Diplomatic Baggage: Adventures of a Trailing Spouse

by Brigid Keenan

The beloved Sunday Times bestseller - a touching, hilarious, often outrageous memoir of home-making and family adventures in the world's furthest outposts

'Hilarious, and utterly beguiling - it's a complete treat to be in Keenan's witty and open-hearted company' Esther Freud
'Deliciously effervescent' Sunday Times
'Brigid writes like a dream ... fabulous' Joanna Lumley
'Irresistible' Mail on Sunday

When Sunday Times fashion journalist Brigid Keenan married the love of her life in the late Sixties, she had little idea of the rollercoaster journey they would make around the world together.

For he was a diplomat - and Brigid found herself the smiling face of the European Union in locales ranging from Kazakhstan to Trinidad, and asking herself questions she never thought she'd have to ask. How do you throw a buffet dinner during a public mourning period in Syria? Where do you track down dog fat in Almaty? And how do you entertain guests in a Nepalese chicken shed?

Negotiating diplomatic protocol, difficult teenagers, homesickness, frustrated career aspirations, witch doctors, and giant jumping spiders, Brigid muddles determinedly through - with no shortage of mishaps on the way.

'There are not many books that have actually made me cry from laughing, but this is one of them' Sunday Times

282 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 4, 2022

About the author

Brigid Keenan was born in 1939.

Her involvement in fashion began when she joined the Daily Express women's page staff at the start of her career in 1959. Two years later she moved to the Sunday Times where she was responsible for their Young Fashion pages. In 1966 she left the paper to become Assistant Editor of Nova magazine and from there she went to The Observer as Woman's Editor. After a year's break, during which she lived with her husband (a development economist) in Ethiopia, she returned to the Sunday Times as fashion and Beauty Editor. In 1977 she moved to Brussels where she now lives with her husband and two small daughters.

She is a founding board member of the Palestine Festival of Literature.

Reviews

[Kirat Kaur · Rating 2 out of 5]

I suppose there is something laudable about being the trailing spouse of a Western diplomat posted to some of the most exotic countries in the world. But every local Brigid Keenan describes throughout this memoir serves as no more than comic relief, a tragic story or a simple and dumb-witted fool. I’d rather read about Barbados or Syria or Kazakhstan from the point of view of someone who considers themselves an active participant in society there, thanks. (Please send reccs if you have any)

[Jenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hilarious

There are few books that make me laugh out loud, but this was one of them. Brigid Keenan’s self-deprecating humour and sharp observation were delightful. Her evident appreciation for the astonishing number of places AW’s career took them to was beautifully balanced by absurdity.