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Sadler's Birthday
From the author of The Gustav Sonata
Today is Jack Sadler's birthday. Or is it? He's not sure, he doesn't really care. It might be his last day or the beginning of a new chapter in his life. He must find the key to his old room. He knows the truth about his past lies there and somehow he must get in and confront it.
Over a million Rose Tremain books sold
‘A writer of exceptional talent ... Tremain is a writer who understands every emotion’ Independent I
‘There are few writers out there with the dexterity or emotional intelligence to rival that of the great Rose Tremain’ Irish Times
‘Tremain has the painterly genius of an Old Master, and she uses it to stunning effect’ The Times
'Rose Tremain is one of the very finest British novelists' Salman Rushdie
‘Tremain is a writer of exemplary vision and particularity. The fictional world is rendered with extraordinary vividness’ Marcel Theroux, Guardian
Today is Jack Sadler's birthday. Or is it? He's not sure, he doesn't really care. It might be his last day or the beginning of a new chapter in his life. He must find the key to his old room. He knows the truth about his past lies there and somehow he must get in and confront it.
Over a million Rose Tremain books sold
‘A writer of exceptional talent ... Tremain is a writer who understands every emotion’ Independent I
‘There are few writers out there with the dexterity or emotional intelligence to rival that of the great Rose Tremain’ Irish Times
‘Tremain has the painterly genius of an Old Master, and she uses it to stunning effect’ The Times
'Rose Tremain is one of the very finest British novelists' Salman Rushdie
‘Tremain is a writer of exemplary vision and particularity. The fictional world is rendered with extraordinary vividness’ Marcel Theroux, Guardian
208 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1991
7 people are currently reading
155 people want to read
About the author
Rose Tremain
79 books1,105 followersDame Rose Tremain is an acclaimed English novelist and short story writer, celebrated for her distinctive approach to historical fiction and her focus on characters who exist on the margins of society. Educated at the Sorbonne and the University of East Anglia, where she later taught creative writing and served as Chancellor, Tremain has produced a rich body of work spanning novels, short stories, plays, and memoir. Influenced by writers such as William Golding and Gabriel García Márquez, her narratives often blend psychological depth with lyrical prose.
Among her many honors, she has received the Whitbread Award for Music and Silence, the Orange Prize for The Road Home, and the National Jewish Book Award for The Gustav Sonata. She was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Restoration and has been recognized multiple times by the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. In 2020, she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire for her services to literature. Tremain lives in Norfolk and continues to write, with her recent novel Absolutely and Forever shortlisted for the 2024 Walter Scott Prize.
Among her many honors, she has received the Whitbread Award for Music and Silence, the Orange Prize for The Road Home, and the National Jewish Book Award for The Gustav Sonata. She was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for Restoration and has been recognized multiple times by the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. In 2020, she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire for her services to literature. Tremain lives in Norfolk and continues to write, with her recent novel Absolutely and Forever shortlisted for the 2024 Walter Scott Prize.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
April 1, 2021
Reading Tremain's first novel it struck me how all the things I love about her writing were there from the very start. This had the same quality and depth of writing and characterisation as her more recent novels and felt very distinct in its style.
Tremain has such a talent for conveying human experience and emotion that I always feel in safe hands with her work and know that it will take me on an emotional journey. Sadler's Birthday is a reflection of the now elderly Jack Sadler on his life leading up to his lonely existence in a big neglected house where his mind and memory are failing him. The narrative includes extended flashbacks to Jack's birth and childhood and to his time working as a butler to a wealthy household during the second world war. It is here that Jack meets and cares for a young evacuee, Tom, who will leave a lasting impression on the rest of his life.
As always with Tremain's stories, this was at times moving, heartbreaking, hopeful and humorous and I loved it.
Tremain has such a talent for conveying human experience and emotion that I always feel in safe hands with her work and know that it will take me on an emotional journey. Sadler's Birthday is a reflection of the now elderly Jack Sadler on his life leading up to his lonely existence in a big neglected house where his mind and memory are failing him. The narrative includes extended flashbacks to Jack's birth and childhood and to his time working as a butler to a wealthy household during the second world war. It is here that Jack meets and cares for a young evacuee, Tom, who will leave a lasting impression on the rest of his life.
