, save to say it’s an unsettling treat. The canal wound and wound, and the reeds grew not only thick on each bank, but in clumps across the canal. The light drained out of the sky into the water and slowly drowned there; the trees and the banks became heavy and black. (p. 197)

A chance encounter also drives the narrative in Toutes Directions, in which a young British girl, Harriet, is on holiday in France. For the most part, the trip isn’t a great success, but Harriet hopes an overnight stay with her friend, Sue, who lives near Marseille, will be more fruitful. But when Harriet arrives, everything is in disarray. Sue will be having an illegal abortion that evening to dispose of an unwanted pregnancy, courtesy of her lover, Jean Christophe. Moreover, a train strike is due to begin the following day, meaning Harriet will need to catch the last train from Marseille that night to avoid being stranded for several days. At first, Harriet is furious with Jean Christophe for causing her friend to undergo the horrors of a backstreet abortion; but the drive back to Marseille station takes an unexpected turn, changing Harriet’s opinion of Sue’s surprisingly charming lover.

The whole thing was mysterious and amazing: in one way she felt that she knew Jean better than she had ever known anyone – in another, not at all. (p. 183)

This strange and disquieting story left me wondering whether it had been influenced by some of Howard’s own experiences with men during the 1960s, a time when women may have felt more pressured to submit to sexual advances than they do today.

Sexual tension also plays a role in Pont du Gard, another troubling story that revolves around a holiday in France. In this instance, an unhappily married couple, Alan and Ruth, are on a break with their sixteen-year-old daughter, Julie, and her slightly older and more experienced friend, Christine. Right from the start, it is evident that all is not well in this family, particularly the relationship between Alan and Ruth.  

‘Now which are we to do? Are we going to have lunch and then bathe, are we going to pack up the boot or not? I simply want to know. I don’t care in the least what we bloody well do if only you’d make up your minds’. His face, scalded by sun, was also steaming from sweat; his sparse, pale ginger hair had gathered into sodden spiky strands, his dry white forearms were blooming with yellow freckles. He was far too hot, Ruth thought: he insisted on spending his holidays in the heat, and it really didn’t suit him. (p. 54)

As this story unfolds, we learn that both Alan and Ruth have been embroiled in extramarital affairs. However, just as Ruth is about to reveal that she plans to leave Alan for her longstanding lover, Mervyn, Alan confesses to an affair of his own, which has now finished for good. Once again, this compelling tale ends on a disquieting note as Alan, having confessed to this previous indiscretion, now feels free to turn his attention to Christine, his daughter’s sexually attractive friend.

Howard continues this vibe with Child’s Play, in which adultery also plays a pivotal role. Kate has become aware that her husband, Brian, has been sleeping with the female farmhand in the couple’s hayloft at night – in fact, there’s a suggestion that this fling is the latest in a long line of similar liaisons, indicating a pattern of infidelity on Brian’s part. Meanwhile, their newly married daughter, Shirley, has come home for a few days to escape marital problems of her own.

Shirley has always been a daddy’s girl, favouring Brian over her mother, whom she seems to dislike; but when Kate is forced to witness a sickening display of flirtatious behaviour between her husband and their married daughter, it is more than she can reasonably bear.

(‘How dare you behave like this! – In front of your wife! Behind your husband’s back!’) She [Kate] needed two voices to scream it, but her body felt like some roaring conduit of surging blood, with a trap-door slammed shut in the bottom of her throat. As they approached her, she began fiddling unsteadily with the strawberries in the colander before her. (p. 150)

Child’s Play is an excellent story in which a mother’s attempts to tarnish her husband’s golden image in the eyes of his dotting daughter backfire in the cruellest manner possible. Howard doesn’t hold back here, ending this cautionary tale with a punch to the gut.

By now, you might be concerned that this collection sounds too unsettling; nevertheless, there are a few brighter elements too, adding delicate shafts of light to the disquieting shade. Sun-drenched, evocative and beautifully written, Summer Picnic showcases Howard’s talent for portraying different generations of women from the same family. In this brief sketch, she moves her point of view from one woman to another as a wealthy family enjoys a leisurely picnic together.

As Lillian watches her teenage daughter Lalage, memories of the halcyon days of her youth come flooding back, particularly an afternoon spent punting on the Thames.

Lalage, on the other hand, lay on a mossy bank of dark delicious green, with her hands clasped behind her golden head, while that nice young man who drove too fast peeled her a nectarine, and told her about motorcars. Suddenly, Lalage’s mother remembered reclining in a punt on the Thames… (p. 47)

Lalage’s grandmother is also reminded of similar outings from her adolescence, most memorably the time when she experienced her first kiss, far away from the other picnickers in a secluded spot.

Also worthy of a mention is The Devoted Ones, another evocative insight into the complex nature of family dynamics; but in this instance, the story takes place on Christmas Day. Central to this tale are two very different brothers, Donald and Russell, and their respective families, most of whom are gathered together in the country for the festive season. Russell, however, is currently in hospital receiving treatment for his alcohol addiction, while his wife, Lillian, waits by his side. As this beautifully crafted story unfolds, we learn that Donald’s wife, Ann, was originally attracted to Russell, but lost out to the more alluring Lillian when the latter appeared on the scene.

Ann was devoted to the house, and she really liked living in the country – it was only when she was tired, or when she compared her life to Lillian’s, that she felt discouraged and a little lost. But the sight of Lillian, haggardly attractive, intelligently debonair, had always roused her to some kind of dim resentment, and now, even Lillian’s children or her mother-in-law’s long-distance anxiety about their father produced the same effect. Russell had always monopolized the attention (and anxiety) of everyone near him. He certainly monopolized mine, Ann thought – fort as long as he wanted to do… (p. 119)

It’s another story where Howard shifts her point of view, giving the reader insights into each character’s inner life as she moves from one member of the household to the next. In this scene, we alight on the family’s nursemaid, Marie-Laure, who clearly misses her own home back in France.

In London, except for the brief, ravishing confidences of Madame, Marie-Laure was alone with the children (the little boy teased her, and spoke too fast, and the girl was jealous of her when Madame was there, and listless when she was not). She lived for the letters from France: for news of her sister’s baby, for the mosaic of domestic detail which made up her home; wept at a distance for the death of her canary, marvelled at the magnificence of Madame Grandet’s funeral, and longed for a proper soup, and her own church, and for the inside of a house to be warm. (pp. 116–117)

Howard’s attention to detail and flair for descriptive writing have always been very strong, and they’re very much in evidence here. I also love the portrait she paints of Russell and Lillian’s daughter, Vanessa, described by her grandmother as ‘a taut, tense little creature, all eyes and bones and secret reserves’. To Ann, however, Vanessa seems ‘morbid’, a closed, uncommunicative girl she finds hard to understand.

In summary, then, Mr Wrong is a fascinating collection of stories, showcasing the full range of Elizabeth Jane Howard’s talents for fiction. Happily, there are no weak links here, just pure unadulterated reading pleasure, especially for readers who enjoy sinister, unsettling, beautifully written stories. Howard, with her perceptive insights into human nature reminds me a little of Elizabeth Taylor, whom Howard names in her opening dedication – a fitting note given Taylor’s death in 1975, the year in which this excellent collection was first published.

Mr Wrong is published by Picador; personal copy.

Galley Beggar Ghost Stories – The Signalman by Charles Dickens and The Old Nurse’s Story by Elizabeth Gaskell

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Back in winter 2024, the independent publisher Gallery Beggar Press issued a small bundle of ghost stories called Pocket Ghosts, comprising three beautifully produced slim volumes, each containing a classic ghost story by a well-known writer: The Signalman by Charles Dickens, The Leaf-Sweeper by Muriel Spark and The Old Nurse’s Story by Elizabeth Gaskell. While ghost stories are often associated with Christmas, these excellent, eerie tales can be enjoyed at any time of the year, especially by readers who love the genre.

I’m going to cover these stories in a couple of posts, starting today with The Signalman, which is easily the best-known of the three, and The Old Nurse’s Story, my first experience of Mrs Gaskell’s supernatural fiction, but hopefully not my last. (Thoughts on The Leaf-Sweeper will follow, probably later this year, as I’ve yet to read it.)

The Signalman by Charles Dickens (1866)

Famously adapted for TV as part of the BBC’s Ghost Story for Christmas series, this chilling tale is thought to have been partly inspired by an accident involving a train on which Dickens was travelling in the late 19th century. The Staplehurst rail derailment in 1865 resulted in multiple fatalities and injuries, as did the Clayton Tunnel rail crash, which took place four years earlier in 1861.

