Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
Virago (2006), Edition: New, 224 pages
Description
"You taste of rain," he said, kissing her. "People say I married her for her money," he thought contentedly, and for the moment was full of the self-respect that loving her had given him.' Kate Heron is a wealthy, charming widow who marries, much to the disapproval of friends and neighbours, a man ten years her junior: the attractive, feckless Dermot. Then comes the return of Kate's old friend Charles - intelligent, kind and now widowed, with his beautiful young daughter. Kate watches happily as their two families are drawn together, finding his presence reassuringly familiar, but slowly she becomes aware of subtle undercurrents that begin to disturb the calm surface of their friendship. Before long, even she cannot ignore the gathering storm . . .… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member gaskella
Many have told me that I should read the books of Elizabeth Taylor - an author I'd not heard of until the publication of Nicola Beauman's recent biography The Other Elizabeth Taylor by the wonderful Persephone Books. I picked up this particular one for its striking cover photo, and was told by pal
Published in 1961, it follows one summer in the lives of a family living in the Thames Valley, with 'The View' of Windsor castle visible in the far distance. This is already prime commuter belt - every day the men go off to work on the train to their jobs in the city - well, everyone except Dermot that is. He is the young Irish thirty-something husband of forty-something well-off widow Kate. They live in some comfort with Kate's sixteen year old daughter Louisa and twenty-two year old son Tom, her Aunt Ethel, and looked after by cook Mrs Meacock. As the novel opens, Kate is on a duty visit to her new mother-in-law, Edwina, up in London for the day. Edwina is always trying to find a job for her youngest, who has never been able to settle at anything or anyone until he fell in love with Kate.
In the first half of the movel we find out what makes them all tick - and frankly, it's all about sex. Kate with her younger husband, Tom with his girlfriends, and Louisa's growing awareness and crush on the young curate in the village. Aunt Ethel watches all these mostly repressed emotions and assesses it in her letters to her friend Gertrude - "When the sex goes Kate will think him no bargain".
Then the Thorntons return from abroad. The Thorntons, Charles and Dorothea, were Kate and her first husband Alan's best friends, and Tom had a thing for Minty, their daughter. Charles' wife died and Kate is keen to make them feel at home again now they're back in England. There are bound to be problems - as three's a crowd - Charles and Kate are the same age, whereas Dermot is closer to the children in age and sometimes, outlook.
"They were walking in circles around each other, Kate thought - both Dermot and Charles. When she had introduced them, Dermot had shaken hands with an air of boyish respect, almost adding 'Sir' to his greeting, and Charles seemed to try and avoid looking at him or showing more than ordinary interest. Although he had not met him before, even as far away as Bahrain he had heard stories, and Kate, writing to tell him of her marriage, had done so in a defensive strain, as if an explanation were due and she could think of no very good one."
The story is mainly told from Kate's point of view, but we hear not only her voice, but her thoughts also - and the two are often opposite. In that terribly repressed middle-class way, everyone says one thing and means another. The author takes a scalpel to these relationships and dissects them with sensitivity and wit, bringing things to a climax with great skill. I can safely say this novel made an instant fan of me, and I wonder why I never discovered her before.
Show More
Helen, that it was about a woman who marries a much younger man - a toy boy! - well that sold it to me instantly.Published in 1961, it follows one summer in the lives of a family living in the Thames Valley, with 'The View' of Windsor castle visible in the far distance. This is already prime commuter belt - every day the men go off to work on the train to their jobs in the city - well, everyone except Dermot that is. He is the young Irish thirty-something husband of forty-something well-off widow Kate. They live in some comfort with Kate's sixteen year old daughter Louisa and twenty-two year old son Tom, her Aunt Ethel, and looked after by cook Mrs Meacock. As the novel opens, Kate is on a duty visit to her new mother-in-law, Edwina, up in London for the day. Edwina is always trying to find a job for her youngest, who has never been able to settle at anything or anyone until he fell in love with Kate.