As always with Tremain's stories, this was at times moving, heartbreaking, hopeful and humorous and I loved it.
February 3, 2016
Echoes of The Remains of the Day , but this was published 13 years before the Ishiguro novel... a rather beautiful book about an old butler who is moving towards his death in the old house his employers left to him. The ending brought a tense moment, but finally, a sense of relief!
September 19, 2022
Sadlers Birthday by Rose Tremain is quite simply a beautiful book. It features several characters and dips into the lives of many more. Long before the end of the book we realize that none of these people - their pets! – are not particularly happy. It’s not that they are sad. It’s not that they are depressed, because they aren’t. This is not a book laden with angst. It’s rather, to put it simply, they are on the receiving end of life. They ought to complain, but they never seem to.
Jack Sadler of the book’s title has been a butler to the Colonel and his wife. He has been in service before, but this couple are a bit grander than his previous employers, grander, at least on the surface. Their large home is starting to crumble from the neglect of insufficient resources. The marriage, childless but arguably not loveless, kept a smile on its public face, at least locally. Blind eyes were turned whenever the Colonel made his regular trips to London. Dinner ruled of the day in this household, and it was Jack Sadler's job to serve it on time.
And, speaking of time, Sadler is as old as the century, so thirty-nine of the outbreak of war. His own origins are acknowledged, remembered but not discussed. “Not discussed” is a phrase that could apply to Sadler’s entire life. Suffice it to say that he was brought up by a single mother. Jack Sadler was very fond of his mother, fond of the warmth of her bed which he shared as a child, shared, no doubt, because mother and child shared a room that came with the job. There was no choice involved on either side.
In the Colonel’s service, Jack has colleagues. These are used to the household. Jack’s dog, a mongrel with the stub of a tail, has no name. He never had one. It’s owner, Jack. Had equally undistinguished origins, and together with its owner, this unnamed dog aged along with the house where it lived.
Lives changed in 1939. A lad called Tom arrives. He’s an evacuee from London, one of an army of children sent to safety from the expected falling bombs. They were sent to the rural areas for their own safety, and families were expected to take them in. His mother, it seems, can’t take him back. Jack had never had children, neither had his employer, but the lady asking for the placement became confident they would cope
Jack and Tom get on well. Jack never married. He also seems not to have made relationships with other people, apart from his mother, whom he worshiped. During the war years, Jack and Tom’s relationship matures over the five years he spends in the household. They discover mutual interests that previously neither of them knew they had.
Then, one day in a new peacetime, Tom’s mother appears in a sports car accompanied by her bloke to reclaim her son. Surely they are spivs, a bit too flash by half. “Bet I know what she does for a living,” was one voiced thought. Jack must live on and with his mother, which he does, because what’s the alternative?
Some years later a queen is crowned in London. It proves to be a momentous day. Lives change. There is precious little reflection but what happens is precious. Why shouldn’t it be Jack’s birthday by the book’s end? Sadler’s Birthday is a memorable, moving and deeply human book. None of these people are anything other than ordinary and that’s their strength.
Jack Sadler of the book’s title has been a butler to the Colonel and his wife. He has been in service before, but this couple are a bit grander than his previous employers, grander, at least on the surface. Their large home is starting to crumble from the neglect of insufficient resources. The marriage, childless but arguably not loveless, kept a smile on its public face, at least locally. Blind eyes were turned whenever the Colonel made his regular trips to London. Dinner ruled of the day in this household, and it was Jack Sadler's job to serve it on time.
And, speaking of time, Sadler is as old as the century, so thirty-nine of the outbreak of war. His own origins are acknowledged, remembered but not discussed. “Not discussed” is a phrase that could apply to Sadler’s entire life. Suffice it to say that he was brought up by a single mother. Jack Sadler was very fond of his mother, fond of the warmth of her bed which he shared as a child, shared, no doubt, because mother and child shared a room that came with the job. There was no choice involved on either side.
In the Colonel’s service, Jack has colleagues. These are used to the household. Jack’s dog, a mongrel with the stub of a tail, has no name. He never had one. It’s owner, Jack. Had equally undistinguished origins, and together with its owner, this unnamed dog aged along with the house where it lived.
