Poor Caroline

by Winifred Holtby

Poor Caroline is a 1931 satirical novel by Winifred Holtby about an eccentric, elderly woman named Caroline Denton-Smyth, who has spent her life working and supporting herself, only to find herself with no place in society in her old age. She dedicates herself to her new venture, the Christian Cinema Company, which she believes will bring moral reform to the masses.

Genres: Fiction, Classics, British Literature, 20th Century, Novels, Historical Fiction, Literary Fiction

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1931

About the author

Winifred Holtby was a committed socialist and feminist who wrote the classic South Riding as a warm yet sharp social critique of the well-to-do farming community she was born into.

She was a good friend of Vera Brittain, possibly portraying her as Delia in The Crowded Street.

She died at the age of 37.

Reviews

[JimZ · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was an OK read. It went along fairly fast. I would not recommend this book as the go-to read for those not acquainted with Holtby’s oeuvre. My strongest recommendation would go to her ‘South Riding’ which is almost universally judged to be not only her best work, but a very fine work indeed. And I also very much liked ‘The Crowded Street’.

An old maid, Caroline Denton-Symth, in her early 70s, is driven to start a society in England that produces films of high moral character (relative to films put out in America) and forms the Christian Cinema Company. A Board of Directors is formed by a person with not-so-ideal intentions, Basil St. Denis. Caroline is made the honorary secretary to the Board. They need to find investors for their new venture. Other members of the Board, besides St. Denis, are:
• Joseph Isenbaum, a Jew, who wants to be affiliated with St. Denis because St. Denis went to school and graduated from Eton...Isenbaum wants to brownnose up to St. Denis so he will put in a good word for his son when it is time for him to go to college. Otherwise, he won’t get in because of the anti-Semitic atmosphere of England during that time period (1920s-1930s);
• Clifton Johnson, a seedy rip-off artist;
• Hugh Macafee, a Scot who has a new way of making film and wants the Christian Cinema Company to fund his efforts.

Two other main characters are:
• Eleanor de la Roux, an intelligent young woman who has a lot of money and who wants to succeed in a male-dominated world, and is a cousin of Caroline;
• Father Mortimer, who is a young curate who saw action in World War One, and came out of it scarred.

The book is structured with an opening ‘chorus’, and then 5 chapters, each chapter focusing on one of the main characters and their interactions with the others, and a closing chorus.
On the back cover of the book, the story is portrayed as a satire.

Note:
• Each of the first 4 of the 5 chapters ended with the words ‘poor Caroline’
• There is a school today (seems to be a college preparatory school) named after Holtby...the Winifred Academy located in the Bransholme area of Kingston upon Hull in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England: https://www.winifredholtbyacademy.co.uk/ Grades 7-11.
• An interesting introduction is written by George Davidson in this Virago Modern Classic re-issue (1984).

Reviews:
• Excellent review...she has a lot more information than I gave regarding the different characters and what they are all about (without giving too much away of the storyline): https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2019...
• https://shereadsnovels.com/2016/08/18...
• To be read only after you read the book..she gives everything away about the storyline in her review!...Poor Caroline (1931) by Winifred Holtby | Reading 1900-1950 (wordpress.com)
• Books and Chocolate: Poor Caroline by Winifred Holtby is Poorly Titled (karensbooksandchocolate.blogspot.com)

[Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘Poor Caroline’ was the fourth of Winifred Holtby’s six novel to be published and it is a little gem, quite unlike the three novels that came before but recognizably the work of the same author; and another book that made me think what a distinguished and era defining author she might have become, had she only been given more years to live and to write.

The novel opens with two of Caroline Audrey Denton-Smith’s young cousins coming home to Yorkshire, after attending her funeral in London. They had felt no great grief for the woman they had never really known or understood, the woman their family had always regarded as a figure of fun; but they had enjoyed their trip to the big city and they had come home with a lovely new winter coat.

Their attitude was sad, but it was understandable.

The Caroline they had known had been a small, plump elderly spinster who dressed eccentrically, who had lived in the poorest of London bedsits, who borrowed money that she had no hope of paying back; because, though she had many grand plans that she was sure would make her rich and successful, they had all been hopelessly impractical.

She wrote a will full of generous legacies, but when she left this life she had not a single penny to her name.

