What do you think?
Rate this book
A Friend from England
In one of her most delicate and suspenseful novels to date, Anita Brookner brings us an exquisite story of friendship and duty. Rachel Kennedy and Oscar Livingston were not precisely friends or family. Rachel had been acquanted with Oscar for some time, first as her father’s accountant, and then as her own. Part owner of a London bookshop, Rachel is thoroughly independent and somewhat distant, determinedly restrained in her feelings for others, but above all responsible. And it is this trait that leads Oscar and his wife Dorrie to seek out Rachel as a mentor for their twenty-seven-year-old daughter, Heather. Yet when Heather seems poised to make an unsuitable romantic decision, Rachel decides to speak out and intervene, causing an unwitting and devastating insight.
208 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1987
26 people are currently reading
429 people want to read
About the author
Anita Brookner
60 books653 followersAnita Brookner published her first novel, A Start In Life in 1981. Her most notable novel, her fourth, Hotel du Lac won the Man Booker Prize in 1984. Her novel, The Next Big Thing was longlisted (alongside John Banville's, Shroud) in 2002 for the Man Booker Prize. She published more than 25 works of fiction, notably: Strangers (2009) shortlisted for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, Fraud (1992) and, The Rules of Engagement (2003). She was also the first female to hold a Slade Professorship of Fine Arts at Cambridge University.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 83 reviews
November 16, 2025
Are we obligated to sacrifice a lot of our own potential opportunities and happiness to take care of aging parents? Rachel, a young woman (30-ish) thinks so. She has a career and former male friends, but she’s prim, proper and old-fashioned. She took care of her aging parents, now deceased, at the expense of opportunities in her own life. Now she’s shocked that her friend Heather, a woman with more modern attitudes, is willing to run off to Italy to be with a man and leave her aging parents behind.
I read this book as a buddy read with my good friend Ebba Simone. She always gives me valuable insights, some of which I have incorporated into this review.
The novel is quasi-autobiographical because that’s what the author did for much of her adult life: take care of aging parents. She never married or had children.
The Rachel-Heather relationship is hardly a real friendship. Heather is kind of inert. The best Rachel might say about her is “But Heather has always struck me as a quiet girl, I put in. Calm. Quite a thoughtful person.” Here’s what she really thinks: “This seemed to me as polite a way as possible of conveying Heather’s mulish but amiable silences, her smile that gave the appearance of being remotely controlled. When I first met her I thought she must be deaf. When I got to know her better I revised my opinion slightly: I thought she was retarded.” (Of course, we learn Heather is not mentally challenged.)
Rachel comes to visit Heather because she adores her parents – a substitute for her own. The parents assume Rachel and Heather are great friends and over the years they have come to think of Rachel as a second daughter.
It’s the 1950s and the author does a good job of describing the pressures on Heather (slightly younger than Rachel) to marry. In the opinion of the weekly visiting aunts (Heather’s mother’s sisters), there are several lines to the effect of "she (Heather’s mother) hasn't done her job yet," and they alternately look down on their sister, maybe even pity her, because her daughter is not married yet.
The different attitudes of the two young women show most strongly when Heather does marry and it’s not working out. Rachel’s thoughts about how Heather has ruined her life and the impossible dilemma she is in go on for pages. Heather is much less concerned.
As in many of Brookner’s novels the settings are old airless houses with heavy furniture such as in Rachel’s parents’ house that she still lives in. That atmosphere surrounds Heather’s parents too. We are told that her parents led "...noiseless and curiously unhopeful lives" and that “Heather has absorbed her parents' habitual melancholy.”
As in many other Brookner novels, the main character is fundamentally lonely. She has few social connections, thus the importance of maintaining this ‘acquaintance’ with Heather because of the importance of Heather’s parents. The two young women never really have a heart-to-heart discussion and this too is true of many of Brookner’s female characters. They meet for lunch but, for example, never discuss their relationships with the men they are involved with (or not) at the time. Their deep feelings are constrained and contained, adding to their loneliness.
I’ve read many novels by Brookner and this one surprised me. In the end, I disliked the main character. She was wrong and she behaved badly. But in the end Rachel’s relationship with Heather brought out some self-recognition for Rachel, although it isn’t pretty.
All in all, a good story told by the author with her usual great writing and psychological insight. Classic Brookner: melancholy, bordering a bit on bleak!
I’ve enjoyed many other novels by Anita Brookner and below are links to my reviews of them. The two I enjoyed most were Hotel du Lac and Making Things Better. (I gave those two novels a rating of 5; all the others, 4.)
The Bay of Angels
Look at Me
Hotel du Lac
Making Things Better
Altered States
A Private View
The Debut
Visitors
Dolly
Undue Influence
Photo of the author from bbc.com
I read this book as a buddy read with my good friend Ebba Simone. She always gives me valuable insights, some of which I have incorporated into this review.
The novel is quasi-autobiographical because that’s what the author did for much of her adult life: take care of aging parents. She never married or had children.
The Rachel-Heather relationship is hardly a real friendship. Heather is kind of inert. The best Rachel might say about her is “But Heather has always struck me as a quiet girl, I put in. Calm. Quite a thoughtful person.” Here’s what she really thinks: “This seemed to me as polite a way as possible of conveying Heather’s mulish but amiable silences, her smile that gave the appearance of being remotely controlled. When I first met her I thought she must be deaf. When I got to know her better I revised my opinion slightly: I thought she was retarded.” (Of course, we learn Heather is not mentally challenged.)
Rachel comes to visit Heather because she adores her parents – a substitute for her own. The parents assume Rachel and Heather are great friends and over the years they have come to think of Rachel as a second daughter.
It’s the 1950s and the author does a good job of describing the pressures on Heather (slightly younger than Rachel) to marry. In the opinion of the weekly visiting aunts (Heather’s mother’s sisters), there are several lines to the effect of "she (Heather’s mother) hasn't done her job yet," and they alternately look down on their sister, maybe even pity her, because her daughter is not married yet.
The different attitudes of the two young women show most strongly when Heather does marry and it’s not working out. Rachel’s thoughts about how Heather has ruined her life and the impossible dilemma she is in go on for pages. Heather is much less concerned.
As in many of Brookner’s novels the settings are old airless houses with heavy furniture such as in Rachel’s parents’ house that she still lives in. That atmosphere surrounds Heather’s parents too. We are told that her parents led "...noiseless and curiously unhopeful lives" and that “Heather has absorbed her parents' habitual melancholy.”
As in many other Brookner novels, the main character is fundamentally lonely. She has few social connections, thus the importance of maintaining this ‘acquaintance’ with Heather because of the importance of Heather’s parents. The two young women never really have a heart-to-heart discussion and this too is true of many of Brookner’s female characters. They meet for lunch but, for example, never discuss their relationships with the men they are involved with (or not) at the time. Their deep feelings are constrained and contained, adding to their loneliness.
I’ve read many novels by Brookner and this one surprised me. In the end, I disliked the main character. She was wrong and she behaved badly. But in the end Rachel’s relationship with Heather brought out some self-recognition for Rachel, although it isn’t pretty.
All in all, a good story told by the author with her usual great writing and psychological insight. Classic Brookner: melancholy, bordering a bit on bleak!
I’ve enjoyed many other novels by Anita Brookner and below are links to my reviews of them. The two I enjoyed most were Hotel du Lac and Making Things Better. (I gave those two novels a rating of 5; all the others, 4.)
The Bay of Angels
Look at Me
Hotel du Lac
Making Things Better
Altered States
A Private View
The Debut
Visitors
Dolly
Undue Influence
Photo of the author from bbc.com
November 20, 2025
What is interesting to me about the work of Anita Brookner is her use of over-thinking. There is a prevailing belief that if you think a matter through, thoroughly and mindfully, clarity will be achieved. Brookner shows us this is not always the case. We may think like the dickens, but if we lose sight of ourselves in the process - our own desires, hurts, objectives and needs - that clarity we're after remains essentially incomplete.
Rachel Kennedy is thirty-two. She's a single woman who owns a bookshop in London. She is currently over-thinking her relationship to the Livingstone family; a relationship inherited through her deceased father which has come to supplant her mom and dad as relational connection for her. She is quite aware that this is not her family, yet the heart yearns and so, in her mind, the connection serves. The Livingstones themselves are inclusive and, in some subtle and not so subtle ways, desirous that she take their daughter Heather in hand. Heather is, well, I suppose the best way to put this is emotionally indolent. (She seems very much a "living stone.") A beau pops up out of nowhere and is swiftly married. The dynamics of the family teeter and Rachel, for reasons she thinks about yet doesn't truly understand, decides action must be taken.
The problem with the use of over-thinking in novels and films is that it can become indulgent, sometimes pedantic, possibly over-wrought. Brookner skates those lines in this work and that is probably why the reviews are mixed. Still, there is a certain keenness in scenes; the capture of a woman facing life unanchored and alone, which chills with its unsettling.
This is not the best Brookner out there, but in its own way it succeeds.