In the first half of the movel we find out what makes them all tick - and frankly, it's all about sex. Kate with her younger husband, Tom with his girlfriends, and Louisa's growing awareness and crush on the young curate in the village. Aunt Ethel watches all these mostly repressed emotions and assesses it in her letters to her friend Gertrude - "When the sex goes Kate will think him no bargain".
Then the Thorntons return from abroad. The Thorntons, Charles and Dorothea, were Kate and her first husband Alan's best friends, and Tom had a thing for Minty, their daughter. Charles' wife died and Kate is keen to make them feel at home again now they're back in England. There are bound to be problems - as three's a crowd - Charles and Kate are the same age, whereas Dermot is closer to the children in age and sometimes, outlook.
"They were walking in circles around each other, Kate thought - both Dermot and Charles. When she had introduced them, Dermot had shaken hands with an air of boyish respect, almost adding 'Sir' to his greeting, and Charles seemed to try and avoid looking at him or showing more than ordinary interest. Although he had not met him before, even as far away as Bahrain he had heard stories, and Kate, writing to tell him of her marriage, had done so in a defensive strain, as if an explanation were due and she could think of no very good one."
The story is mainly told from Kate's point of view, but we hear not only her voice, but her thoughts also - and the two are often opposite. In that terribly repressed middle-class way, everyone says one thing and means another. The author takes a scalpel to these relationships and dissects them with sensitivity and wit, bringing things to a climax with great skill. I can safely say this novel made an instant fan of me, and I wonder why I never discovered her before.
Show Less
LibraryThing member rainpebble
It took me some pages to get into this one but I ended up loving it a great deal. With Taylor I frequently find that my favorite characters are not the lead characters but the secondary ones and with In A Summer Season this was no different. I really enjoyed the characters of Lou, Charles, Ethel,
The end of the book did not surprise me in the least as I had been waiting for it since the purchase of the new auto.
But I love how Ms. Taylor reveals the layers of her characters to us. And she takes her time with the storyline and lets it flow. I am looking forward to the September selection, The Soul of Kindness. I am loving reading one special author throughout the year and already looking forward to next year's author of choice.
Show More
Edwina, & Father Blizzard. I even engaged with Tom whom I found to have so many underlying issues to think about as I read of him. But Kate was a bore and Dermot a juvenile idiot with no redeeming qualities. What a letdown he must have been after Kate's first husband.The end of the book did not surprise me in the least as I had been waiting for it since the purchase of the new auto.
But I love how Ms. Taylor reveals the layers of her characters to us. And she takes her time with the storyline and lets it flow. I am looking forward to the September selection, The Soul of Kindness. I am loving reading one special author throughout the year and already looking forward to next year's author of choice.
Show Less
LibraryThing member lauralkeet
Kate Heron is a middle-aged, comfortably well-off woman in a second marriage with Dermot, who is several years her junior. Her son Tom is a young adult, seemingly lacking in talent and maturity, but expected to take over his paternal grandfather's business. Her 16-year-old daughter Louisa attends a
Elizabeth Taylor is quite skilled at portraying ordinary people, embodying some with amusing idiosyncracies (such as the aunt who is obsessed with sex, although she has no direct personal experience), while also putting her characters under a microscope to expose the tiny flaws that are often the source of their downfall. This is what I enjoy most about her writing. Unfortunately, the plot did not measure up to the characters, and in my view this book fell short of her other work (i.e.; A View of the Harbour, and Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont).
Show More
boarding school but, for most of this novel, she is at home on holiday and pining after the local curate. Dermot is, in short, a ninny, who is unable to hold down a job and so sponges off his wife and his mother. Although never explicitly stated, it appears Kate joined up with Dermot out of loneliness when she was suddenly widowed. They seem an odd couple, and most of the other characters in this book are generally wondering how long the marriage will last. Kate is also mourning the passing, several years ago, of her dear friend Dorothea. About halfway through the novel, Dorothea's husband and daughter return to the village after a long absence, unwittingly upsetting the order of relationships.Elizabeth Taylor is quite skilled at portraying ordinary people, embodying some with amusing idiosyncracies (such as the aunt who is obsessed with sex, although she has no direct personal experience), while also putting her characters under a microscope to expose the tiny flaws that are often the source of their downfall. This is what I enjoy most about her writing. Unfortunately, the plot did not measure up to the characters, and in my view this book fell short of her other work (i.e.; A View of the Harbour, and Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont).