Her last enterprise was the Christian Cinema Company, through which she planned to make British films that would be a corrective to the immoral offerings of Hollywood. She found some support, she was able to assemble a board of directors and a little financial backing, but of course that wasn’t enough and the project – and Caroline – were doomed.

Each person who sat on the board of directors each had their own reason for being involved with the company.

The chairman was a minor aristocrat who was quite unqualified, but his wife had pushed him towards the position as she thought he would be happier if he had something to keep him busy.

A single-minded young inventor signed up because he was sure that the company would want his new type of film; and not realising that while he had been beavering away in his laboratory the film industry had developed something much better.

A Jewish businessman agreed join the board and agreed to provide some initial finance, in the hope that the chairman would arrange entrance to Eton for his son.

The proprietor of the Anglo-American School of Scenario Writing had put himself forward knowing that the company had no chance of success but quite certain that he could make himself a profit from a bunch of amateurs ….

Caroline was blind to all of this, she worked hard as secretary to move things forward, and two well meaning individuals helped to keep things going.

Eleanor de la Roux, a distant relative of Caroline’s, came to London from South Africa after her father had been killed in a car accident. She was an independent young woman who wanted a career, and she was inspired to invest most of her inheritance to to help the one relation who had welcomed her by a sermon …

Father Roger Mortimer, Caroline’s young and earnest parish priest, preached that sermon, and he was drawn into the Christian Cinema Company by his concern for a vulnerable parishioner and by his growing love for her young relation.

Each chapter is devoted to the story of one of these characters. The story-telling is immaculate, and I couldn’t doubt for a moment that Winifred Holtby had considered every detail of the different people, lives and relationships. They were beautifully observed, they were gently satirised, and the different stories spoke about so many things: class, race, faith, prejudice, family, loss, philanthropy, ambition ….

Each chapter was absorbing, and could have been the foundation of a different novel.

The ongoing consequences of the Great War were very well considered; and the many serious points were perfectly balanced by a rich vein of humour.

Every chapter ends with the words ‘Poor Caroline’ Each character sees Caroline in a different light but whether they are contemptuous, frustrated, infuriated or bemused, they all see her as a woman to be pitied.

But consider her words to a younger woman:

‘My dear child, when you’ve lived as long as I have, fighting and striving for what seems impossible, you’ll know there are some questions best left unasked. It will be. It must be. Faith. I will have faith until the heavens fall. Don’t you see, dear, that for people like us, who step off the beaten track and dare to scale the heights, there is no retreat, no turning back. There is no ‘If not’. It must be.’

And

‘What do you know about the worst? Wait until the iron has entered your soul, Wait until you have gone down to the depths in utter loneliness and risked everything, everything, even your own self-respect. Who are you to tell me about the worst when you have always led a sheltered life, with capital behind you, and a university education? When you have accepted the conditions that lead to utter nakedness of spirit? When your relations wondered if it wouldn’t be safer and more economical to get you certified and put away quietly in a nice mental hospital? When that have told you to give up the struggle and live on an old-age pension in a home for decayed gentlewoman? When there has been nothing, nothing left except success?

This is the story of a woman who had little education, who hadn’t married, who had worked to support herself, and who when she could work no more found that society had no place for her.

The way that is threaded through this book that told me that Winifred Holtby knew that the world had to change, that she knew how and that she knew why.

The book is strongest when it is considering the character and their stories, rather than the rather improbable story of the Christian Cinema Company. In many ways, it is quite unlike anything else of Winifred Holtby’s that I have read, but I saw common threads and shared concerns, allowing it to sit very well alongside those other novels.

‘Poor Caroline’ is both thought provoking and entertaining – I loved it!