Lives changed in 1939. A lad called Tom arrives. He’s an evacuee from London, one of an army of children sent to safety from the expected falling bombs. They were sent to the rural areas for their own safety, and families were expected to take them in. His mother, it seems, can’t take him back. Jack had never had children, neither had his employer, but the lady asking for the placement became confident they would cope
Jack and Tom get on well. Jack never married. He also seems not to have made relationships with other people, apart from his mother, whom he worshiped. During the war years, Jack and Tom’s relationship matures over the five years he spends in the household. They discover mutual interests that previously neither of them knew they had.
Then, one day in a new peacetime, Tom’s mother appears in a sports car accompanied by her bloke to reclaim her son. Surely they are spivs, a bit too flash by half. “Bet I know what she does for a living,” was one voiced thought. Jack must live on and with his mother, which he does, because what’s the alternative?
Some years later a queen is crowned in London. It proves to be a momentous day. Lives change. There is precious little reflection but what happens is precious. Why shouldn’t it be Jack’s birthday by the book’s end? Sadler’s Birthday is a memorable, moving and deeply human book. None of these people are anything other than ordinary and that’s their strength.
May 8, 2021
Years ago at work someone brought in tiny, lovely cupcakes iced with sweetened creamed cheese and decorated with a chocolate rose on top. As I bit into mine, my teeth and tongue found a little knot of baking soda which had failed to integrate into the cupcake batter. I had to quickly and discreetly dispose of the inedible lump. That didn't stop me enjoying the rest of the cupcake but it is still a distinct, visceral memory that returned to me here. In this beautifully written, flawed gem of a book, Sadler has thrown in the distasteful bit deliberately and then sailed away to let us chew and spit or digest as we will. I haven't read another review that mentions in so many words what the issue is and I wonder if, for some, that brief passage and its aftermath simply escaped their comprehension. Yes, I did enjoy this book, as it ended up being more of a view of guilt and penance, and ultimately both sad and hopeful. 4 stars.
August 25, 2021
Sadler’s birthday is a fine novel about loneliness, old age and missed opportunity.
Jack Sadler is 76 and muses about death. His only real companion is an old dog. He looks back over his life and wonders what might have been.
Sadler’s birthday is often sad but also uplifting at times. Despite a fairly tough start in life, he achieves much and even finds a kind of love in the most unlikely of places.
Dame Rose Tremain is one of the world’s very best authors writing in the English language. Her descriptive passages of beautiful prose bring people and places to life that few others can.Sadler’s Birthday is another excellent novel from Rose Tremain.
David Lowther. Author of The Blue Pencil, Liberating Belsen, Two Families at War and The Summer of’39, all published by Sacristy Press
Jack Sadler is 76 and muses about death. His only real companion is an old dog. He looks back over his life and wonders what might have been.
Sadler’s birthday is often sad but also uplifting at times. Despite a fairly tough start in life, he achieves much and even finds a kind of love in the most unlikely of places.
Dame Rose Tremain is one of the world’s very best authors writing in the English language. Her descriptive passages of beautiful prose bring people and places to life that few others can.Sadler’s Birthday is another excellent novel from Rose Tremain.
David Lowther. Author of The Blue Pencil, Liberating Belsen, Two Families at War and The Summer of’39, all published by Sacristy Press
December 1, 2018
I enjoy this author with The Road Home possibly my favourite of those novels I have read. This is Tremain’s first novel and a fine one. I found it reminiscent of The Remains Of The Day by Ishiguro so I maybe developing a soft spot for elderly butlers LOL. I read this in two long sittings and although not big on plot it was a quiet thoughtful reading experience. My copy is now off in the post to be shared with another reader via Bookcrossing as a wishlist tag.
January 9, 2016
I am taking pleasure in going back into Tremain’s bibliography. This is her first novel and an unusual one, focussing as it does on the recollections of an elderly man, Sadler, who is having a birthday – ‘maybe today, maybe next week’.
Sadler lives alone in the mansion he inherited from his former employers, the Colonel and Madge. He remembers the value of his life as a butler and his only love – the young Tom, an evacuee from East London during the Blitz. Sadler is not portrayed as a paedophile but as Tom’s friend, protector and initiator into sexuality. Tom later professes not to care for ‘pansies’ and doesn’t contact Sadler again after he returns to London but there is no suggestion that he has been damaged.