In Dickens’ story, a narrator tells of his encounters with a troubled signalman, whom he visits at night in a signal box near a railway tunnel. On the second night, the signalman reveals he is haunted by strange, inexplicable occurrences – the ringing of a bell that no one else can hear and the appearance of a ghostly figure that no one else can see. On two previous occasions, these events were swiftly followed by fatal incidents in the tunnel – firstly, a horrific train crash, in which many people died, while others were seriously injured, and secondly, the sudden death of a beautiful woman, glimpsed by the signalman as she writhed in agony on the passing train. Consequently, the signalman is convinced that the bell and ghostly figure are prophecies of impending doom – eerie augurs of a forthcoming tragedy.

‘That very day, as a train came out of the tunnel, I noticed, at a carriage window on my side, what looked like a confusion of hands and heads, and something waved. I saw it just in time to signal the driver, Stop! He shut off, and put his brake on, but the train drifted past here a hundred and fifty yards or more. I ran after it, and, as I went along, heard terrible screams and cries. A beautiful young lady had died instantaneously in one of the compartments, and was brought in here, and laid down on this floor between us.’ (p. 30)

With this foreshadowing groundwork in place, the reader knows that another dreadful incident will almost certainly occur, especially once the signalman reveals a recent sighting of the figure accompanied by the ringing bell. The question is, will the signalman be able to prevent another tragedy in the tunnel, or is he powerless against whatever terrifying supernatural forces are at play?

His pain of mind was most pitiable to see. It was the mental torture of a conscientious man, oppressed beyond endurance by an unintelligible responsibility involving life. (pp. 35–36)

This story feels so atmospheric, partly because Dickens infuses it with a creeping sense of dread. Alongside the haunting symbols of the bell and the spectral figure, Dickens creates an air of mystery about the narrator himself as we never really learn who he is – or indeed, how reliable he might be. One might even wonder whether he is also a phantom, especially given the mirroring between his initial greeting to the signalman and the words uttered by the ghostly figure when he appears by the tunnel. Either way, it’s a very unsettling tale, ideal for a chilly, windswept night.

So little sunlight ever found its way to this spot, that it had an earthy, deadly smell; and so much cold wind rushed through it, that it struck chill to me, as if I had left the natural world. (p. 13)

The Signalman has been adapted many times, but the most famous version was written by Andrew Davies for the BBC’s Ghost Story at Christmas TV series. This excellent adaptation, starring Denholm Elliot as the titular signalman, was first broadcast in December 1976 and remains a favourite for many fans of the format.  

The Old Nurse’s Story by Elizabeth Gaskell

This spooky, suspenseful story features many of the classic elements of the best Gothic literature, from an orphaned child sent to live with a distant, elderly relative in the country, to a cold, stately manor house with a mysterious wing that remains off-limits to new arrivals.

The story is narrated by Hester, the young nanny who accompanies her charge, five-year-old Rosamond, to their new home at Furnivall Manor in the Northumberland fells. This vast, foreboding house is so close to the surrounding forest that it is at risk of being overshadowed by trees, their branches stretching out like gnarled and wizened fingers. The eerie atmosphere is enhanced by the sound of an old organ being played on stormy nights, even though the old footman, James, and his kindly wife, Dorothy, try to pass it off as the wind whistling through the trees. Meanwhile, elderly Miss Furnivall, who is virtually deaf, and her companion, Mrs Stark, eke out their days making tapestries in the drawing room, ensconced in the lonely, melancholic aura that permeates this disquieting house.

Sitting with her, working at the same great piece of tapestry, was Mrs Stark, her maid and companion, and almost as old as she was. She had lived with Miss Furnivall ever since they both were young, and now she seemed more like a friend than a servant; she looked so cold, and grey, and stony, as if she had never loved or cared for anyone; and I don’t suppose she did care for anyone, except her mistress; and, owing to the great deafness of the latter, Mrs. Stark treated her very much as if she were a child. (p. 17)

Where Gaskell really excels here is by slowly ratcheting up the suspense as her story unfolds. The house and its inhabitants are harbouring secrets, information that Hester and Rosamond are not privy to, even though the former is disturbed by various frightening occurrences. As this unnerving tale spins towards its dramatic denouement, powerful supernatural forces threaten Rosamond’s safety, prompting Hester to be on the alert for the appearance of a ghostly figure or two intent on luring the child onto the sinister fells…

I turned towards the long narrow windows, and there, sure enough, I saw a little girl, less than my Miss Rosamond – dressed all unfit to be out-of-doors such a bitter night – crying, and beating against the window-panes, as if she wanted to be let in. She seemed to sob and wail, till Miss Rosamond could bear it no longer, and was flying to the door to open it, when all of a sudden, and close upon us, the great organ peeled out so loud and thundering, it fairly made me tremble; and all the more, when I remembered me that, even in the stillness of that dead-cold weather, I had heard no sound of little battering hands upon the window-glass, although the phantom child had seemed to put forth all its force… (p. 42)

As in The Signalman, foreshadowing plays a key role in this haunting story, tapping into themes of jealousy, sibling rivalry and terrible family secrets, all cloaked in the snowy atmosphere of winter to ramp up the chilly mood.

The Galley Beggar Pocket Ghosts are still available from the publisher’s website – link here – and their stylish covers make them ideal as gifts. Highly recommended, particularly for fans of the genre.

Stories for Mothers and Daughters – Maeve Brennan, A. S. Byatt, Jeanette Winterson & more!

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Over the past few years, the British Library has been doing sterling work with its excellent Women Writers series, reissuing lesser-known 20th-century novels by female authors for modern-day readers to enjoy. Alongside the novels, the series includes a handful of carefully curated anthologies, one of which – Stories for Mothers and Daughters – I’m discussing here.

Sometimes, these types of collections can be a little uneven, but in this instance, almost all the entries are very good. Here we have stories that explore various facets of mother-daughter relationships, from headstrong, liberated daughters opposing the more traditional authority figures their mothers represent, to shy, uncertain girls being pushed into society with limited support. In other tales, we learn of the sacrifices some mothers are prepared to make for the benefit of their children. It’s a fascinating collection, spanning a variety of different styles and the full breadth of the 20th century in settings / timeframes. As is often the case, different stories will likely resonate with different readers depending on their tastes, but there really does appear to be something for everyone here, from humorous sketches to poignant pieces to dramatic stories of clashing ideals.

The collection opens with Week-End by Richmal Crompton, who is probably best known for her Just William books, which makes perfect sense given the protagonists in this tale. As the story opens, a widowed mother who values peace and quiet is preparing to welcome her three boisterous adult daughters and their friend, ‘Nibbles’, for the weekend. The girls duly arrive, sweeping through the country cottage in a whirlwind of noise, selfish behaviour and blatant disregard for their mother’s way of life, The crux of this story rests on illustrating how blinkered these daughters are to their mother’s true desires – in short, they assume their mother needs cheering up, while in actual fact, she’d much rather be on her own. However, Compton overdoes it in the execution of this tale, portraying these girls as spoilt ten-year-olds rather than working women in their twenties or late teens. I loved the concept behind this one but couldn’t buy the girls’ behaviour, which included sliding down bannisters and surfing on tea trays when the weather turned foul!

Clashing priorities of a different kind feature in Inez Holden’s excellent story, The Value of Being Seen, in which Mrs Ascot is determined to launch her daughter Daphne into London society. Every preparation has been made, from ‘polishing’ Daphne at a Parisian finishing school and taking a house in London for the debutante season to instructing the girl on the importance of being seen and making a good impression. And yet, Daphne, who is shy and retiring at heart, finds the endless whirl of society dances terribly intimidating. As the interminable season unfolds, Daphne finds herself fading into the background to the point of becoming invisible to those around her.

Daphne’s existence went on. There were more dances, tea meetings, Lord’s, Goodwood, helping with plays for good causes; the unending putting on of dresses and having pictures taken; Daphne went about in a group of other débutantes all the time. They had nothing of any interest to say to one another—only cries of approval, foolish little laughs, and accounts of dancers fixed for the future. There was not a quiet minute, and through it all no one seemed to see Daphne. She was unconscious of herself, and she went on being unseen. (p. 22)

It’s a very striking story – sad, dark and beautifully executed.

