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The Radiant Way #2
A Natural Curiosity
Mysteries explained have fateful results for three women in present-day England, as one struggles to find a friend taken hostage, one investigates her mother's death, and one befriends a mass murderer
309 pages, Paperback
First published September 8, 1989
57 people are currently reading
321 people want to read
About the author
Margaret Drabble
160 books508 followersDame Margaret Drabble was born in Sheffield in 1939 and was educated at Newnham College, Cambridge. She is the author of eighteen novels including A Summer Bird-Cage, The Millstone, The Peppered Moth, The Red Queen, The Sea Lady and most recently, the highly acclaimed The Pure Gold Baby. She has also written biographies, screenplays and was the editor of the Oxford Companion to English Literature. She was appointed CBE in 1980, and made DBE in the 2008 Honours list. She was also awarded the 2011 Golden PEN Award for a Lifetime's Distinguished Service to Literature. She is married to the biographer Michael Holroyd.
Drabble famously has a long-running feud with her novelist sister, A.S. Byatt. The pair seldom see each other, and each does not read the books of the other.
Drabble famously has a long-running feud with her novelist sister, A.S. Byatt. The pair seldom see each other, and each does not read the books of the other.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews
February 22, 2025
This book has an unfinished quality. There are too many stories here, and when the author makes an appearance in the text The French Lieutenant's Women style, it doesn't seem staged, as if it's part of the narrative, but instead highlights the gaps and the excesses in the narrative, as if she were reflecting on her notes, considering the way forward. But those stories that are developed - the psychotherapeutic account of a serial killer, a suicide widow's breakdown - these stories are compelling.
It is self consciously of its time - 1987, as if the most important function of the novel is to document social history. However, the effect is to remind me of novels written of the same period: London Fields and Black Dogs: right down to specific word play - 'Alix's murderer' vs 'the murderee' and a specific breed of dogs - mastiffs. For me, the suspicion that it is not social history that is being recorded, but literary history created. A closed circuit of writers writing about what other writers have written. In the UK in the eighties and nineties, literary fiction doesn't seen to have been so much about literature, the use of language to create art, but about the culture of a particular social class. Maybe 'literary' fiction is an upper middle class niche market, the primary product of which is to tell the socially anxious what they think, how they should behave. The later work of Ian McEwan in particular seems to mine deeper and deeper in this particular niche, where his earlier work was much more broadly based. Martin Amis perhaps exhausted himself trying to escape. Margaret Drabble seems to have gone on and on, keeping up with the times, or at least the elite mores of the times. I will probably read another.
It is self consciously of its time - 1987, as if the most important function of the novel is to document social history. However, the effect is to remind me of novels written of the same period: London Fields and Black Dogs: right down to specific word play - 'Alix's murderer' vs 'the murderee' and a specific breed of dogs - mastiffs. For me, the suspicion that it is not social history that is being recorded, but literary history created. A closed circuit of writers writing about what other writers have written. In the UK in the eighties and nineties, literary fiction doesn't seen to have been so much about literature, the use of language to create art, but about the culture of a particular social class. Maybe 'literary' fiction is an upper middle class niche market, the primary product of which is to tell the socially anxious what they think, how they should behave. The later work of Ian McEwan in particular seems to mine deeper and deeper in this particular niche, where his earlier work was much more broadly based. Martin Amis perhaps exhausted himself trying to escape. Margaret Drabble seems to have gone on and on, keeping up with the times, or at least the elite mores of the times. I will probably read another.
June 24, 2009
What happened? A Natural Curiosity is a fragmented, over-populated and under-managed sequel to the Radiant Way, which is one of Drabble's best to date. It was impossible to resist another chapter in the lives of Liz, Alix and Esther, but it seemed a random mess of rather messy lives and rather too many of them. What was the need to introduce such a constellation of uninteresting, albeit new, characters and for no apparent purpose? The pacing is missing, the underlying purpose is unclear. What I've loved in Drabble's previous two books: The Realms of Gold and the Radiant Way was that the characters overlaid an intelligent and articulate foundation of British modernity, zeitgeist, social complexes. This is characteristic too of A Natural Curiosity, but it gets lost in the barrage of improbable plot and unlikeable people. Sorry, Margaret, and I'm one of your biggest fans from way back.