This is a rather melancholy book; it reminded me of ‘The Remains of the Day’ though not as accomplished. Stays in the mind – and would make a good movie even now (35 years after it was written). Three and a half stars.
Sadler lives alone in the mansion he inherited from his former employers, the Colonel and Madge. He remembers the value of his life as a butler and his only love – the young Tom, an evacuee from East London during the Blitz. Sadler is not portrayed as a paedophile but as Tom’s friend, protector and initiator into sexuality. Tom later professes not to care for ‘pansies’ and doesn’t contact Sadler again after he returns to London but there is no suggestion that he has been damaged.
This is a rather melancholy book; it reminded me of ‘The Remains of the Day’ though not as accomplished. Stays in the mind – and would make a good movie even now (35 years after it was written). Three and a half stars.
May 18, 2017
This early Rose Tremain novel is a bit of an oddity. It starts with Sadler, a lonely old man in a big house, thinking it must soon be his birthday. The reader is then taken through the bits and pieces of Sadler's life and the few people that have meant something to him. It's rather melancholy, and despite being a relatively short book has a tendency to meander. Tremain's quality as a writer is already evident here, but otherwise there is nothing remarkable about it.
December 27, 2014
I found this rather a flat and sad book. Nothing in particular to recommend it apart from Tremain's ability to write. It is unusual and odd, lacking in any joy or vigour. I have to rate it 3 star for its quality but as a yarn, it's rather limp.
December 16, 2017
What a surprising little book- i wonder this book isn’t more well known and admired. It weaves a clever tale of old age and the life lived behind it that we do not see and may never guess. This story has stayed with me .
September 6, 2017
A man has a dream...
There's a lot of dust around in this book. Tremaine lifts the lid off post-war Britain in a very moving novel about the interior lives of people driven by aimless daily rounds and unnamed cravings. A society that cannot name paedophilia cannot challenge it while it keeps its intimate secrets in closed cupboards and mouldy attic rooms. Characters get caught up in the strange conundrums of names and nomenclature in old houses and gardens that still cling on to the Colonel's 'cardinal rules.' Tom's confusion at how to address the Colonel when he first arrives as an evacuee from the East End leads to his complete abandonment of the old soldier. There is a touching moment when Tom calls Sadler 'Jack' for the first time. The ageing dog also remains nameless until, after Jack has found his mother's birthday card showing a boat on water in the rat-infested room at the top of the house, he decides, at the very end of the book that 'tomorrow he would have to give it a name.' Sadler's desperate loneliness after Tom's departure in 1945 builds to a point of total stasis in his urine-drenched bed after 30 years. This novel is non-judgemental throughout as it pulls apart the matted layers of sexual and social repression in mid-20th century England and their terrible life-denying effects at a time when the country was pouring confetti and cheers on the new Queen. But it is also about subtle expressions of freedom and self-determination, symbolised by the motifs of rowing, boats and streams, that help to gather and build identity in a world that seeks constantly to smother it. Go with Tom and Jack and pull hard on the oars when you are reading this and you reach some breathless sense of release at the end.
There's a lot of dust around in this book. Tremaine lifts the lid off post-war Britain in a very moving novel about the interior lives of people driven by aimless daily rounds and unnamed cravings. A society that cannot name paedophilia cannot challenge it while it keeps its intimate secrets in closed cupboards and mouldy attic rooms. Characters get caught up in the strange conundrums of names and nomenclature in old houses and gardens that still cling on to the Colonel's 'cardinal rules.' Tom's confusion at how to address the Colonel when he first arrives as an evacuee from the East End leads to his complete abandonment of the old soldier. There is a touching moment when Tom calls Sadler 'Jack' for the first time. The ageing dog also remains nameless until, after Jack has found his mother's birthday card showing a boat on water in the rat-infested room at the top of the house, he decides, at the very end of the book that 'tomorrow he would have to give it a name.' Sadler's desperate loneliness after Tom's departure in 1945 builds to a point of total stasis in his urine-drenched bed after 30 years. This novel is non-judgemental throughout as it pulls apart the matted layers of sexual and social repression in mid-20th century England and their terrible life-denying effects at a time when the country was pouring confetti and cheers on the new Queen. But it is also about subtle expressions of freedom and self-determination, symbolised by the motifs of rowing, boats and streams, that help to gather and build identity in a world that seeks constantly to smother it. Go with Tom and Jack and pull hard on the oars when you are reading this and you reach some breathless sense of release at the end.