Show Less
LibraryThing member nmhale
I discovered this author because of the Virago publications, and this is the second I read from Taylor. In this book, we spend time with a family that has reestablished a tentative calm after the death of the husband/father in the family. Kate, the widow, has fallen in love and remarried Dermot, an
The novel presents a complex insight
Show More
aimless man much younger than herself. Her son, Tom, surprised her by bonding with her new husband, and she isn't always happy about the outcome of their close relationship. Kate's daughter, on the other hand, is not pleased. Louisa resents her mother and Dermot; her mother for not acting age and creating a scandal, and Dermot for taking her father's place. The family is rounded out by Aunt Ethel, their spinster aunt who lives on Kate's generosity.The novel presents a complex insight
Show Less
LibraryThing member LyzzyBee
(04 Jan 1998, book stall in Greenwich Market)
An original green covered Virago book, although the cover doesn’t really fit the subject matter. I didn’t really take to this book at first. It ticks all the Taylor boxes – slightly wonky marriage of misfits, suburban, middle class concerns,
This book is more full of sex and death than you’d perhaps expect an Elizabeth Taylor novel to be, from the outset, when we meet widowed Kate and her younger, very attractive husband, Dermot. It’s an interesting book, very Taylorian indeed, with all her hallmarks, including sudden events told dispassionately and the usual milieu … interestingly, I was never that keen on the mid-period Iris Murdoch novel “An Unofficial Rose”, which has the same features of being an uber-Murdochian novel. Not sure what that says about me, though!
An original green covered Virago book, although the cover doesn’t really fit the subject matter. I didn’t really take to this book at first. It ticks all the Taylor boxes – slightly wonky marriage of misfits, suburban, middle class concerns,
Show More
interfering mother in law, odd relatives … but the central character, Kate, didn’t really seem to come alive for me too much. Then suddenly, half way through, it “took” and I loved it from then on. The teenage characters are beautifully done, as they so often are. In particular, Louisa, with her odd collections, styes and love for the curate, is a great character, thrown into relief by her relationship with Aunt Ethel, a kind of aunt that doesn’t seem to exist any more, living in the family home and taking such pains to be unobtrusive that she becomes yet more intrusive. Add to the mix Mrs Meacock, the housekeeper, with her American puddings and wearing task of compiling a book, and son, Tom, nose to the grindstone in his grandfather’s office, and all you need is the return of next door’s Charles and his beguiling daughter to throw everything topsy-turvy.This book is more full of sex and death than you’d perhaps expect an Elizabeth Taylor novel to be, from the outset, when we meet widowed Kate and her younger, very attractive husband, Dermot. It’s an interesting book, very Taylorian indeed, with all her hallmarks, including sudden events told dispassionately and the usual milieu … interestingly, I was never that keen on the mid-period Iris Murdoch novel “An Unofficial Rose”, which has the same features of being an uber-Murdochian novel. Not sure what that says about me, though!
Show Less
LibraryThing member raizel
I picked this book up because I saw the author's name (but quickly saw that this was another Elizabeth Taylor) and because I've liked other Virago Modern Classics. This book is about family and love seen from many different perspectives and the reviews cover the relationships nicely. There is also
... until one ends up wondering what was the use of writing War and Peace, for instance.' She regarded that as the ultimate achievement, as a sacred novel almost, about which, like the Bible, there are not two opinions. One subscribed to it, or kept quiet. She herself subscribed to it, although she had not read it. She seemed to know all about it without doing so.