June 8, 2020
Drabble follows up on some of the characters from The Radiant Way, dealing with late 1980s England in a less explicitly political way than in the earlier book. She writes wonderfully - a few passages of visceral disgust about food stood out particularly vividly - and draws rich, messy characters. The flirtations with meta-fictional tricks feel a bit clunky, but this is an entertaining and energetic book.
January 17, 2019
Margaret Drabble is a skilled writer, so not even this rather uninspired novel is truly poor. There were too many people for such a thin volume and you hardly got to know any of them that well. The narrator jumps from person to person, telling snippets from their lives, seldom getting close and personal. The last 25% of the book the pace picks up a bit - as if the writer was eager to finish this tale from a dreary post-industial England.
March 1, 2020
The Radiant Way, the first in this series was amazing, and I didn’t want to let the characters go, especially Alix Bowen, with whom I feel a special kinship. I was delighted to discover that there were two more books about Liz, Esther, and Alix! I enjoyed A Natural Curiosity even more than the first book, which I hardly thought was possible. If you are remotely interested in middle-aged female friendships between intelligent, unconventional women, you will probably devour this series.
September 29, 2018
First read 1990
July 10, 2020
There, now I've read a Margaret Drabble novel (thankfully a shorter one), and know what the fuss is about, just like I've eaten poi and tripe, and attended a performance of a Bruckner symphony. The writing is quite good. The story is clogged with close observation of life in the professional classes in England in 1987. It is so crammed with those details, nicely described though they are, that it feels irrelevant to anything outside that small world. There seems to be an overarching theme of people reacting to the unexpected and unpredictable in life in various ways, often seeking out the unknown; that is interesting but somewhat overdone.
Many other books describe particular places and people but leave breathing room for imagination. The people in them can be imagined in other settings and their worlds do not feel encased in a glass globe. Disliked the macabre bits and the third-person narrator occasionally speaking directly to the reader. It was worth a try, however.
Many other books describe particular places and people but leave breathing room for imagination. The people in them can be imagined in other settings and their worlds do not feel encased in a glass globe. Disliked the macabre bits and the third-person narrator occasionally speaking directly to the reader. It was worth a try, however.
February 11, 2025
This was a weird, wild book. It had too many characters, annoying, pointless tense changes, a very strange "break the fourth wall" section where the narrator starts talking to you, and an ending that just drones on and on and some weird stuff about dogs. Somehow, though, through all of that, I kinda liked it. The writing was like John Updike's in a way. Someday, I might try another one of her books, one that is better received.
March 25, 2010
This is the first of Margaret Drabble's books that I have read and if extensive description of surroundings and thought processes is her propensity then I won't pick up another. That was my first problem with this book. More importantly, there was an abundance of characters who were poorly developed and the story lacked any definable focus. The prose meandered here and yon and back 'round again without really arriving.
January 2, 2019
More of the eighties
Margaret Drabble’s saga of the eighties continues and she captures the time well. The various strands of the story are diverse and not always believable but they are probably not meant to be. Love the names and the characters. Having started with the Gates of Ivory I will be interested to reread it in the light of it’s prequels.
Margaret Drabble’s saga of the eighties continues and she captures the time well. The various strands of the story are diverse and not always believable but they are probably not meant to be. Love the names and the characters. Having started with the Gates of Ivory I will be interested to reread it in the light of it’s prequels.
July 31, 2012
Very British. Lots of characters. No chapter breaks. The author, interestingly and humourously, speaks directly to the reader from time to time. Drabble's writing drags a bit for me as my attention span declines!