I also loved A. S. Byatt’s evocative story Rose-Coloured Teacups, my first experience of this writer’s work. When Veronica’s daughter, Jane, breaks her mother’s sewing machine – a treasured family heirloom – Veronica is filled with rage at the girl’s behaviour. But the incident also prompts Veronica to recall a similar experience from her student days when she broke several rose-coloured teacups – a gift she detested at the time. Just like the sewing machine, the rose-coloured tea-cups were a treasured possession, passed from one generation to the next in an emotionally charged gesture. When the terrible breakage was discovered, Veronica’s mother was outraged by her daughter’s carelessness, not only at the destruction of the cups themselves but also as a howl of anguish at being trapped by the restrictions of marriage, motherhood and domesticity in general.

The teacups had been given by her mother’s old college friend, to take back a new generation to the college. She had not liked the teacups. She did not like pink, and the floral shape of the saucers was most unfashionable. She and her friends drank Nescafe from stone mugs or plain cylinders in primary colours. She had left folded in her drawer the tablecloth embroidered for her by her grandmother, whose style of embroidery was now exemplified by the cloth, so stiff and clean and brilliant, in the visionary teaparty she had taken to imagining since her mother died. It was a curious form of mourning, but compulsive, and partly comforting. It seemed to be all she was capable of. The force of her mother’s rage against the house and housewifery that trapped her and, by extension, against her clever daughters, who had all partly evaded that trap, precluded wholehearted mourning. (pp. 122–123)

Another excellent story, full of emotional truth. 

A clash of another sort is central to Mary Arden’s striking story The Stepmother,in which a former schoolmistress, Esther King, who prides herself on being able to understand young girls, finds herself struggling to form a bond with her teenage stepdaughter, Ella. Newly married to Ella’s middle-aged father, Esther tries every trick in her armamentarium to befriend Ella, who remains stubbornly polite yet distant and aloof.

In the days, in the weeks after Ella’s coming, Esther was not at all happy. She felt that she was always trying to be nice to Ella, and yet always her advances were met—no, not exactly coldly, and yet somehow not met at all. And still—utterly unlike the Miss King of former days—Esther simply had to go on being sweet to this obstinate creature who refused to respond to her charms. Sometimes she hated herself for it, sometimes there came a little twinge of hatred for Ella, but there was something about the child… (p. 190)

When an infatuated former pupil of Esther’s comes to stay during the holidays, the situation comes to a head, forcing a brutal showdown between Ella and her stepmother. It’s a crushing story culminating in a dramatic denouement.

Phyllis Bottome’s The Battle-Field is another standout example of a mother and daughter pulling in different directions, but in this instance, the mother’s behaviour poses a serious risk to her child’s health. Madeleine has always been a delicate young woman, prone to lung disease and other related conditions, which her mother has nursed. Nevertheless, when a new physician takes over Madeleine’s care, complete rest in a sanatorium is prescribed, which ultimately means no visits from her mother. As this excellent story plays out, the nature of the maternal bond is tested, emotional truths come to light and secrets are revealed, forcing Madeleine to reassess the true aim of her mother’s actions. Bottome paints a vivid picture of a toxic, co-dependent relationship in this dark, beautifully executed story that chills the soul.

Deceptions of a different kind are at the heart of Amy Bloom’s Love is Not a Pie, in which two grown-up sisters develop a deeper awareness of the tangled nature of their mother’s love life in the wake of her death. The significance of puzzling scenes from the girls’ childhoods now slots into place, revealing hard truths about a family friend and his complex relationships with both of their parents.

What was that, I thought, what did I see? I wanted to go back and take another look, to see it again, to make it disappear, to watch them carefully, until I understood. (p. 139)

This surprising story will take readers to some unexpected places, echoing perhaps the sexual freedoms of the ‘60s and ‘70s in its narrative arc.

Maeve Brennan’s The Shadow of Kindness is a bleak, melancholic gem, in which the absence of Delia Bagot’s two children – on holiday with their aunt and uncle in the country – throws the emptiness of Delia’s life into sharp relief. The most heartbreaking aspects of this story stem from the semi-estranged state of the Bagots’ marriage, now an emotional desert following the early death of their first child some ten years earlier.

She knew things were not as they should be between them, but while the children were at home she did not want to say anything for fear of a row that might frighten the children, and now that the children were away she found she was afraid to speak for fear of disturbing a silence that might, if broken, reveal any number of things that she did not want to see and that she was sure he did not want to see. Or perhaps he saw them and kept silent out of charity, or out of despair, or out of a hope that they would vanish if no one paid any attention to them. (p. 111)

This story appears in Brennan’s superb collection The Springs of Affection, which I would highly recommend if you haven’t read it already – it’s one of my all-time favourites!

Elsewhere, Jeanette Winterson has fun with her darkly humorous tale Psalms, whose fervently religious mother and sanguine daughter reminded me of Oranges are Not the Only Fruit. Janet Frame’s Pictures is particularly lovely – a touching story of a mother and daughter enjoying a trip to the cinema. There is no conflict here, just beauty and humanity, an escape from the lonely boarding house where the pair live.

It was a wonderful picture. It was the greatest love story ever told. It was Life and Love and Laughter, and Tenderness and Tears. (p. 49)

Tillie Olsen’s I Stand Here Ironing is another poignant one, highlighting the challenges faced by a poor single mother, raising a daughter during America’s Great Depression.

She was too vulnerable for that terrible world of youthful competition, of preening and parading, of constant measuring of yourself against every other, of envy… (p. 175)

This is a sad story of a child whose life is shaped by harsh circumstances, but there are glimmers of something more hopeful here, especially towards the end.

Finally, a mention for Winifred Holtby’s The Silver Cloak, one of my favourites in this delightful collection – a memorable story in which age and experience must give way to the freshness of youth, even when the mother is still relatively young (thirty-six!) and beautiful herself.

Annie stared at her daughter, and as she looked, the hot shame brought dark blushes to her own cheeks, bathing her neck in warm colour. “Why, Katie!” Katie was jealous. Jealous of her. She had been a thief. She had wanted to steal the pretty things and the attention and the fun which belonged to youth by right of birth. She had been greedy, usurping the girl’s place, because, through her own experience, she knew so much better than Katie what to say and do and wear. She saw the lovely relationship which had bound them so closely breaking down before her grasping desire for a good time. And all for a cloak, a silly silver cloak which wasn’t even very suitable. (pp. 62–63)

As ever with the BL’s Women Writers series, the book is beautifully produced and comes with an informative introduction – in this instance by Molly Thatcher and Simon Thomas. Highly recommended; my thanks to the publisher for kindly providing a review copy, which I read for Karen’s Read Indies event.

My Books of the Year, 2025 – Part 1

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I seem to say this every year, but 2025 really has been a great reading year for me. From new releases to treasures from the TBR to brilliant reissues and rediscoveries, the books have been excellent, with very few misses.

As before, I’m splitting my favourite reads of the year into two parts, with thirteen highlights in each post; however, in this instance, the split is fairly arbitrary. Today’s post covers my favourites from the first half of the reading year (roughly speaking), while part two (coming at the weekend) will feature the standout reads from the second half of 2025. I couldn’t bear to leave any of them out, even though it means a total of twenty-six books.

So, without further ado, here are my favourite reads from Jan – May 2025! These are the books I loved, the books that have stayed with me, the books I’m most likely to recommend to other readers. As ever, many of these titles were first published in the 20th century, although there are a few recent releases as well. I’ve summarised each one in this post, but in each instance, you can find my full review by clicking on the relevant title.

The Fate of Mary Rose by Caroline Blackwood (1981)

With its undercurrent of domestic horror and flashes of pitch-black humour, this unnerving novel is a brilliant exploration of our collective fascination with gruesome true crimes, how sometimes we can become emotionally involved in a media story with which we have no personal connection. Blackwood seems particularly interested in how a mother’s protectiveness towards her child can tip over into an unhealthy obsession – in this instance, the transition is prompted by the brutal assault and murder of a young girl in the local community, fuelled by media reports and underlying social anxieties. It’s a fascinating, disturbing book, reminiscent of Shirley Jackson in its darkness and unflinching pursuit of a singular vision.

The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick (2015)

First published in 2015 and reissued this year by Daunt Books, The Odd Woman and the City is Gornick’s ode to New York, a book that captures the rhythms and idiosyncrasies of this vibrant metropolis in sharp, insightful prose. Presented as a sequence of beguiling vignettes, the book 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 relationships other writers enjoy with major cities are also briefly featured. The vignettes are not grouped chronologically or by topic; rather, Gornick moves seamlessly backwards and forwards in time and from one theme to the next, sharing insights and confidences on a variety of different subjects as she goes. In fact, the book’s rhythm – vibrant, fast-moving and constantly changing in nature – reflects the city’s character itself.

