Better Late Than Never

I know a lot of fellow bloggers have mentioned this book in the last year or so, all praising it highly.  Dear Gill at Lucy Locket (www.lucysarah.blogspot.com) sent me this copy absolutely ages ago.  I added it to the teetering pile of books beside the bed and somehow it got subsumed beneath other books I picked up in charity shops or car boot sales (pretty much all of them thrillers), until last week when I found it again half way down the pile.

I was in the mood for a change from murder and mayhem and thought I'd give it a go.  Well, what a fabulous book.  It is so easy to read, and although it's not chock-full of action, the narrative is so gentle and descriptive that after the first couple of pages I was well and truly hooked.  For some reason I'd imagined it was an American book (probably because I've read a lot about it on American blogs) but it's not, it's set in Suffolk, and the descriptions of the countryside are wonderful.

Also amazing are the descriptions of the desperate poverty the Mortmain family find themselves in at the beginning of the book.  It certainly puts our present 'credit crunch' into perspective (the book is set in the early 1930s), and I love some of the inventive re-fashioning the female charaters do in order to squeeze every last useful moment from their clothing.  Inspirational stuff.

Talking of the credit crunch (and I'm not sure the 'CC' is the reason), I realised yesterday that although it is the beginning of September, I haven't spotted any Christmas cards for sale yet.  Not in charity shops (some of which have Christmas  cards from mid August), nor in W H Smiths.  Has anybody spotted these early harbingers of winter yet?

Comments

[French Knots]

I got it from the library last year after Kim at Ragged Roses mentioned it - it's lovely isn't it, I really enjoyed it.

[jeanie]

I love this book, and another, somewhat more recently novel she wrote, called The New Moon With the Old--it's much harder to find, but it's also charming.

[Gill]

I'm so pleased you enjoyed the book Elizabeth, I read it on the recommendation of Kim (Ragged Roses) too, I think she may have been responsible for a surge in sales of the book! Look out for the video ,it brings the story to life and worth watching. I've not seen a lot of Christmas cards in the shops yet, I guess they have to get the "back to school" stuff out of the way first!

[Frugal Trenches]

hhmm....that's a good point re Christmas cards. It's now how it should be. I think from November 1st is a good philosophy!