[Troy Alexander · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had no idea what I was in for with this book. Based solely on the title and the rather dour cover image on the VMC edition, I thought perhaps it might be “a lonely spinster making cocoa in her bedsit” type of story. But it’s even more fun than that. The novel focusses on Caroline Denton-Smyth as she heads up the newly founded Christian Cinema Company, aiming to reform the moral and aesthetic standards of British cinema in the late 1920s. Despite being in her early seventies (a fact that she hides), Caroline is full of life and spirit and believes wholeheartedly in the ambitions of her company. Yet orbiting around her are a cast of characters whose intentions are not quite as altruistic as those of poor Caroline. Apparently Holtby’s most comic novel, I also found this rather moving, as one can’t help feel sympathy for Caroline as she desperately seeks purpose and fulfilment in something that is ultimately meaningless.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

Caroline Denton-Smyth is an eccentric do-gooder, who dreams of reforming the film world through the Christian Cinema Company. She draws in a group of very different people with very different aims to work on her project, and Holtby observes them each in turn. Poor Caroline is a mix of satire and pathos, an interesting mix though I thought sometimes uneasy, with characters as sharply observed as in South Riding, on a smaller scale.

[Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

In 'Poor Caroline' we have several rather unlikeable characters, who all have something to do with the ill fated Christian Cinema Company, which has become Caroline Denton Smyth's dream and obsession, as she approaches her 72 birthday. Poor Caroline lives in shabby room, and has no money, but she has ideas, so many ideas and feels her big chance in life has finally come. She is too, a rather ridiculous character, she borrows money with no hope of returning it, and develops rather a crush on young Father Mortimer. She she is however ever hopeful, poignantly so, which I did find ever so slightly endearing, and she is undeniably the heroine of the book, in spite of, or maybe because of her exasperating inability to see things as they really are.
The novel opens as two younger cousins of Caroline's return to Yorkshire from London, having attended her funeral, they were rather glad of the chance to "go up to town" as one of them had needed a new coat. Their hilarity over Caroline's continuing ridiculousness even in death is desperately sad, and beautifully sets the tone of the whole novel. Each subsequent chapter introduces us to the characters who had become involved in some way with Caroline and her Christian Cinema Company, each of them soon thinking of her as "Poor Caroline".
I loved this novel, as I have loved everything else of Winifred Holtby's that I have read, that she lived to write so few is a tragedy in itself. Human beings and their failings are so well captured by Winifred Holtby, everything so beautifully observed and often satirised. A brilliant novel.

[JacquiWine · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

Along with many other readers, I first discovered Winifred Holtby through her friendship with Vera Brittain, whose memoir – The Testament of Youth – is considered a classic for its depiction of the impact of the Great War on the British middle classes, particularly the women. While I’ve previously enjoyed some of Holtby’s other novels, it’s fair to say that my feelings about Poor Caroline (1931) are somewhat mixed. More about that later once I’ve explained a little about the novel itself – an inventive satire about the failings and cruelties of human nature and one woman’s fixation with a farcical scheme.

To read my review, please visit:

https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2019...

[Frances Brody · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poor Caroline was the wittiest book of 1931. It's still delightful, inventive, funny and uplifting. It begins with Caroline's Yorkshire cousins back from her funeral, which they combined with a shopping trip. Betty and Dorothy are highly amused by Caroline's Last Will and Testament in which she bequeathes vast sums of money she does not have.
Six different characters have point of view chapters, each chapter ending with the words "Poor Caroline".
I relished Clifton Roderick Johnson, proprietor of the Anglo-American School of Scenario Writing, and his four pupils. Would-be novelist Doreen steals £25 from her company's petty cash to pay Johnson for an appraisal of her novel, which he has totally forgotten about, and she now fears prosecution.
A really good read, highly recommended.

[Shruti Buddhavarapu · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a little apprehensive of reading this book, coming to it after having read what critics claim is the best in her oeuvre, 'South Riding'. I should clarify though, that my rating is a 3.5 stars, because while it otherwise get's a solid four stars (somewhere in the middle of the book, I lost my bearings, the plot tends to lag for the tiniest second), it doesn't have the lateral density of 'South Riding'.

That being said, I don't think writers have written an old, eccentric, ''cracked'' single woman the way Holtby has. I do realise though, that while reading about Caroline, I had only warmth and affection; meeting the likes of her in person might be every bit as exasperating as each character in the text tends to find her.

Curl up with tea and put an arm around the 72-year-old incurable optimist with creaking bones, as she tells you the story of how despite dying alone, penniless and unsuccesful, the world never failed her.

[Mary Durrant · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poor Caroline!
I loved this book especially as each chapter ended with Poor Caroline!