May 14, 2020
Having not read The Radiant Way, these characters are new to me. Somehow they're still boring as hell. As other reviewers have mentioned, it's a bit of a mess of separate, incomplete stories that never interconnect. From what I can tell, Thatcher's England is no different from any other England; if Drabble was trying to show a unique political climate, she failed. She also interjects as the author speaking directly to the reader too often. It's not clever, it's annoying.
Only the climax (what I consider the climax, perhaps it's not) held my interest. In fact, it had me speed-reading to its (disappointing) resolution. The rest of the book feels random and half-asleep with unfinished characters and an overabundance of uninteresting sub-plots. Only read to the end so I can say I finished it.
Only the climax (what I consider the climax, perhaps it's not) held my interest. In fact, it had me speed-reading to its (disappointing) resolution. The rest of the book feels random and half-asleep with unfinished characters and an overabundance of uninteresting sub-plots. Only read to the end so I can say I finished it.
October 1, 2018
It`s been quite a few years since I read "The Radiant Way" and I cannot recall any of it. I will go and re-read it now and also the third book in the trilogy. I got a wee bit confused regarding the characters, but liked the author`s style. I think I will also read and re-read more of Margaret Drabble's work. I am aged in my 60s and enjoyed the thoughs and feelings of the mature characters.
March 22, 2018
I liked it, will look for more by her. Go 3 1/2. I started reading this piecemeal, but that doesn't work. I had to concentrate to get to know the various/numerous characters - their relationships and foibles are complex enough. 1980's era so a bit out-of-date in that sense, but doesn't bother me.
March 22, 2020
Quite an unsatisfying read. The writing was highly stylised, with the author frequently breaking the fourth wall, and discussing her characters and their actions. It made for a very detached reading experience, making it hard to maintain an interest.
The structure was also quite disjointed adding to the sense of detachment.
One also had the sense that Margaret was flashing her deep knowledge of the classics. "Look at me I was in Oxford".
The book was deeply rooted in its era, the late 80s.
The structure was also quite disjointed adding to the sense of detachment.
One also had the sense that Margaret was flashing her deep knowledge of the classics. "Look at me I was in Oxford".
The book was deeply rooted in its era, the late 80s.
March 6, 2024
the story had potential but the novel was very disorganized. i feel as though if it were divided into parts or chapters to focus on each character’s life it could have been better, or if it just narrowed its focus on a few of the characters lives.
July 29, 2017
Actually 3-1/2 stars. I liked this book.
July 25, 2018
Not impressed
November 17, 2018
Even better than The Radiant Way!
June 1, 2019
Really pretty passee now. Well enough written but didn't really get involved at all
June 13, 2020
Excellent story lines - just a few too many characters to keep straight!
March 7, 2023
The second in her trilogy which I've probably read five times. She's a fricken genius.
November 16, 2023
Book about almost nothing, just the interconnected lives of a random group of British people. Had such a sense of calm and satisfaction finishing this book, possibly my new favorite
February 14, 2024
I enjoyed this as much as The Radiant Way, you can see the development over time from 1979 to the mid/late 80's
July 20, 2025
Lang geleden gelezen, prachtig!
January 3, 2013
This is one of those rare pieces of fiction to which I return again and again and yet have no real grasp on the reasons why I do. It is simultaneously enchanting and disenchanting; in freeing us from our illusions (as 1980s Britain easily does), it ignites a spark—some flickering of curiosity or hope—that both acknowledges the terrifying nature of humanity and celebrates it. I find it difficult to seize the necessary words for it, and perhaps I am the only one who has found so much in this book.
July 18, 2022
A Natural Curiosity picks up where The Radiant Way left off. Three women friends, now in their early 50s, continue with their friendships, marriages, professions and murderer visiting. I haven't read Margaret Drabble in ages and forgot how much I enjoy her writing. Perfect for summer reading.
December 12, 2009
I don't remember much about it, so I guess I wasn't impressed.
April 2, 2010
Not as good as it's predecessor, but enjoyable enough.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews