RETRO READS
HOLIDAY by Stanley Middleton (Windmill £8.99, 256 pp)
HOLIDAY
by Stanley Middleton (Windmill £8.99, 256 pp)
How to fill the time? In this vividly moving novel, Edwin, 32, strolls through a seedy seaside town. He has walked out on his deranged wife, Meg, because love ‘had dropped away as dry as dust’.
His chintzy guest house, with its chips, chops and chirpy banter at meal times, is an undemanding sanctuary.
As he dwells on Meg’s violent behaviour and the death of their baby son, he finds that the rowdy pubs, amusement arcades, flirty girls, the kiss- me-quick-ery and his own intellectual superiority increase his loneliness.
When his well-meaning in- laws arrive, determined to save the marriage, Edwin must make painful choices.
AT THE JERUSALEM by Paul Bailey (Head of Zeus £18.99, 240 pp)
AT THE JERUSALEM
by Paul Bailey (Head of Zeus £18.99, 240 pp)
Sartre’s maxim ‘Hell is other people’ certainly applies in Bailey’s book, written mostly in dialogue, about an elderly widow’s care home nightmare.
Faith Gadney, her mind fragmenting, is dumped at the Jerusalem by exhausted family members. She must endure the horrors of communal living — loos with no locks, group meals, blaring TV, ladies snoring in the lounge with mouths hanging open, a malodorous shared dormitory . . . Worse, she is befriended by a resident gasbag who never stops yapping.
All Faith wants is to be left alone with her memories.
Depressing? Not entirely — the nurses are kind, residents jolly and outings fun. But not for solitary, uncooperative Faith.
TEA AT FOUR O’CLOCK
TEA AT FOUR O’CLOCK by Janet McNeill (Turnpike £12, 192 pp)
by Janet McNeill (Turnpike £12, 192 pp)
It’s a joy to discover an almost forgotten author, one who writes with insight, compassion and prose of great beauty.
McNeill’s story, about letting go of the past, opens with the funeral of an unloved older sister.
Timid Laura, 40, grew up tyrannised by her at their comfortable Irish house, both parents dead.
Now an heiress, Laura is free to make a new life. However, after 20 years of silence, her devious, money-cadging, black-sheep brother turns up.
He plans to move in and install his wife and stroppy daughter. Will Laura assert herself at last? Or be bullied? And can she shake off the guilt caused by a secret teenage love adventure? Utterly gripping.