This book is so funny Caroline who doesn't have any money just lives on others and her Christian Cinema Company which is a total farce.
You just have to laugh that the money she left in her will wasn't hers!
I love the quote;

'You just can't alter people like Caroline.She always thought she knew better than anyone.She was always going to do something extraordinary.'

[Priscilla · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and learning about Winfred Hotlby's short life. Although she wrote in Britain in the 1920s, her themes are still relevant. As a feminist, she deals with the tug between career and family for many women and sounds a warning about the technology revolution and the unintended consequences of the inventions of engineers. Her medium is satire but her points are well woven into her narrative. I am so glad I bought this book int he 1980s and just realized I had never read it!

The British actress Jean Marsh (co-creator with now-Dame Eileen Atkins of Upstairs Downstairs) was here for a celebration of Masterpiece Theatre many years ago when I worked at UNC TV. I had the fun of escorting her for the weekend. We talked books and she sent me a box of Virago Modern Classics as a thank you. I sent her some of my favorite American novels by women. Anyway, after reading a few of the books she sent me, I began collecting the series, then published in the US by Penguin. I have about 20 or 25 and have read most. They continue to be a great source of pleasure for me.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I often hope, when I am reading my last novel by an author, that it will be brilliant, and justify my tendency towards completeism (not a real word apparently). Sadly it was not the case with this, Winifred Holtby's 'London' novel. With hardly a mention of the Yorkshire wolds, seaside towns or farms, it is a satirical novel about an elderly lady who wants to start a film company in the 1930s as a moral antidote to the improper kind of fare that is being served up to the British public. Of course nothing goes to plan. In fact the novel starts with Caroline's funeral and the knowledge that she died in penury, an indication of her lack of success. The writing itself was good enough, but the plot was a bit lack-lustre for my liking, and nowhere near a funny or entertaining as the author's other non-Yorkshire novel, the excellent, African-set 'Mandoa! Mandoa!'. Oh well, one less to re-read, and it helps me pin-point the ones I really enjoyed.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poor Caroline is a witty and farcical story of a passionate and self deluded septuagenarian, the eponymous Caroline, who has set about to create a business, the Christian Cinema Company, to clean up British cinema. Caroline is more or less an annoyance to all (including the reader), as well as a target for those who lack her commitment to clean Christian living but have a variety of ulterior motives. And so they involve themselves—as investors, board members, technical advisors—in the CCC, an enterprise in the process of failure even as it is begun.

There is considerable comedy, some lovely writing, as well as Holtby’s familiar socialist and feminist values. It was written in 1931 and so inevitably some aspects seemed a little dated. But overall, I find Holtby’s novels likable and entertaining. I did think South Riding the better novel but I will not hesitate to read another of hers.

[Ape · Rating 3 out of 5]

Books can be such a great distraction from life.
I disgress.
This book is good, and I suppose a clever satire on a certain type of woman at a certain point in history. But in comparison to the amazing South Riding, it's just "all right". Yes, this is worth reading, but I did find it dragged a bit.

So, this is set in the 1920s in London. Poor Caroline is an old lady, actually in her early seventies but says she's in her late fifties. Every chapter ends with the thought 'poor Caroline' as though she is a tragic victim of circumstance. She is definately poor in the literal sense, so although she is horrified to end up in hospital with common folk who have no money, well, neither does she, yet she has delusions of grandeur which doesn't add to her likeability. I could never quite decide whether she was conscious of the manipulative way she lives her life, guilt-tripping people into paying for her, or not. Whenever she sees someone she's always asking for 'loans' of money, just for a few days. She writes to her cousins in Yorkshire and tells them when they've finished with that lovely coat they have, make sure to send it to her. She writes a will leaving people thousands of pounds she never has, for she is a pauper... and if you want to word it more extremely, essentially she is a deluded parasite who lives off other people and never really takes an active responsibility for her own live. I struggled with Caroline. She had personality and umph, but she was so manipulative and parasitic at times. Holtby is so good in writing characters, in that no one is perfect and even when she is writing about vile characteristics, she writes so matter-of-factly so as not to manipulate your opinions by her own words.

