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A House Unlocked |
The story of an Edwardian house and family where Penelope Lively's grandparents lived in what was then remote West Somerset and where she often visited as a child. Often told through mundane household objects which prompt memories, the radical changes, social, economic and in rural society are charted and described in fascinating detail and brought vividly to life. It is a thoughtful reflection of 20th century life, attitudes and perceptions.
(Sue Pratt - bwl 105 Summer 2022) |
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According to Mark |
This novel will appeal - especially at the holiday season - to many readers, certainly to those with literary, critical tastes as well as to those who just like a good read. Written with great insight into the human condition, the love interest is especially intelligent, subtle and certainly 'unusual'. Lively's analytically amused and astringent view of her fellow creatures is a must.
(Kathie Somerwil Ayrton - bwl 19 June 2003) |
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Ammonites and Leaping Fish: A Life in Time |
This is not a memoir exactly rather a reflective look at old age, her own life, the history she has lived through, memories and how they shape us all, the pleasures of reading and writing and six objects important to her. The book is a joy to read - beautifully written (as you might expect), thoughtful and totally absorbing. If you have enjoyed her novels, you will enjoy this.
(Christine Miller - bwl 75 Winter 2015) |
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Beyond the Blue Mountains |
A collection of fourteen short stories with very different subject matters, but a humorous humanity links them all. I particularly liked the title story, along with 'The Butterfly and The Tin of Paint' and 'Crumbs of Wisdom'. Lively can speak volumes in very few words. Perfect as a light summer read, and small enough to pop in a pocket. As three of the stories have a distinct seasonal theme (Christmas), perhaps a suitable stocking filler?
(Mary Standing - bwl 52 July 2009) |
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Consequences |
The book opens as they meet on a park bench in 1935 and is all about what happens next and over the next seventy years. Beautifully told and with delightful characters, it mirrors the changes in life and society during this time. The consequences of the title demonstrate how chance events have far reaching outcomes. For me the only criticism is in the ending - too convenient and improbable I'm afraid.
(Sue Pratt - bwl 72 Spring 2014) |
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Family Album |
The six siblings growing up in Allersmead, a shabby, rambling Victorian pile, shared an apparently idyllic childhood with their earth mother, remote father and the au pair. Many years later and scattered throughout the world, as that time is reviewed through adult eyes and with adult voices a very different picture emerges, while revealing the subsequent diverse paths that their lives have taken. Beautifully told - I loved it.
(Sue Pratt - bwl 70 Autumn 2013) |
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Judgement Day |
Clare Paling is a newcomer to village life, where she discovers a diverse community, each with his or her own stories, worries and concerns. Initially a wry observer, she gradually becomes involved in their lives and activities but it takes a devastating event to make her reassess her own life. Told with compassion and understanding this absorbing narrative evokes a real and believable contemporary world.
(Sue Pratt - bwl 71 Winter 2014) |
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Making It Up |
This is fiction not based on but inspired by the author's life. She has discerned some of the 'might have beens' in her own existence, following them into alluring and quite different paths. Varied and excellently written, it might strike some as being over fanciful and sometimes forced. However, social comment and psychological insight, in a style brief in words and rich in content, go together with the darker and more forbidding side of the human condition.
(Kathie Somerwil Ayrton - bwl 44 February 2008) |
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Moon Tiger |
This winner of the Booker Prize 1987 deserves its accolade. Seemingly desultory and unfocused at the beginning, it gathers momentum but is so transparent in its portrayal of complex human relations against a true historical background that the outcome is at once satisfying, beautiful and emotionally stirring. Although foreseeable, the end comes as a surprise and fulfills the promise, seemingly exaggerated and superficial, of the beginning. A book perhaps richer in depth because of its concise, even terse, style.
(Kathie Somerwil Ayrton - bwl 44 February 2008) |
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Moon Tiger |
This is a beautifully written account of a dying woman's life seen through her eyes and those of her family and friends. Lively slips easily between past and present as she develops the theme that no two people experience the same event in the same way, and that perhaps we are never truly known even by those closest to us.
(Judith Peppitt - bwl 56 Spring 2010) |
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Passing On |
Edward and Helen are middle-aged siblings, still living at home; their narrow and uneventful lives dominated by their selfish and demanding mother. The book opens with her death, proceeds to what happens next to the brother and sister and how they react to their new freedom and her absence. They evoke equally pity, sympathy and exasperation, but the tale is told with sensitivity and compassion and has a clear sense of place and characterisation.
(Sue Pratt - bwl 71 Winter 2014) |
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Spiderweb |
Stella, an anthropologist, has just retired after many years conducting research in distant primitive communities. She settles down in a small West Country (UK) village. How she finds her new environment compares with the communities in which she has lived before and the situation of a female anthropologist at work 'in the field' are just two of the themes the author develops in what I found to be a fascinating story.
(Jeremy Swann - bwl 19 June 2003) |
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The Photograph |
An interesting book that shows how a man, years after his wife's suicide, realises how far he was from knowing and understanding her. It's constructed like a detective novel: he finds a photograph of his wife with a lover, and he becomes involved in searching for what really happened.
(Laurence Martin Euler - bwl 25 August 2004) |
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The Photograph |
This novella grows from an inauspicious beginning into a haunting analysis of how the ripple effect of a small event can threaten and destroy all those it touches. Morally but not moralistically, Lively illustrates how even our most insignificant actions can count, how impossible it is to properly assess or control their impact on others for good or evil and that even the element of time has no boundaries. A rather horrifying book.
(Kathie Somerwil Ayrton - bwl 44 February 2008) |
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The Photograph |
Glyn discovers a photograph of his dead wife holding hands with her brother-in-law. Driven by an obsessive need to know if she was unfaithful, he starts a quest which draws in all those who knew and loved her. The spreading ripples of questioning and growing self-knowledge transform the memories they had chosen to have into those they should have. Skillfully handled and utterly credible - a treat!
(Annabel Bedini - bwl 39 April 2007) |
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