Show More
Mrs. Meacock, who cooks for the family and is working on a book of sayings that she has collected over many years. In one paragraph she worries about the point of existence, concluding: ... until one ends up wondering what was the use of writing War and Peace, for instance.' She regarded that as the ultimate achievement, as a sacred novel almost, about which, like the Bible, there are not two opinions. One subscribed to it, or kept quiet. She herself subscribed to it, although she had not read it. She seemed to know all about it without doing so.
Show Less
LibraryThing member thorold
Delicate, slightly wistful but also rather ironic account of a very English family not quite finding happiness in very English ways. The Swinging Sixties look as though they are going to invade suburban Berkshire (or is it Oxfordshire?), but the even pace of Home Counties commuter life keeps them
Show More
firmly at bay. Show Less
LibraryThing member lisapeet
This was fun. I'm still new to the whole English novel of manners thing, and the class issues leave me a little itchy, but they're at least part of what the book is about, after all. Marvelous tiny observations and celebrations of what lies beneath the surface—joys, resentments, and
For anyone interested, there's a discussion of the book starting up over at Bookballoon.com (a literary discussion forum, worth checking out if you haven't already).
Show More
recalibrations for the most part. Even a little sex. I'll definitely be reading more of Taylor.For anyone interested, there's a discussion of the book starting up over at Bookballoon.com (a literary discussion forum, worth checking out if you haven't already).
Show Less
LibraryThing member BeyondEdenRock
Elizabeth Taylor wrote wrote beautiful, subtle human dramas with such wonderful clarity. The stories that she wrote were wonderfully insightful about people and their relationships; and they reward close reading because she had such a wonderful eye and ear and because she was so very good at making
This novel – her eighth – is about love. It shows different kinds of love, it shows how love can change; and it shows how love affects one family and the people around them, and how it changes them and their lives, over the course of one summer season.
Kate was a young widow and she has recently married for the second time. Her new husband, Dermot, has tried a number of careers without ever finding the right one. He isn’t particularly driven, but he wants to do something, to play the role that he feels he should be playing.
Kate and Dermot are happy together as a couple.
‘Separated from their everyday life, as if in a dream or on a honeymoon, Kate and Dermot were under the spell of the gentle weather and blossoming countryside. They slept in bedrooms like corners of auction rooms stacked with old fashioned furniture, they made love in hummocky beds, and gave rise to much conjecture in bar parlours where that sat drinking alone, not talking much, though clearly intent on each other.’
Family life though, brings complications
Dermot has a good relationship with Kate’s son, Tom, who is working his way up in his grandfather’s business and having fun with a string of girlfriends; but he struggles with Kate’s daughter, Lou, who is back from boarding school for the holidays and hates that somebody else is taking her father’s place and making her mother the subject of gossip.
Kate is fully aware of Dermot’s weaknesses, but she accepts them, and tells herself that they can be – they will be happy.
But it becomes clear that their marriage has fault lines.
‘On the way home they quarreled – or, rather, she listened to Dermot quarreling with an imaginary Kate, who supplied him with imaginary retorts, against which he was able to build up his indignation. Then, when they were nearly home, he began to punish himself, and Kate realised that the more he basked in blame, the more it would turn out to be all hers; her friends, for close friends of hers they would become, would seem to have lined up to aggravate him, and her silence would be held to account for his lack of it.'
Dermot doesn’t share many of the interests and attitudes of Kate and her friends; he feels inferior, he resents that, and he resents that he can’t quite establish himself in the position he wants.
This becomes clear over the course of the summer.
In the first act of this two act drama family life simply plays out. Lou is drawn to the young local curate and she spends her summer caught up with parish affairs and events. Kate’s Aunt Ethel, who lives with the family is caught up with her own concerns, but she is worried about the family and she quietly does what she can for them.
In the second act Kate prepares for the return home of her best friend’s widower Charles and his daughter Araminta. They have been away since his wife died, they have never met Dermot, and Kate worries that the presence of an old friend, with so much shared history and so many common interests will unsettle him.
'They were walking in circles around each other, Kate thought – both Dermot and Charles. When she had introduced them, Dermot had shaken hands with an air of boyish respect, almost adding ‘Sir’ to his greeting, and Charles seemed to try and avoid looking at him or showing more than ordinary interest. Although he had not met him before, even as far away as Bahrain he had heard stories, and Kate, writing to tell him of her marriage, had done so in a defensive strain, as if an explanation were due and she could think of no very good one.'
She is right, and, quite unwittingly, Tom and Araminta, upset the precarious balance of Kate’s family. Tom is fascinated by Araminta, an aspiring model, who is beautiful, cool and distant; the first girl he wants but cannot win. And the return of her own friend unsettles Kate as well as Dermot.
There is little plot here, but the characters and the relationships are so well drawn that it really doesn’t matter.
The minor characters are particularly well drawn. I was particularly taken with Ethel, a former suffragette who wrote gossipy letters to her old friend in Cornwall but also had a practical and unsentimental concern for family; with Dermot’s mother, Edwina, who tried to push her son forward and was inclined to blame Kate for his failings; and with the cook, Mrs Meacock, who experimented with American food and was compiling a book.
They brought a different aspects to the story, as did Lou’s involvement with the curate.
There are so many emotions here, including some wonderful moments of humour that are beautifully mixed into the story.
‘Love was turning Tom hostile to every one person but one. They all affronted him by cluttering up the earth, by impinging on his thoughts, He tried to drive them away from his secret by rudeness and he reminded Ethel of an old goose she had once had who protected her nest with such hissings, such clumsy ferocity, that she claimed the attention of even the unconcerned.’
I believed in these people and their relationships; they all lived and breathed, and Elizabeth Taylor told all of their stories so very well.
The summer is perfectly evoked, and this book is very well rooted in its particular time and place.
I loved the first act of this book, when I read that I thought that this might become my favourite of Elizabeth Taylor’s books, but I loved the second act a little less. It felt just a little bit predictable, a little bit like something I’ve read before and I couldn’t help wondering if the dénouement came from a need to do something to end the story rather than simply being a natural end.
It was love though, and I can explain away all my concerns by telling myself that stories do repeat in different lives and that lives often take unexpected turns, and can be changed by events that are quite unexpected.
I’m glad that I finally picked this book up, and that I have other books by Elizabeth Taylor to read and to re-read.
Show More
every detail exactly right – and worthy of notice.This novel – her eighth – is about love. It shows different kinds of love, it shows how love can change; and it shows how love affects one family and the people around them, and how it changes them and their lives, over the course of one summer season.
Kate was a young widow and she has recently married for the second time. Her new husband, Dermot, has tried a number of careers without ever finding the right one. He isn’t particularly driven, but he wants to do something, to play the role that he feels he should be playing.
Kate and Dermot are happy together as a couple.
‘Separated from their everyday life, as if in a dream or on a honeymoon, Kate and Dermot were under the spell of the gentle weather and blossoming countryside. They slept in bedrooms like corners of auction rooms stacked with old fashioned furniture, they made love in hummocky beds, and gave rise to much conjecture in bar parlours where that sat drinking alone, not talking much, though clearly intent on each other.’
Family life though, brings complications
Dermot has a good relationship with Kate’s son, Tom, who is working his way up in his grandfather’s business and having fun with a string of girlfriends; but he struggles with Kate’s daughter, Lou, who is back from boarding school for the holidays and hates that somebody else is taking her father’s place and making her mother the subject of gossip.
Kate is fully aware of Dermot’s weaknesses, but she accepts them, and tells herself that they can be – they will be happy.
But it becomes clear that their marriage has fault lines.
‘On the way home they quarreled – or, rather, she listened to Dermot quarreling with an imaginary Kate, who supplied him with imaginary retorts, against which he was able to build up his indignation. Then, when they were nearly home, he began to punish himself, and Kate realised that the more he basked in blame, the more it would turn out to be all hers; her friends, for close friends of hers they would become, would seem to have lined up to aggravate him, and her silence would be held to account for his lack of it.'
Dermot doesn’t share many of the interests and attitudes of Kate and her friends; he feels inferior, he resents that, and he resents that he can’t quite establish himself in the position he wants.