There is so much insight, honesty and intelligence in these vignettes, and Gornick is a delightful companion – smart, curious and ever-observant. If, like me, you enjoy exploring cities on foot, soaking up the atmosphere of the urban streets, you will likely love this one.

Mr Bowling Buys a Newspaper by Donald Henderson (1943)

I can’t quite recall where I first heard about Donald Henderson’s excellent novel, Mr Bowling Buys a Newspaper, a wickedly satirical portrayal of a murderer operating under the cloak of the London Blitz. It may have been on Backlisted, always an excellent source of lesser-known gems, or possibly during a discussion about boarding-house novels, a genre close to my heart. Either way, I’m very glad to have discovered it. That said, this pitch-black wartime gem might not be to everyone’s tastes. If you’re a fan of Patrick Hamilton’s Hangover Square, William Trevor’s The Boarding-House or Patricia Highsmith’s The Blunderer, chances are you’ll enjoy this book. If not, you might want to steer clear! I loved this darkly satirical portrayal of Henderson’s twisted, opportunistic killer, and the Patrick Hamilton-style vibe really drew me in. Not for the sensitive or faint-hearted, but a wickedly compelling novel nonetheless. Raymond Chandler was a huge fan!

A Little Luck by Claudia Piñeiro, 2015 (tr. Frances Riddle, 2023)

A fascinating, utterly gripping novel about chance vs fate, split-second decisions and their irreversible consequences, guilt vs responsibility and condemnation vs redemption. In short, this thought-provoking story follows a middle-aged woman, Mary Lohan, who returns to her old neighbourhood in Temperley, Buenos Aires, after an absence of twenty years. At first, we don’t know why she has come back, or the reasons behind her earlier departure, but things gradually become clearer as the novel unfolds. Piñeiro is very skilled at withholding key information, and the novel is a masterclass in measured pacing and the piece-by-piece reveal. The compelling first-person narrative reads like a kind of confession, establishing a level of intimacy with the reader and drawing them into Mary’s story from the opening pages. An outstanding, beautifully written novel that’s hard to shake.

Box Office Poison by Tim Robey (2024)

There is something genuinely fascinating about raking over the coals of a humungous financial disaster – a point eloquently illustrated by film critic and writer Tim Robey in his hugely enjoyable book, Box Office Poison, a catalogue of cinematic catastrophes from the past hundred years. In some respects, this roll call of wreckage presents an alternative history of Hollywood through its most costly failures, and it’s a delight to read!

Robey’s definition of a flop is simple. Crucially, the film must have made a significant loss at the box office. In other words, flops are defined in commercial terms rather than ruinous reviews by critics (although in some instances, the two go hand in hand). Moreover, the production must have been truly insane in some way for a film to qualify for inclusion, thus making the story suitably interesting to recount. From outright horrors with few redeeming features (such as Jan de Bont’s pedestrian actioner Speed 2: Cruise Control and Thomas Lee’s ‘textbook shambles’ Supernova) to genuinely decent films that flopped due to unfortunate circumstances (e.g. William Friedkin’s Sorcerer), this is catnip for the cinephile in your life!

The Sweet Dove Died by Barbara Pym (1978)

Barbara Pym has made several appearances in my reading highlights over the years, and she’s here again in 2025 with a fairly recent reissue. First published in 1978, The Sweet Dove Died is one of Pym’s post-wilderness novels, and as such, the tone feels somewhat darker than her earlier work. There’s a genuine poignancy here, a sense of a woman losing her beauty and allure as younger, more attractive rivals threaten to supersede her in the search for affection. While the novel’s tone is poignant, especially towards the end, there are some wonderful touches of humour here, too. Pym’s fiction may at first seem light or inconsequential, but it’s a testament to her skill as a writer that she captures the delicate tension between humour, pathos and absurdity that characterises so much of our lives. I adored this beautifully written exploration of the narrowing opportunities for love as we age and lose our lustre – it’s top-tier Pym for me!

There’s No Turning Back by Alba de Céspedes, 1938 (tr. Ann Goldstein, 2024)

Groundbreaking on its initial publication in 1938, There’s No Turning Back can now be viewed as a prescient, transgressive exploration of women’s desire for independence, autonomy and self-expression. By weaving together the stories of eight young female students living in the Grimaldi, a convent-style boarding house in Rome, de Céspedes presents the reader with a range of different experiences as each of these women must find a way to live, to shape her future direction for the better.

In essence, each student is trying to bridge the gap between the role society has deemed for her and the one she herself wishes to adopt. Moreover, she must consider what challenges must be overcome and what sacrifices need to be made to achieve her aspirations. With many of these women looking to branch out beyond the traditional gender-based roles of wife and mother, the novel explores themes such as female friendship, agency, independence, autonomy, ambition, desire, and fulfilment in a wonderfully engaging way. By focusing on the choices these characters make to break free from their constraints, de Céspedes explores the upsides and downsides of progression through education vs work, love vs independence and personal desires vs familial duty. An immersive, richly imagined novel that deserves to be better known.

Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood (2023)

Strange, unsettling and beautifully written, Stone Yard Devotional is a quiet, meditative novel that explores themes of loss, grief, forgiveness, guilt, atonement and death – the kind of mysterious, slow-burning narrative that gets right under the skin. Written partly as brief diary-style entries and partly as a series of reflections on events, the novel is narrated by an unnamed woman in late middle age. With her marriage crumbling and a loss of faith in her environmental work, Wood’s narrator has come to an isolated retreat in New South Wales to reflect and contemplate her existence. All proceeds smoothly until the retreat’s peaceful atmosphere is rudely disrupted by three unsettling visitations (more of which in my full review).

Wood’s style is subtle and understated, leaving much unsaid for readers to contemplate and fill in for themselves. Forgiveness and atonement are recurring themes here as the author invites us to consider what it means to forgive someone who has wronged us and what we truly want when attempting to atone. An absorbing, thought-provoking book – one of the best new novels I’ve read in recent years.

It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over by Anne de Marcken (2024)

This strange, magical, exquisitely written book is a tricky one to summarise in a few lines, but I’ll give it a go! On one level, it’s a remarkably poignant reflection on what it might be like to exist in the afterlife, how it feels emotionally to be caught between life and death, to be a member of the undead. In other words, it’s a zombie story, but not as we know it – de Marcken’s vision is much more inventive and beautiful than that brief description suggests. Alongside (and perhaps entwined with) its themes of yearning, loss and grief, the book can be viewed as a metaphor for our current existence in an isolated, alienating 21st-century world, where the overwhelming horrors and uncertainties of modern life leave us feeling disillusioned and numbed. The ending, when it comes, is beautiful, enigmatic, sad and strangely fitting. I adored this deeply affecting exploration of grief and all the longing, pain and sadness this all-consuming experience evokes. A highly original novella that deserves to be widely read.

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. 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 Reef by Edith Wharton (1912)

Over the years, Edith Wharton has become one of my favourite authors. She writes precisely and perceptively about the cruelties embedded within the upper echelons of American society in the early 20th century. For instance, the tensions that exist between restraint & passion and those between respectability & impropriety. These qualities are central to Wharton’s much-loved society novels The Age of Innocence and The House of Mirth, both of which I adore. The Reef could easily be added to this list, particularly given the devastating nature of the premise. It’s a story of indiscretions, deceptions and complex romantic entanglements where what remains unsaid can be more damaging than the details revealed.

Central to the novel, which revolves around a love triangle (or possibly a quadrangle), are questions of trust and integrity. For instance, it is better for us to be honest about our past mistakes, even when we know such revelations will hurt the ones we love, or should we lie and cover our tracks to avoid undue distress? And if the terrible truth should come to light, will it be possible for our loved ones to forgive and forget?

The Dangers of Smoking in Bed by Mariana Enriquez, 2009 (tr. Megan McDowell, 2021)

Last year, I read and loved Mariana Enriquez’s Things We Lost in the Fire, a superb collection of macabre, deeply disturbing short stories in which elements of Gothic horror and surreal, otherworldly imagery mingle with insightful social critique, tapping into the collective traumas from Argentina’s atrocities, both past and present. Enriquez grew up during the Dirty War, when several thousand Argentine citizens were murdered or disappeared. Consequently, the ghosts of the vanished – both literal and metaphorical – haunt many of her stories, bringing the country’s horrors to life in vivid and compelling ways.