Caroline is one of these Edwardian 'ladies' bred for one purpose, to get married and have kids. But she seems to be so repressed sexually, and that life never worked out for her. So instead of living on and through a husband and children, she does it through relatives and friends, rather than thinking, ok, I'm going to be a woman for myself. Compare with her distant and much younger cousin, Eleanor, who comes from South Africa after the sudden death of her father with an inheritance. In one strop Caroline has a go at her making out that Eleanor is spoilled because of the time she has been born and the opportunities in front of her, none of which Caroline had, and she has been trapped into the life she has by the circumstance of her time. I suppose in that way, yes, poor-tragic Caroline that she never got out of that thinking and let it take over her entire life.

During this book, she has a deluded idea of setting up a Christian cinema company to look after the morals of the UK. A number of people join her organisation, all for ulterior motives and zero interest in this pious organisation (getting a son into Eton, getting promotion for an invention, stealing money etc etc), and in fairness given that this organisation sucks up thousands of pounds and produces NOTHING - never a thought or an attempt at a film, just Caroline setting up an office, running pointless board meetings and glorifying herself over all she has "achieved". She emotionally manipulates Eleanor into giving her entire inheritance to this joke of an organisation, then verbally attacks her for being a selfish career woman when Eleanor says she's going to America to work and earn her fortune so she's better able to do something for people. Part of that is also jealously as Caroline developes a crush on a young priest who is in love with Eleanor. And she mentally rips Eleanor to shreds when this jealously takes hold, which is awful in consideration of all Eleanor gives up for "poor" Caroline (she also gives up the job in America to stay and attend Caroline in hospital).

It is an interesting story/satire of the cinema company - albeit very slow moving - and an interesting character study of Caroline, who I can't help feel is also a representation of many of these Edwardian style genteel women who were trained to be mindless women for husbands and children and if that didn't work out, were utterley incapable of financing themselves (Caroline even refuses to take her old age pension and sponges off relatives and friends instead) or taking any real responsibility for their own life. She assures herself she has had a marvellous life by putting overly grand interpretations onto the events of her life and the things she has done. And nothing is her fault. She's always the poor victim of circumstance in her mind. Yeah.... I don't think I would have liked her if I'd gotten to know her well.

[Sandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can’t help but think this novel would be helped by a better title. ‘Poor Caroline’ is such a negative sounding title for this, the fourth novel by Yorkshire author Winifred Holtby. From the first page, it is clear this is a fond but sharp satire of the inter-war years showing how the expectations of people can on the surface appear aligned but in reality are self-serving.
Caroline Denton-Smyth, honorary secretary of the Christian Cinema Company, works hard in the belief that her company is doing good. But the people on the board of directors each have their own reason for being involved with the company, reasons that are not admitted and which diverge hugely from Caroline’s intentions. One hopes to leverage connections with the chairman to gain entrance for his son to Eton. Another wishes to sell his new type of film. Caroline has so many ideas but little success. At the age of 72 she has no money and is dependent on loans from long-suffering relatives. But she is always hopeful. This is the story of Caroline, her fellow directors, and the Christian Cinema Company. Holtby tells the story of each person in turn so the full picture, and the extent of Caroline’s folly, becomes evident. You can’t help but feel simultaneously sorry for her and exasperated with her inability to see the truth.
It is a while before we meet the eponymous heroine. First we learn of her death, as some distant relatives return from her funeral. In her will, Caroline left bequests of money she didn’t have. “Oh, you can’t alter people like Caroline. She always thought she knew better than anyone. She was always going to do something extraordinary.”
Two scenes in particular stayed with me. The description of the odious Clifton Roderick Johnson’s screenwriting class is a classic. He spits instructions to his paltry four students. ‘They did not know, and indeed Mr Johnson hardly knew, that their lecturer who spoke so confidently of technique, cuts, drama and royalties had himself been able to sell for performance only one scenario and a set of captions.’ And the storm at film inventor Hugh Macafee’s derelict warehouse when he continues to work despite the efforts of two fellow directors to evacuate him before a wall collapses.
This novel requires patience, to allow the author time to draw the full scenario so the true manipulations, fraud, dissembling and love, can unfold.
Read more of my book reviews at http://www.sandradanby.com/book-revie...

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

" 'She was a witch. Her brown eyes glowed: her bosom heaved. She built up for Eleanor a glowing, romantic picture of High Finance and Big Business inspired by Idealism, of Art and Ethics reconciled at last'

"Caroline Denton-Smyth is an eccentric, remarkable for her vivid costumes trailing feathers, fancy beads and jingling lorgnettes. Sitting alone in her West Kensington bedsitter, she dreams of the Christian Cinema Company -- her vehicle for reform. For Caroline sees herself as a pioneer, one who must risk everything in the 'Cause of Right.' Her Board of Directors are a motley crew: Basil St Denis, upper crust but impecunious; Joseph Isenbaum, aspiring to Society and Eton for his son; Eleanor de la Roux, Caroline's independent, left-wing cousin from South Africa; Hugh Macafee, a curt Scottish film technician; young Father Mortimer, scarred from the First World War; and Clifton Johnson, seedy American scenario writer on he make. Through each of these different characters -- their secret desires and motivations -- Winifred Holtby affectionately observes the foibles of human nature in this delightful satire, first published in 1931."
~~back cover

A delightful book, holding each of these characters (and others) up to scrutiny, in a gentle but searchlight way. There's a great vein of sadness running through this book: "poor Caroline" is the only one who truly believes in the project and she spends herself in promoting it, dreaming of a future when the Christian Cinema Company has become big business, and she, as Secretary, has at last reached the delightful, longed for realm of riches. The others (except Eleanor and young Father Mortimer) are mercenary, callous selfish creatures, using the business for other purposes, and bailing when the end becomes all too near and apparent.

I think the author wanted to make a point: Caroline has had an adventurous life, although she neglected to provide for her old age so that she spends her old age in a nasty little bedsitter in West Kensington, living on crumbs. Is she to be censored or pitied because she came to a bitter, penny-pinching end, or admire because she lived so fully and saw so much along the way?

[Kay Robart · Rating 2 out of 5]

This novel is a satire of charitable organizations written in the 1930's by Winifred Holtby, who usually writes about small-town Yorkshire. Caroline is a do-good spinster who attempts to form a film company that only produces Christian films. In pursuing her goals, she assembles a board of directors for her company, the members of which all have their own agendas, including enriching themselves at others' expense. I had an ambivalent reaction to the novel. Most of the characters are not likeable, but the novel is well-written and carefully observed.

See my complete review here:

http://whatmeread.wordpress.com/tag/p...

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

How clever Winifred Holtby is! Each chapter is told from the point of view of a different player, but every one ends with the same refrain: Poor Caroline!
Poor Caroline indeed. An unloved elderly relative with a bee in her bonnet about good Christian films hardly makes for a heroine, and yet Holtby's Caroline is a charming if deluded old woman, and she has a will and a work ethic one has to admire. And she has a last will and testament that made me smile and cry all at once. Quite a wonderful read.

[Carolyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a wonderful book for group discussion! Winifred Holtby's literary construction is admirable ... her quotes fabulously quotable; her characters, three dimensional representations of societal class and character. It's like time in a bottle. Hooray for Caroline: the richest of 'em all!

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the way each chapter was from the point of view of a different character. I was surprised at how real the interwar period seemed - obviously it was real for Holtby, but so many novels of that period don't give you any sense of believability or characters you could imagine existing.

[Jean Brodie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written, witty and easy to read. This book deserves more current recognition

[John Scothern · Rating 4 out of 5]

'Human foibles'... What wonderful characters to savour and ' No, don't do it!' I often found myself gasping . As relevant to life now as ever.

[Peter McGinn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the Virago series of novels that mostly feature women writers who were well-known in the early to mid-1900s, but who have largely fallen by the wayside most recently. There are a lot of hidden gems in this series, and I guess this counts as one.

Many of the characters are more witty and less stodgy that I expect to see in works of this era, and even long paragraphs or entire pages without dialogue to break it up do not drag the story down. The titular character Caroline os decried at the beginning of the book as an old woman who borrows money and who is rather tedious and grasping. This caused me to wonder if she was misrepresented by her family and that the story would reveal the true Caroline. And so the story did, very patiently and steadily. But I won’t say any more about it as that is a part of the reader’s journey.

The book is a satire, but not as much fun as some where we laugh at the foibles of some of the characters. They are not a likable bunch.

It is a pretty good book in my opinion, ahead of its time, perhaps, as it has a modern feel to it.

[Liz · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was impressed by Winifred Holtby's serious novels, but this humorous one wasn't for me.