This becomes clear over the course of the summer.
In the first act of this two act drama family life simply plays out. Lou is drawn to the young local curate and she spends her summer caught up with parish affairs and events. Kate’s Aunt Ethel, who lives with the family is caught up with her own concerns, but she is worried about the family and she quietly does what she can for them.
In the second act Kate prepares for the return home of her best friend’s widower Charles and his daughter Araminta. They have been away since his wife died, they have never met Dermot, and Kate worries that the presence of an old friend, with so much shared history and so many common interests will unsettle him.
'They were walking in circles around each other, Kate thought – both Dermot and Charles. When she had introduced them, Dermot had shaken hands with an air of boyish respect, almost adding ‘Sir’ to his greeting, and Charles seemed to try and avoid looking at him or showing more than ordinary interest. Although he had not met him before, even as far away as Bahrain he had heard stories, and Kate, writing to tell him of her marriage, had done so in a defensive strain, as if an explanation were due and she could think of no very good one.'
She is right, and, quite unwittingly, Tom and Araminta, upset the precarious balance of Kate’s family. Tom is fascinated by Araminta, an aspiring model, who is beautiful, cool and distant; the first girl he wants but cannot win. And the return of her own friend unsettles Kate as well as Dermot.
There is little plot here, but the characters and the relationships are so well drawn that it really doesn’t matter.
The minor characters are particularly well drawn. I was particularly taken with Ethel, a former suffragette who wrote gossipy letters to her old friend in Cornwall but also had a practical and unsentimental concern for family; with Dermot’s mother, Edwina, who tried to push her son forward and was inclined to blame Kate for his failings; and with the cook, Mrs Meacock, who experimented with American food and was compiling a book.
They brought a different aspects to the story, as did Lou’s involvement with the curate.
There are so many emotions here, including some wonderful moments of humour that are beautifully mixed into the story.
‘Love was turning Tom hostile to every one person but one. They all affronted him by cluttering up the earth, by impinging on his thoughts, He tried to drive them away from his secret by rudeness and he reminded Ethel of an old goose she had once had who protected her nest with such hissings, such clumsy ferocity, that she claimed the attention of even the unconcerned.’
I believed in these people and their relationships; they all lived and breathed, and Elizabeth Taylor told all of their stories so very well.
The summer is perfectly evoked, and this book is very well rooted in its particular time and place.
I loved the first act of this book, when I read that I thought that this might become my favourite of Elizabeth Taylor’s books, but I loved the second act a little less. It felt just a little bit predictable, a little bit like something I’ve read before and I couldn’t help wondering if the dénouement came from a need to do something to end the story rather than simply being a natural end.
It was love though, and I can explain away all my concerns by telling myself that stories do repeat in different lives and that lives often take unexpected turns, and can be changed by events that are quite unexpected.
I’m glad that I finally picked this book up, and that I have other books by Elizabeth Taylor to read and to re-read.
Show Less
LibraryThing member k6gst
Not to be confused with the actress. I’d never read her before, but she is often mentioned with one of my favorites, Barbara Pym. Kingsley Amis and Hilary Mantel are very keen on her. So I picked this one up at my used bookstore a few months ago and pulled it down yesterday when I noticed that it
The blurb on my Virago edition: “Kate Heron is a wealthy, charming widow who marries, much to the disapproval of friends and neighbors, a man ten years her junior: the attractive, feckless Dermot. Then comes the return of Kate’s old friend Charles—intelligent, kind and now widowed—with his beautiful young daughter. Kate watches happily as their two families are drawn together, finding Charles’s presence reassuringly familiar, but slowly she becomes aware of subtle undercurrents that begin to disturb the calm surface of their friendship. Before long, even she cannot ignore the gathering storm …”
Well, seeing as how I am myself someone’s attractive, feckless Dermot, I had to see how it turned out. (Spoiler: Not well for Dermot.) It is very good. I swallowed it whole in two sittings, and will seek out the rest of her stuff.
Show More
was the anniversary of her birth, in 1912.The blurb on my Virago edition: “Kate Heron is a wealthy, charming widow who marries, much to the disapproval of friends and neighbors, a man ten years her junior: the attractive, feckless Dermot. Then comes the return of Kate’s old friend Charles—intelligent, kind and now widowed—with his beautiful young daughter. Kate watches happily as their two families are drawn together, finding Charles’s presence reassuringly familiar, but slowly she becomes aware of subtle undercurrents that begin to disturb the calm surface of their friendship. Before long, even she cannot ignore the gathering storm …”
Well, seeing as how I am myself someone’s attractive, feckless Dermot, I had to see how it turned out. (Spoiler: Not well for Dermot.) It is very good. I swallowed it whole in two sittings, and will seek out the rest of her stuff.
Show Less
LibraryThing member yarb
I’ve now read three of Taylor’s novels and all her short stories and I’m ready to agree with the back-cover blurb from Phillip Hensher that she is “one of the hidden treasures of the English novel.” She has an exquisite facility for having her characters thoughts run in counterpoint to
This one is something I especially love: a seasonal story, a sort of Shakespearean chamber piece in which love acts differently on diverse lovers. Kate is almost forty and has recently lost her husband and her best friend. She’s remarried, to an amiable loafer ten years her junior, and lives with him and her adult-sized son and daughter and a spinster sister of her ex-husband. Then the husband and intoxicatingly beautiful daughter of her dead friend come back from abroad and over the course of a hot summer everything becomes subtly clouded and unclear.
Taylor captures the subtlest of changes in prose that is precise, observant, and pure pleasure to read. Every character, from the lackaday curate whom Kate’s daughter loves unrequitedly, to the cook who spends her spare time compiling an “anthology” and dreams of Bermuda, to Kate’s bluff industrialist ex-father in law, has an inner world to which we’re given access. Reading Elizabeth Taylor feels like a special privilege.
Show More
their dialogue; her stories are like helices, the inner world and the outer world intertwining and equally vivid but seldom aligning. This one is something I especially love: a seasonal story, a sort of Shakespearean chamber piece in which love acts differently on diverse lovers. Kate is almost forty and has recently lost her husband and her best friend. She’s remarried, to an amiable loafer ten years her junior, and lives with him and her adult-sized son and daughter and a spinster sister of her ex-husband. Then the husband and intoxicatingly beautiful daughter of her dead friend come back from abroad and over the course of a hot summer everything becomes subtly clouded and unclear.
Taylor captures the subtlest of changes in prose that is precise, observant, and pure pleasure to read. Every character, from the lackaday curate whom Kate’s daughter loves unrequitedly, to the cook who spends her spare time compiling an “anthology” and dreams of Bermuda, to Kate’s bluff industrialist ex-father in law, has an inner world to which we’re given access. Reading Elizabeth Taylor feels like a special privilege.
Show Less
LibraryThing member almin
My second Elizabeth Taylor novel, I enjoyed it as much as the first (Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont), it is more character study and less plot. I love her character's dialogue saying one thing but their thoughts say the complete opposite...can be quite funny at times. Her dinner table conversations
I listened to a podcast about Taylor, her grandson revealed that she would go to restaurants alone so she could eavesdrop on conversations as part of her research. She definitely honed that skill....
The intoduction (I usually read those after I've read the book as I think sometimes they spoil the story) was confusing and added nothing to my enjoyment of the book.
Recommend...
Show More
are numerous and she switches between conversations so smoothly I was never confused as to who was talking.I listened to a podcast about Taylor, her grandson revealed that she would go to restaurants alone so she could eavesdrop on conversations as part of her research. She definitely honed that skill....
The intoduction (I usually read those after I've read the book as I think sometimes they spoil the story) was confusing and added nothing to my enjoyment of the book.
Recommend...
Show Less
Subjects
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
1961
Physical description
272 p.; 5 inches
ISBN
9781844083206
Similar in this library
DDC/MDS
| 823.914 |