Translated into English in 2021, The Dangers of Smoking in Bed is in a very similar vein to Fire – another unnerving collection of stories with the power to destabilise and disturb contemporary readers. Enriquez excels at weaving together the surreal and supernatural, embedding these into the real-world socio-political horrors of life in Argentina, from poverty, parental neglect and sexual abuse to disappearances, murders and other criminal activities. There’s a wildness or sense of craziness to many of these stories, twisting the recognisable into distorted, destabilising shapes – and it’s this rooting in reality, the real and inescapable, that makes Enriquez’s stories so horrifying and impactful to read. Unnerving, alluring and inventive, these stories are not for the faint-hearted; otherwise, very highly recommended indeed!

The Grand Babylon Hotel by Arnold Bennett (1902)

I loved this hugely enjoyable, fast-moving caper, largely set 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!

So, that’s it for Part 1 of my favourite books from another year of reading. Do let me know your thoughts on my choices – I’d love to hear your views.

Join me again for Part 2, when I’ll be sharing another thirteen favourites, this time from the second half of my reading year.

The New Dress by Virginia Woolf

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I’ve always had a tricky relationship with Virginia Woolf, having first read her when I was grieving the loss of a parent, which still makes it difficult to separate her from painful memories of that time. Recently published in the Archive series, which marks Penguin’s 90th anniversary, The New Dress seemed like a good way for me to reconnect with Woolf, especially because it’s a collection of her short fiction, thereby making it easier for me to read a story every now and again whenever I was in the right mood.

It’s also a good introduction to various elements of Woolf’s modernist style, ranging from what I would term her conventional short stories (e.g. The Legacy and Solid Objects) to more experimental sketches, in which the protagonists’ thoughts seem to flow like a cascade, spinning off into various directions in a stream-of-consciousness style. I must admit to preferring her more conventional work to the experimental pieces, but there’s no denying the thrilling nature of her prose.

Several of these tales show how everyday objects, such as a new dress, a needlework pin or a piece of coloured glass can act as powerful conduits for deep-rooted feelings, often revealing something essential about a character’s personality and mindset. In the titular story, one of the standout pieces here, a forty-year-old married woman’s insecurities are exposed during a party hosted by Clarissa Dalloway. (This is one of a handful of pieces linked to Woolf’s much-loved novella, Mrs Dalloway.)

Hoping to make a good impression with people from a higher social class than her own, Mabel Waring arrives at the party wearing a new yellow silk dress. She’s had the dress specially made for the occasion from a traditional (i.e. old-fashioned) patten, thinking it would look stylish and original. However, amidst the confident, fashionably-dressed guests at Clarissa’s gathering, Mabel sees the new dress for what it is – a reflection of her weak, ineffectual, indecisive personality.

Mabel had her first serious suspicion that something was wrong as she took her cloak off and Mrs Barnet, while handing her the mirror and touching the brushes and thus drawing her attention, perhaps rather markedly, to all the appliances for tidying and improving hair, complexion, clothes, which existed on the dressing-table, confirmed the suspicion – that it was not right, not quite right, […] No! It was not right. And at once the misery which she always tried to hide, the profound dissatisfaction – the sense she had had, ever since she was a child, of being inferior to other people – set upon her, relentlessly, remorselessly, with an intensity which she could not beat off… (p.115)

The experience leaves Mabel feeling self-conscious and inadequate, like a fly trapped in a saucer of milk, desperately trying to escape but failing dismally.

But she dared not look in the glass. She could not face the whole horror – the pale yellow, idiotically old-fashioned silk dress with its long skirt and its high sleeves and its waist and all the things that looked so charming in the fashion book, but not on her, not among all these ordinary people. She felt like a dressmaker’s dummy standing there, for young people to stick pins into. (pp. 116–117)

As the party unfolds, Mabel’s discomfort is heightened by thoughts of the other guests, what they must be thinking and saying about her and the frightful yellow dress. Moreover, she reflects on all the disappointments in her life, the hardships she has endured and the chances sorely missed. Born into a large, cash-strapped family, Mabel has spent much of her life skimping and saving. Despite her great dreams of a marriage to a prosperous, successful man, she lives an ordinary, unexciting life with her unambitious husband, Hubert, an underling in the law courts. Her approach to motherhood has also been fretful and worrisome, vacillating from one position to another, none of them very strong.

Still, out of this painful reckoning with past failings comes a sense of determination as Mabel resolves to transform her life for the better. The ending is somewhat open, leaving the reader to wonder whether this new burst of positivity will triumph over old habits, or whether Mabel’s inherent insecurities will win out. It’s an excellent story, vividly told.

The Legacy is another highlight – again, more conventional than the impressionistic pieces here. In this beautifully paced story, a prominent politician is puzzled by his late wife’s meticulous planning on what is to be done with various personal possessions following her death. The deeper Gilbert delves into his wife’s diaries – diaries kept strictly private while she was alive – the more agitated he becomes at the mention of B. M. Who is B. M., and what was his/her relationship with his late wife, Angela?

The initials B. M., B. M., B. M., recurred repeatedly. But why never the full name? There was an informality, an intimacy in the use of initials that was very unlike Angela. Had she called him B. M. to his face? He read on. ‘B. M. came unexpectedly after dinner. Luckily, I was alone.’ That was only a year ago. ‘Luckily’ – why luckily? – ‘I was alone.’ Where had he been that night? He checked the date in his engagement book. It had been the night of the Mansion House dinner. And B. M. and Angela had spent the evening alone! He tried to recall that evening. Was she waiting up for him when he came back? Had the room looked just as usual? Were there glasses on the table? Were the chairs drawn close together? He could remember nothing – nothing whatever… (p. 83)

The mystery is revealed, of course, partly through a brooch Angela has left to her secretary; but I’ll let you discover the outcome for yourself, should you read the book.

I also really enjoyed Lappin and Lapinova, in which these rabbit-related nicknames, and the secret fantasy world these creatures exist in, become signifiers for the happiest times in a young couple’s relationship. Should Lappin and Lapinova ‘disappear’, the marriage will be over…

Elsewhere, in Moments of Being: Slater’s Pins Have No Points a sewing pin reveals to a pupil something significant about the inner life of her music teacher, while A Woman’s College from Outside offers an evocative glimpse into Newnham College, Cambridge.

From all the rooms where women slept this vapour issued, attaching itself to shrubs, like mist, and then blew freely out into the open. Elderly women slept, who would on waking immediately clasp the ivory rod of office. Now smooth and colourless, reposing deeply, they lay surrounded, lay supported, by the bodies of youth recumbent or grouped at the window; pouring forth into the garden this bubbling laughter, this irresponsible laughter: this laughter of mind and body floating away rules, hours, discipline: immensely fertilizing, yet formless, chaotic, trailing and straying and tufting the rose-bushes with shreds of vapour. (p. 24)

In Solid Objects, another intriguing story, Woolf explores the potential dangers of becoming fixated on something to the exclusion of all else. When a man finds an attractively shaped piece of coloured glass, almost like a gemstone, washed up on a beach, he becomes obsessed with looking for similar ‘treasures’. As the month and years pass, his friendships and social life fall by the wayside, as do his political ambitions – all at the expense of all-consuming compulsion.

In several of these stories, Woolf blurs the margins between the real and the imaginary, leaving the reader to wonder what is true vs a figment of the protagonist’s imagination. The Shooting Party is an excellent example of this, an evocative sketch in which a woman is returning by train from just such an event. The Lady in the Looking-Glass: A Reflection is similarly slippery, prompting us to reassess the situation we are reading about as more information is revealed.

As for facts, it was a fact that she was a spinster; that she was rich; that she had bought this house and collected with her own hands – often in the most obscure corners of the world and at great risk from poisonous stings and Oriental diseases – the rugs, the chairs, the cabinets which now lived their nocturnal life before one’s eyes. Sometimes it seemed as if they knew more about her than we, who sat on them, wrote at them, and trod on them so carefully, were allowed to know. In each of these cabinets were many little drawers, and each almost certainly held letters, tied with bows of ribbon, sprinkled with sticks of lavender or rose leaves. For it was another fact…that Isabella had known many people, had had many friends; and thus if one had the audacity to open a drawer and read her letters, one would find the traces of many agitations, of appointments to meet, of upbraidings for not having met, long letters of intimacy and affection, violent letters of jealousy and reproach, terrible final words of parting – for all those interviews and assignations had led to nothing – that is, she had never married, and yet, judging from the mask-like indifference of her face, she had gone through twenty times more of passion and experience than those whose loves are trumpeted forth for all the world to hear. (p. 57–58)

So, all in all, a fascinating collection of Woolf’s short fiction, even if some of the pieces resonated more strongly with me than others. It’s ideal for readers looking to sample (or reconnect with) this author’s work, maybe as a lead-in to some of her novels. Karen (at Kaggsy’s Bookish Ramblings) has also written about this Penguin Archive edition here.

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. 

Stories for Summer and Days by the Pool – Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Taylor, Daphne du Maurier and many more!

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Over the past few years, the British Library has continued to develop its excellent Women Writers series, reissuing lesser-known novels by female authors from the 20th century for modern-day readers to enjoy. Alongside these novels, the series includes a handful of carefully curated anthologies, one of which, Stories for Summer and Days by the Pool, I’m reviewing here.

Overall, this is an evocative collection of summer-themed stories, full of heady, sunny days, warm sultry nights and the powerful feelings these conditions tend to evoke. As the heat rises, jealousies swirl, passions are stirred and repressed emotions begin to resurface. Here we have stories of holiday romance, coming-of-age, changes in destiny and relationships under strain.

Occasionally, these sorts of collections can be somewhat uneven, with a few slighter stories lurking between the gems. In this instance, however, all fourteen stories are well worth your time, while four entries – those by Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Taylor, Daphne du Maurier and Muriel Spark – are very good indeed.

The book is also beautifully produced – the literary equivalent of a box of chocolates, featuring perennial favourites, new discoveries and the occasional left-field choice. With contributions from critically acclaimed writers such as Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Taylor and Sylvia Townsend Warner to lesser-known contemporaries including Sylvia Lynd, Phyllis Bottome and Mary Lavin, this delightful anthology showcases tales in a range of styles – from evocative sketches to poignant encounters and partings to creepy, atmospheric stories that linger in the mind. Inevitably, different stories will resonate with different readers, depending on their tastes, but there really does appear to be something for almost everyone here! As in reviews of other anthologies and short story collections, I’ll focus on some of my favourites to give you a flavour of the highlights.

The collection opens with Katherine Mansfield’s Carnation, a brief, evocative sketch with sexual undertones, which takes place in a girls’ school. Mansfield uses imagery very effectively here, leaving the symbolism open to interpretation by the reader as her story unfurls.

She bought a carnation to the French class, a deep, deep red one, that looked as though it had been dipped in wine and left in the dark to dry. (p. 1)

Flowers also make an appearance in Virginia Woolf’s equally evocative story Kew Gardens, a short sketch in which a couple’s emotional history is briefly illuminated by glimpses of their past.

The petals were voluminous enough to be stirred by the summer breeze, and when they moved, the red, blue and yellow lights past one over the other, staining an inch of the brown earth beneath with a spot of the most intricate colour. (p. 5)

In Elizabeth Bowen’s Requiescat, one of my favourites from this collection, Stuart has come to Italy to see the recently widowed Mrs Majendie, who was married to his friend, Howard. As this subtly devastating story unfolds, Bowen reveals the true nature of Stuart’s feelings for Mrs Majendie, hinting at what might have been if their paths had taken the same turn.

She was less beautiful than he had remembered her, and very tall and thin in her black dress. Her composure did not astonish him; her smile, undimmed, and the sound of her voice recalled to him the poignancy of his feelings when he had first known her, his resentment and sense of defeat—she had possessed herself of Howard so entirely. She was shortsighted, there was always a look of uncertainty in her eyes until she came quite near one, her big pupils seemed to see too much at once and nothing very plainly. (p. 14)

This excellent, exquisitely written story quivers with the latent energy of emotions long suppressed, all played out against the beauty of an Italian garden resplendent in summer.

Tentative relationships of a different kind can be found in Elizabeth Taylor’s excellent story In a Different Light, in which a married, middle-aged woman, Barbara, travels alone to a Greek island, ostensibly to comfort her recently widowed sister, Jane. While Barbara believes there is nothing left for her sister in Greece, Jane seems determined to stay, irreverently dismissing any practical concerns.

During her trip, Barbara becomes friendly with Roland, a married architect from Hampstead, holidaying by himself on the island. Nothing sexual or romantic happens between the pair as they spend their afternoons together exploring the island’s quiet charms. Nevertheless, away from the familiar, mundane routines of their daily lives back in the UK, Barbara and Roland form an unlikely attachment to one another, a bond that leaves both parties somewhat unsettled and changed by the experience.

Where this story really excels, though, is in the final pages when Roland and his rather dreadful wife, Iris, visit Barbara’s family for Sunday lunch. It is here that Taylor reveals the sadness of Roland’s life, an emptiness and lack of fulfilment that have coloured his world.

These weeks, since his [Roland’s] return from the island, must have been worse than hers [Barbara’s], she realised—as the rest of his life would be worse. His experience must have been deeper, his brief escape desperately planned and wearily paid for. It was something for her—for Iris—to deride along with the other things. Once he had liked music, he had told Jane in answer to one of her off-hand enquiries: later the sisters had laughed about it, but Barbara could not have laughed now. She could see too clearly the history of discarded interests. (pp. 154–1 55)

In Phyllis Bottome’s The Shark’s Fin, a young honeymooner named Dorothy gets into a huff when her husband, Jo, decides to accompany a friend to a nearby island, leaving her alone. In a fit of pique, Dorothy decides to swim to the island to prove a point; however, her plan backfires when the journey proves more hazardous than anticipated…

Something, probably a jellyfish or a piece of floating sea-weed, brushed against her thigh. It didn’t even sting her; but it did worse. Fear slid from that light touch through Dorothy’s whole body. It rushed full tilt into her shallow heart. (p. 79)

Water also plays a significant role in Daphne du Maurier’s excellent story, The Pool, in which two young children, Deborah and Roger, stay at their grandparents’ country house during the summer holidays. This story opens with a glorious scene, heralding the pleasures that surely lie ahead.

The children ran out on to the lawn. There was space all around them, and light, and air, with the trees indeterminate beyond. The gardener had cut the grass. The lawn was crisp and firm now, because of the hot sun through the day; but near the summer-house where the tall grass stood there were dew-drops like frost clinging to the narrow stems. (p. 98)

As this disquieting story unfolds, a palpable sense of darkness creeps in, reflecting Deborah’s fascination with a nearby woodland area and pool, to which she offers small tokens, such as a pencil stub, as ritual sacrifices. Du Maurier is known for her unnerving, atmospheric short fiction, and The Pool is very much in this vein, casting an unsettling spell over Deborah’s secret visits.

Her reflection wavered up at her, and it was not the face she knew, not even the looking-glass face which anyway was false, but a disturbed image, dark-skinned and ghostly. The crossed hands were like the petals of the water-lilies themselves, and the colour was not waxen white but phantom green. The hair too was not the live clump she brushed every day and tied back with ribbon, but a canopy, a shroud. When the image smiled it became more distorted still. (p. 104)

As with many of this author’s stories, the symbolism in The Pool is mysterious and open to interpretation, hinting at themes of loss, grief and sexual awakening in adolescence.

Elsewhere, the reasons for an English woman’s presence in Florence – and her fascination with developments in London society – are alluded to in Sylvia Lynd’s aptly named story, Exile. A white lie kickstarts a complex sequence of entanglements in G. B. Stern’s sprightly and surprising tale, Black Cat for Luck, and a day on the beach presents a microcosm of family dynamics as three siblings build a fortress in Mary Lavin’s story, The Sand Castle. Here, selfishness, competitiveness and rejection give way to inclusion and teamwork in this charming story reminiscent of simpler times.

Finally, a mention for Muriel Spark’s memorable tale The Fortune Teller, in which a young woman, Lucy, encounters a clairvoyant while holidaying in France with a couple whose marriage is crumbling. Somewhat ironically, Lucy herself tells fortunes for a hobby, using a pack of cards to discern her subjects’ potential futures. This excellent story has a delicious twist, indicating that our futures are not set in stone but open to alteration.

So, all in all, a terrific anthology of summer stories from the 20th century, ideal for seasonal getaways or chilling out at home. As ever with the BL’s Women Writers series, the book comes with an informative and enjoyable introduction/afterword by series consultant Simon Thomas, highlighting each author and the stories featured in the collection. (My thanks to the publishers for kindly providing a review copy.)