May 15, 2025
Sadler's Birthday is the very first novel from Rose Tremain back in 1976. All alone is his big mansion, Jack Sadler is 76 and another birthday is on the horizon. The book is obviously full of his memories, particularly from when he first came to the house as a butler at the beginning of the second world war. Here are the elderly Colonel and his wife Madge, together with Vera the housemaid. But now they have all left or died. On his own, Jack is feeling his age: "he's been old it seemed for so long", a typical case of "senile decay"? "An awareness of your mediocrity".
But suddenly we are back to when his mother Annie was sixteen and living with her father Greg, a piano tuner. Annie is "far too timid and shy", but who would not be with her looks. But she does marry although all the family connections are sometimes vague. You have to work them out. Annie has been left with Jack, just a child then, and finds employment as a housekeeper. Jack leaves at fourteen to find his own path.
But it's Jack's memories of wartime in the big house that are the most interesting, especially when they take in a boy. Jack and Tom become close. Then watching the coronation on TV when a phone call is what makes the day memorable. But now Sadler has been on his own for twenty years with just visits from his housekeeper Vera. Feeling his age, thinking about his own mortality, he needed someone there but could not face another person living in that house. Rose Tremain gives us a poignant story for her first novel, one I was glad I found. Especially an old hardback from 1989 in such great condition.
But suddenly we are back to when his mother Annie was sixteen and living with her father Greg, a piano tuner. Annie is "far too timid and shy", but who would not be with her looks. But she does marry although all the family connections are sometimes vague. You have to work them out. Annie has been left with Jack, just a child then, and finds employment as a housekeeper. Jack leaves at fourteen to find his own path.
But it's Jack's memories of wartime in the big house that are the most interesting, especially when they take in a boy. Jack and Tom become close. Then watching the coronation on TV when a phone call is what makes the day memorable. But now Sadler has been on his own for twenty years with just visits from his housekeeper Vera. Feeling his age, thinking about his own mortality, he needed someone there but could not face another person living in that house. Rose Tremain gives us a poignant story for her first novel, one I was glad I found. Especially an old hardback from 1989 in such great condition.
December 13, 2024
A remarkable first novel about a retired butler living in his retirement the house in which he had previously served. He reflects on his early life with his mother, working as a maid in service after his father left her and also the time when he, as butler, served during the war. His relationship with an evacuee, assigned to the owners of the house, is gradually revealed. The novel is elegiac, profound and assured.
January 13, 2021
Her first novel, and what an achievment. This is a touching account of an old butler's reminisces about his life and increasing age. Rose Tremain writes with great tenderness and feeling for her characters. Her writing always has an undercurrent of humour which serves to highlight eccentricities but never to mock them. A totally enjoyable read.
June 21, 2017
well written, I was compelled to keep reading and it kept me interested all the way through. i like the way it all fits together, but at the same time I didn't feel like anything really happened. so I'm left feeling that it was a really good ready, but am still slightly disappointed somehow
June 16, 2020
Stunning first book, more of a novella than a novel. I loved the feeling of isolation and despondency portrayed when describing Sadler and his small life. An uncomfortable read but poignant and intensely sad.
August 16, 2019
Very sweet; gentle. A bit 'Remains of the Day’.
September 15, 2019
Not what you'd expect for a woman's first novel & not as sad as I remember, in fact full of surprises.
March 10, 2021
This is a lovely, book, but it's sad. An elegiac tale of old age, loneliness, and memories, well written and ultimately heart-rending. Highly recommended.
August 3, 2024
Beautiful and somewhat sad story of the butler Jack Sadler, seeing his life through his memories
September 13, 2025
Not quite sure how to categorize this, but I enjoyed it. Reminded me of Ove, but not nearly as good!
September 5, 2007
This small rather melancholic volume packs a punch. Tremain has earned a spot on my most loved authors list.
April 3, 2013
Not a nice subject but so well written. How do you end up feeling sorry for this old curr?
August 11, 2013
Tremain's a wonderful writer, but this is the weakest, and slowest, of her books.
March 13, 2023
Not my favorite Rose Tremain!
July 8, 2015
This was quite disturbing.
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews