Margaret Forster was a celebrated novelist, biographer, and literary critic whose insightful prose explored the complexities of human experience. Her work, characterized by keen observation and a distinctive narrative voice, offered readers profound explorations of society and the individual. Forster's contributions to literature and public discourse through her writing and criticism left a lasting impact.
The narrative unfolds through the edited diary of Millicent King, a woman born in 1901, capturing her experiences from the eve of the Great War through the tumultuous events of the twentieth century. Her journey takes readers from bohemian London to 1920s Rome, encompassing her social work and wartime efforts as she drives ambulances during the London bombings. This poignant blend of fiction and reality offers a richly textured portrayal of an ordinary woman's life against the backdrop of significant historical upheavals.
The diary is slight, but very sweet. You would be pleased to find it in your
Christmas stocking... Margaret is a good egg. You like her more and more... If
you were happy at school, Forster's diary will bring it all back. If you were
unhappy, she will make you wistful for what you missed. Laura Freeman The
Times
‘I was born on 25th May, 1938, in the front bedroom of a house in Orton Road, a house on the outer edges of Raffles, a council estate. I was a lucky girl.’ So begins Margaret Forster’s journey through the houses she’s lived in, from that sparkling new council house, to her beloved London home of today. This is not a book about bricks and mortar though. This is a book about what houses are to us, the effect they have on the way we live our lives and the changing nature of our homes: from blacking grates and outside privies; to cities dominated by bedsits and lodgings; to the houses of today converted back into single dwellings. Finally, it is a gently insistent, personal inquiry into the meaning of home.
Only one person knows what happened that day... Julia was the only person who
knew what happened that day. But she didn't tell the police. And then it was
too late. Now, years later, her secret looms large. Is it really too late? And
if she does tell, can she bear the consequences?
The curiously named Isamay, a would-be academic, is trying to write a coherent thesis about grandmothers in history - from Sarah Bernhardt and George Sand to the matriarchal Queen Victoria and other influential grannies -- while constantly ambushed by the secrets her own family has been keeping. An only child, she is named after her grandmothers, Isa and May, who were there at her birth and who have formed and influenced her in very different ways. Jealous of each other, they both want to be first in their granddaughter's affections. Isa has an edge, in that young Isamay looks like her, but Isa's reserved and elegant exterior hides startling surprises that could undermine her granddaughter's certainties. May, on the other hand, is plump, indomitable and opinionated, and it's from her thatIsamay inherits her stubborn determination. Isamay, almost thirty, has never wanted children, but suddenly considers changing her mind. Her live-in lover, Ian (always mysterious about his own family history) is sure that he does not want a child.Engrossing, set in the present but with hooks into the past, this is an unusual story about grandmothers and their potentially powerful role in family life, about nature vs nurture, bloodlines and bridges across generations.
A classic Margaret Forster novel with the same satisfying appeal as her bestselling Diary of an Ordinary Woman — the story of an actual early 20th century painting and its fictional adventures through the century and of the women whose lives it touches.From the Hardcover edition.
Don and Louise's eighteen-year-old daughter Miranda has died in a sailing
accident. The surviving children handle the loss of their sister better than
their parents, but what they can't handle is their family being torn apart...