Another Marvelous Thing by Laurie Colwin

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When Dorian (at Eiger, Mönch & Jungfrau) first introduced me to Laurie Colwin’s books, he described them as very New York-y. Wry rather than funny, bittersweet but not sentimental – and Jewish, albeit in a low-key kind of way. A little like Woody Allen’s films, back in the days when they were good. (Annie Hall and Hannah and Her Sisters are great reference points here.)

Published in 1986, Another Marvelous Thing fits right into this groove. It’s a wryly humorous collection of eight linked short stories/vignettes, laced with a seam of poignancy that frequently breaks through, piercing the reader’s heart.

With her characteristic light-touch approach to the complexities of human relationships, Colwin offers us glimpses into a downbeat love affair between two ordinary Americans: Billy (aka Josephine), an economics historian, teacher and sometimes columnist, and her older lover, Francis, a consultant and former investment banker. When the pair meet at a work-related cocktail party, it’s a clear case of opposites attract. Both are happily married to partners they seem very well-suited to and appear to love; nevertheless, an idiosyncratic affair between this mismatched couple gradually begins, which Colwin charts in these charming, emotionally resonant vignettes.

My wife is precise, elegant, and well-dressed, but the sloppiness of my mistress knows few bounds. Apparently, I am not the sort of man who acquires a stylish mistress—the mistresses in French movies who rendezvous at the cafés in expensive hotels and take their cigarette cases out of alligator handbags, or meet their lovers on bridges wearing dashing capes. My mistress greets me in a pair of worn corduroy trousers, once green and now no color at all, a gray sweater, an old shirt of her younger brother’s which has a frayed collar, and a pair of very old broken shoes with tassels, the backs of which are held together by electrical tape. (p. 1)

Billy and Francis are completely different from one another in almost every respect. While Francs loves fine food, stylish clothes, romantic flourishes and a well-ordered home, Billy is serious, unglamorous, messy and often glum. She has no interest in food, clothes, perfume or the finer things in life, and her discomfort in the kitchen is abundantly clear. There are no candlelit dinners or delicious treats to tempt the lover in Billy’s domain. Instead, Francis must make do with a bowl of canned soup and some stale water biscuits as a post-coital snack.

As their respective spouses travel frequently for work, Billy and Francis usually meet in the afternoon in Billy’s flat, conducting their trysts on the hideous sofa that occupies her study. Unlike most other fiction about illicit affairs, there is no sense of excitement or danger here – neither passion nor the thrill of discovery seems to be a factor in this relationship. Rather, the lovers seem to draw comfort and familiarity from one another, like a favourite pair of comfortable shoes creased from repeated wear. Moreover, their relationship is a form of escape from the realities of their daily lives, giving the couple ‘an invented context’ all of their own.

That was the thing about a love affair. It went by frame by frame, unlike ordinary life, which unrolled slowly and surely, whose high moments did not tear your heart apart when you thought of them because they were affixed, as surely as a turquoise in a silver bracelet, in context. The time Billy and Francis spent together had a beginning and an end. The middle was full of moments, of one sort or another. It was like a movie—it was like a French movie, Francis said, in which the lovers leave a Chinese restaurant, as they did now, when they thought a rainstorm had let up, only to find themselves pressed together in the doorway of an Oriental grocery store, penned in by what looked like a monsoon. (p. 50)

Both parties understand that this relationship could never last in the real world if they were thrown together for more than a few days. Francis’ wife, Vera, an elegant, stylish interior designer and accomplished cook, seems to be her husband’s ideal match; similarly, in Grey, Billy has found her true soulmate, a man who eschews style and neatness in favour of hiking and birdwatching. Consequently, there is never any suggestion of either lover leaving their longstanding partner, thereby removing this source of tension and angst from their regular hook-ups.

She [Billy] is too relentlessly dour, and too fond of silence. I [Francis] prefer false cheer to no cheer and I like conversation over dinner no matter what. Furthermore we would never have proper meals and, although I cannot cook, I like to dine. I would soon resent her lack of interest in domestic arrangements and she would resent me for resenting her. (p. 15)

Nevertheless, despite these givens, this is a relationship grounded in love and a deep sense of affection — ‘I conduct a mental life with her when we are apart,’ says Francis at one point. In fact, Francis finds it hard to contemplate life without Billy, should some change in their circumstances force them to part.

I have tried my best to formulate what it is I want from Billy, but I have not gotten very far. Painful consideration has brought forth this revelation: I want her not ever to stop being. This is as close as grammar or reflection will allow.

One day the horse will jump over the hurdle and the end will come. The door will close. Billy will doubtless do the closing. She will decide she wants a baby, or Grey will be offered an academic post in London, or Billy will finish her dissertation and get a job in Boston, and the Delielles will move. Or perhaps Vera will come home one evening and say that she longs to live in Paris or San Francisco, and we will move. What will happen then? (p. 19)

While Francis sees nothing untoward in their affair, Billy considers it morally wrong. Consequently, she feels guilty about her infidelity towards Grey and tries to put an end to the adulterous relationship on several occasions, mostly unsuccessfully.

“This is the twentieth century. We are two grown people who are hurting no one at all. We are sincerely fond of one another. I think what we are doing is entirely on the up-and-up. And besides, if it is immoral, you don’t have much right getting sticky on smaller points like not talking about your husband.”

When Francis looked at Billy he saw an expression on her face he had never seen before, of awful sadness and tension. It made him realise that she did see this as a moral issue. How far apart they were! (p. 59)

And yet, we know, as do Billy and Francis, that the end of this liaison will inevitably come…

All eight stories initially appeared as standalone pieces in various magazines and literary journals before being collected here, which gives rise to a certain amount of repetition across the first four vignettes. For instance, the first two cover the same ground, initially narrated by Francis, then presented as a third-person narrative. Sadly, we never hear from Billy directly, which is a pity as it might have shed more light on her motives for the affair. While I could see the appeal of Billy for Francis, perhaps as an escape from the order and perfection of his constraining home life with Vera, the advantages for Billy seems much less clear. Like many men, Francis seems to want to have his cake and eat it, frequently nosing into Billy’s marital relationship with Grey and coercing her into continuing with their illicit liaison, even when she clearly wants out. Francis is the one doing all the pushing here, not Billy!

In the final three or four stories, following the end of the pair’s affair, Colwin really steps it up a notch, revealing more of the mutual tenderness at the heart of Billy’s relationship with Grey. We learn about this couple’s backstory, how they met as ex-pat children growing up together in England, drifted apart in early adulthood, then reconnected at a party in London after college.  

The moment she saw him, Billy knew that she had found what she was looking for. It was not love at first sight. It had been love all these years. “We were imprinted on each other early, like ducks,” Grey said. “They always love the first person close to them.” (p. 81)

Moreover, when Billy is admitted to hospital a few weeks before her baby is due, it is Grey (the baby’s father) who is her bedrock, providing the emotional stability and voice of reason she so desperately needs. They are so clearly made for each other that it makes Billy’s dalliance with Francis somewhat tricky to square….

A difficult birth by caesarean section subsequently ensues, with baby William being whisked off to intensive care where he remains for a couple of weeks. It’s a deeply moving piece of fiction, beautifully expressed.

He [Grey] had been so brave and cheerful. He had held her hand while William was born. He had told her it was like watching a magician sawing his wife in half. He had taken photos of William in his isolette and sent them to their parents and all their friends. He had read up on growth curves and had bought Billy a book on breast-feeding. He had also purloined his hospital greens to wear each year on William’s birthday. Now he had broken down. (p. 114)

In the final vignette, Billy, with nine-month-old William in tow, runs into Francis unexpectedly at a social function. A couple of years have passed since they broke up, and Francis is shocked to see Billy with a baby. Billy, too, is taken aback, especially as her former lover seems to have a new, younger, more glamorous model on the go – nevertheless, appearances can be deceptive. A somewhat terse exchange duly ensues, illustrating that the embers of their former affair might be muted but are still glowing. It’s a fitting, wryly amusing conclusion to a highly engaging collection. Possibly not the best entry point for readers new to Colwin’s work, but a perceptive, emotionally resonant suite of vignettes nonetheless, especially towards the end.

Another Marvelous Thing is published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson; personal copy.

The Dangers of Smoking in Bed by Mariana Enriquez (tr. Megan McDowell)

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Last year, I read and loved Mariana Enriquez’s Things We Lost in the Fire, a superb collection of macabre, deeply disturbing short stories in which elements of Gothic horror and surreal, otherworldly imagery mingle with insightful social critique, tapping into the collective traumas from Argentina’s atrocities, both past and present. Enriquez grew up during the Dirty War, when several thousand Argentine citizens were murdered or disappeared, many of whom were not formally documented due to the terrorist regime in place. Consequently, the ghosts of the disappeared – both literal and metaphorical – haunt many of her stories, bringing the country’s horrors to life in vivid and compelling ways.

Translated into English in 2021, The Dangers of Smoking in Bed is in a very similar vein to Fire – another unnerving collection of stories with the power to destabilise and disturb contemporary readers. Enriquez excels at weaving together the surreal and supernatural, embedding these into the real-world socio-political horrors of life in Argentina, from poverty, parental neglect and sexual abuse to disappearances, murders and other criminal activities. There’s a wildness or sense of craziness to many of these stories, twisting the recognisable into distorted, destabilising shapes – and it’s this rooting in reality, the real and inescapable – that makes Enriquez’s stories so horrifying and impactful to read. This forms part of the society we exist in, whether we like it or not.

The Dangers of Smoking in Bed is an earlier collection than Fire, and there’s a sense that Enriquez is experimenting with different styles here. In some respects, this makes it particularly interesting to read as we can see a degree of development across the two collections.

At fifty pages, Kids Who Come Back is the longest and most effective story in the collection, benefiting from a deeper development of its themes compared to some of the shorter pieces here. The story’s protagonist, Mechi, maintains the Buenos Aires archive of lost and disappeared children, comprising cases including runaways, abductees and the disappeared (presumed dead). It’s an emotionally challenging role, but Mechi takes it very seriously, obsessing over one girl in particular, the stunningly attractive Vanadis. Suddenly, Vanadis and a bunch of other children (previously presumed dead) miraculously reappear in the city’s parks, seemingly unchanged from before – and soon, they are reunited with their families, who are eager to welcome them home.

Among the older kids, silence reigned. None of them said much, or seemed to want to talk about where they had been. Nor did they seem to recognize their families, though they left with the people who came to pick them up with a meekness that was somehow even more disturbing. (p. 146)

However, something isn’t right with these kids, who seem oddly catatonic and have no need for any food or drink. Most worrying of all, none of the children have aged since the time of their disappearance, which in some instances was several years ago. Fast-forward a couple of weeks and the families start returning these children to the authorities or the parks, giving remarkably similar reasons for their decisions:

This isn’t the girl we knew, this isn’t our baby. We don’t know who she is. The person looks like her, has her voice, answers to the same name, she’s the same down to the last detail, but she isn’t our daughter. Do what you want with her. We don’t want to see her ever again. (p. 165)

It’s the start of a deeply unsettling period for the people of Buenos Aires as the returned children gather in the parks, casting a shadow over the city’s collective mood. This is Enriquez at her best, layering the surreal, supernatural horrors of these revenant children over the reality of Argentina’s history – a society in which poverty, parental neglect, child abuse, sexual violence, abduction and corruption were endemic and inescapable.

The disappeared are also central to Back When We Talked to the Dead, in which a group of teenage girls try to make contact with the dead using a Ouija board, only for events to take a horrifying turn. It’s a remarkably creepy story, partly because the protagonists are left questioning what is real vs imaginary when a manifestation of past atrocities resurfaces in the present.

In Angelita Unearthed, the narrator is haunted by a ghost baby after she finds some human bones buried in her family’s back garden – ghostly visits that become more disturbing once she moves away. The bones, as it turns out, were those of the narrator’s great aunt, Angelita, who died a few months after she was born, back in the distant past. Enriquez has a little fun with this one, adding touches of mordant humour as she develops her themes. This gives the story a surreal quality which works very well.

The angel baby followed me. And that was only the first sign of her demanding personality. I didn’t hesitate. I put the gloves on and grabbed her little neck and squeezed. It’s not exactly practical to try and strangle a dead person, but a girl can’t be desperate and reasonable at the same time. (p. 7)

A ghostly presence also haunts the streets of Barcelona in Rambla Triste, in which an Argentine woman, Sofia, visits her friend, Julieta, an Argentine ex-pat now living in Spain. A terrible smell, like rotting meat, lingers in the city, a sign of the dead children hovering in the background.

That’s the kid most people see, the most popular ghost, the one who touches you with his black hands, the one who brushes against the jacket slung over your chair and leaves it stinking of dead meat. But there are also kids who fell off balconies after their junkie mothers left them there. Kids who had keys hung around their necks at three, four years old. Kids who murdered taxi drivers and died of overdoses, whored themselves out, went looking for crack. (p. 68)

Like many of the stories here, Rambla Triste uses supernatural imagery and motifs to highlight the horrors embedded in society, from paedophilia, sexual abuse and neglected children to drug abuse, murder and prostitution. Once again, themes of entrapment are also present here, locking the protagonists into a kind of living hell on earth.

Another highlight is The Well, an excellent story highlighting how trauma can be passed through the generations from grandmother to mother and ultimately to daughter. At the age of six, Josefina is taken by her mother and grandmother to see ‘The Woman’, who is rumoured to be a witch. All the women in this family, including Josefina’s older sister, Mariela, are fearful and over-cautious by nature, haunted by unspoken terrors and concerns. Until now, Josefina has been immune to these disturbances; but once she visits ‘The Woman’, her own terrors begin, steadily becoming more serious and debilitating as the years go by.

She couldn’t go to La Boca because it seemed to her that the river’s black surface hid submerged bodies that would surely try to rise up as soon as she got near its edge. She never slept with a leg uncovered, because she just knew she would feel a cold hand touching it. Josefina’s mother left her with Grandma Rita when she had to go out; if she was half an hour late Josefina would start to vomit, because the delay could mean only that her mother had died in a car crash. (p. 42)

As this unsettling narrative unfolds, we discover the relationship between Josefina’s fears and those formerly experienced by the other women in her family. It’s a devastating story with a terrifying ending, largely because there is no obvious escape.

I also really like The Cart in which a tramp is abused and hounded out of the neighbourhood when he turns up out of the blue with a cart full of garbage. He also relieves himself in the street, doing little to endear himself to the local inhabitants. Only one resident steps in to put a stop to the vilification – a point the vagrant duly notices before abandoning his cart. Two weeks after the cart’s arrival, everything begins to go wrong for the local residents – men suddenly lose their jobs for no particular reason; stores are robbed; bank accounts are mysteriously emptied; and many are left in financial ruin. Within months, the place has descended into a ghetto town – even the police and social services refuse to get involved, such are the risks of entering the neighbourhood. Only one family are unaffected – that of the woman who stepped in to defend the tramp. Again, lots of great ideas in this one, even if it ends somewhat abruptly.

Elsewhere, there are stories of teenage jealousy and revenge (Our Lady of the Quarry), a ghost looking for a suitable host to inhabit (The Lookout) and rock star idolisation taken to horrific extremes (Meat) – fans of Sayaka Murata’s Life Ceremony and Earthlings should check this one out!

Finally, a few words about Where Are You, Dear Heart? in which a disturbing childhood encounter turns into a sexual fetish for abnormal heartbeats as the female protagonist grows up. This brilliant, deeply twisted story takes these obsessions to the extreme, pushing this girl into increasingly dangerous territory as she seeks riskier thrills.  

Soon we both abandoned the online life, and we locked ourselves in my room with a sound recorder, a stethoscope, medicines and substances that helped change his cardiac rhythm. We both knew how it could end, and we didn’t care. (p. 94)

I couldn’t help but be reminded of David Cronenberg’s body horror films as I was reading this one – especially Crimes of the Future, in which ‘surgery is the new sex’. Cronenberg has always been interested in sexual fetishes, bodily transformations and mutilations of the flesh as means of exploring life, death and other existential matters. Now that I’ve read this collection, I suspect Enriquez is too.

So, in summary, The Dangers of Smoking in Bed is another knockout collection of stories from one of Latin America’s most thrilling writers. Enriquez has a genuine talent for embedding the surreal and supernatural into the real-world socio-political horrors of Argentine life, from poverty, parental neglect and sexual abuse to disappearances, murders and other criminal activities. Many of Enriquez’s most impactful stories begin in the realms of normality, only to shift into darker, nightmarish territory as they begin to unfold. Time and time again, Argentina’s dark underbelly bursts through the surface, making its presence felt in the characters’ anxieties and fears. Unnerving, alluring and inventive, these stories are not for the faint-hearted; otherwise, very highly recommended indeed!

The Dangers of Smoking in Bed is published by Granta; my thanks to the publishers and the Independent Alliance for kindly providing a review copy.