Rachel Kennedy is thirty-two. She's a single woman who owns a bookshop in London. She is currently over-thinking her relationship to the Livingstone family; a relationship inherited through her deceased father which has come to supplant her mom and dad as relational connection for her. She is quite aware that this is not her family, yet the heart yearns and so, in her mind, the connection serves. The Livingstones themselves are inclusive and, in some subtle and not so subtle ways, desirous that she take their daughter Heather in hand. Heather is, well, I suppose the best way to put this is emotionally indolent. (She seems very much a "living stone.") A beau pops up out of nowhere and is swiftly married. The dynamics of the family teeter and Rachel, for reasons she thinks about yet doesn't truly understand, decides action must be taken.
The problem with the use of over-thinking in novels and films is that it can become indulgent, sometimes pedantic, possibly over-wrought. Brookner skates those lines in this work and that is probably why the reviews are mixed. Still, there is a certain keenness in scenes; the capture of a woman facing life unanchored and alone, which chills with its unsettling.
This is not the best Brookner out there, but in its own way it succeeds.
September 14, 2016
As I finished this last night, I was left with a disconcerted feeling of being let down: the ending just sputtered out of life, or so it seemed to me at the time. I closed the book to go to sleep, thinking that was it, I was done with this one; but apparently I am not, as I’m thinking of it more and more as I go through my day.
Rachel, the first-person narrator—a modern, 'liberated' woman of what I am guessing is the 1980s—glosses over what might seem to be the more interesting parts of her life, insteadfocusing obsessing over the boring (my word) adult daughter of an upper-middle class couple. As with the other two Brookner novels I’ve read, the ending is quietly devastating—if not, at least with this one, to this reader, certainly for the narrator—elucidating a cosmic shift to the narrator’s self-image.
As with the late-Renaissance Venetian painting described (though not named) near the story’s end, meaning remains enigmatic.
Rachel, the first-person narrator—a modern, 'liberated' woman of what I am guessing is the 1980s—glosses over what might seem to be the more interesting parts of her life, instead
As with the late-Renaissance Venetian painting described (though not named) near the story’s end, meaning remains enigmatic.
May 10, 2010
Anita Brookner is one of my favorite contemporary authors, and probably my very favorite contemporary author who writes about women. I can’t get over how interesting her uneventful, rather cautious heroines are. These are absolutely not books for people who read for the action, for big dramatic scenes, or grand passions. Brookner’s writing and her characters are intelligent, almost claustrophobically restrained, and full of self-possessed dignity. The beauty of this book, and all of her books, is that it presents a painstaking honest and fully-realized portrait of a woman’s mind – complete with neuroses, disappointments, regrets, shame, fears, and the steeliness that keeps it all under control. The next time I hear someone say, “I’ll never understand how women think” I’m going to recommend he go to the bookstore, fill a large bag with Brookner novels, and apply himself.
The primary thing I read her novels for is that every now and again, I'll read a line that seems to have been plucked straight out of my head and put on the page. It's almost frightening to see your thoughts in print in someone else's book. The quote for this novel was, "My second impression was that a man of such obvious and exemplary charm must be a liar."
The other thing I love about Brookner’s novels is that they all but demand introspection. I didn’t particularly agree with Rachel’s views on life; I thought she was rather joyless and coldly rational, even though I think even she understood to an extent that her chosen outlook on love was little more than an internalized defense mechanism. It was her views on other women that really made me think, though. Rachel was alone in every sense – parents dead from late childhood, no husband or long-term partner, no children, no very intimate friends. Some of this was bad luck, but some of it seemed the intentional result of holding herself aloof from everyone around her, other than the strange attachment she formed with the Livingstones. And whether from true conviction or from a sort of jealousy, she had a particular superior distaste for “protected women”. She had carved out a life for herself with absolutely no assistance, and felt constantly irritated at the easy, irresponsible lives of other women who had things handed to them. She felt they could never be truly independent or liberated in the way she was – they couldn’t face the hard decisions, the unromantic truth of life for an single woman of a certain age.
Naturally, I felt a bit stung. For the past few years, I’ve flattered myself that I am, or at the very least could be, completely independent. I have a job and a mortgage, I save for retirement, I’m reasonably well educated, and have made Thanksgiving dinner without my mother’s assistance. That seemed like a respectable notion of independence to me until I thought about it a bit more after finishing this book last night. In honesty, I am and have always been one of Rachel’s protected women. My parents kept a close eye on me my entire childhood. They let me to live “on my own” at a private college that came equipped with housekeeping, security guards, and lovely roommates, in what I considered a coup of independence. Even my one year of living “alone” at graduate school was spent with housemates and the fuzzy emotional blanket of being engaged. That naturally flowed into marriage, complete with another set of watchful parents and wonderful husband who deals with all the salespeople, strangers, and crazy people that I flatly refuse to speak to, as well as the repairs, car maintenance, bugs, minor injuries, and a million other things that I find myself unequal to dealing with. I find myself in the position of both respecting the honesty of Rachel’s criticism and feeling rather resentful at the idea that my good fortune somehow makes me less of an adult or a serious person. The point to this long ramble is that Brookner has a fantastic way about bringing these classic, no-easy-answer women’s questions to the forefront of your mind. I have a whole stack of her novels on my shelves at home, and can’t wait for the next one.
The primary thing I read her novels for is that every now and again, I'll read a line that seems to have been plucked straight out of my head and put on the page. It's almost frightening to see your thoughts in print in someone else's book. The quote for this novel was, "My second impression was that a man of such obvious and exemplary charm must be a liar."
The other thing I love about Brookner’s novels is that they all but demand introspection. I didn’t particularly agree with Rachel’s views on life; I thought she was rather joyless and coldly rational, even though I think even she understood to an extent that her chosen outlook on love was little more than an internalized defense mechanism. It was her views on other women that really made me think, though. Rachel was alone in every sense – parents dead from late childhood, no husband or long-term partner, no children, no very intimate friends. Some of this was bad luck, but some of it seemed the intentional result of holding herself aloof from everyone around her, other than the strange attachment she formed with the Livingstones. And whether from true conviction or from a sort of jealousy, she had a particular superior distaste for “protected women”. She had carved out a life for herself with absolutely no assistance, and felt constantly irritated at the easy, irresponsible lives of other women who had things handed to them. She felt they could never be truly independent or liberated in the way she was – they couldn’t face the hard decisions, the unromantic truth of life for an single woman of a certain age.
Naturally, I felt a bit stung. For the past few years, I’ve flattered myself that I am, or at the very least could be, completely independent. I have a job and a mortgage, I save for retirement, I’m reasonably well educated, and have made Thanksgiving dinner without my mother’s assistance. That seemed like a respectable notion of independence to me until I thought about it a bit more after finishing this book last night. In honesty, I am and have always been one of Rachel’s protected women. My parents kept a close eye on me my entire childhood. They let me to live “on my own” at a private college that came equipped with housekeeping, security guards, and lovely roommates, in what I considered a coup of independence. Even my one year of living “alone” at graduate school was spent with housemates and the fuzzy emotional blanket of being engaged. That naturally flowed into marriage, complete with another set of watchful parents and wonderful husband who deals with all the salespeople, strangers, and crazy people that I flatly refuse to speak to, as well as the repairs, car maintenance, bugs, minor injuries, and a million other things that I find myself unequal to dealing with. I find myself in the position of both respecting the honesty of Rachel’s criticism and feeling rather resentful at the idea that my good fortune somehow makes me less of an adult or a serious person. The point to this long ramble is that Brookner has a fantastic way about bringing these classic, no-easy-answer women’s questions to the forefront of your mind. I have a whole stack of her novels on my shelves at home, and can’t wait for the next one.
March 2, 2019
I feel quite spent after finishing in a marathon afternoon read. And I think it will take a re-read to really sort it all out. Exquisite writing and beautifully drawn characters. Her style always knocks me dead. She’s so cool and elegant. I can’t help but feel she was really hurt in her life, and is examining it in a detached yet very kind way.
February 1, 2015
A really suspenseful and creepy book. Reminded me a bit of Sarah Waters' Little Stranger in its all-too-knowing and completely untrustworthy narrator. She tells us what she thinks she is and shows us what she really is. Brookner a masterful writer of flowing sentences. I don't think I'll be in a hurry to read another of hers, though. I don't like getting freaked out that much! The creepiest part of all is that we're all like the narrator--or at least *I* am--walking around imposing our own world view on everything around us!!
February 20, 2019
Rachel Kennedy is in her early 30s and co-owns a London bookshop; she lives above it in a small flat with an ”unheimlich” bedroom for which ”’unhomely’ was too mild a translation to convey the effect of alienation that the German original possessed.” Rachel prides herself on her independence: ”It seemed to me that I conducted my life on rather enlightened principles; that is to say, I imposed certain restraints on my feelings, kept a very open mind, rather despised those conventions that are supposed to bring security, ad passed lightly on whenever I saw trouble coming.” She eschews self-analysis and prefers her romantic relationships brief with few entanglements. As Rachel tells us, ”I try to avoid introspection. I long ago decided to live my life on the surface, avoiding entanglements, confrontations, situations that cannot quickly be resolved, friendships that lead to passion.” She’s self-satisfied, proud of her ability to navigate her life as a single and self-supporting woman, and resents those whose lives seem easier: ”These people, with all their hardships, were so fortunate! Even these hardships came into a special category: a few adjustments to be made, and they would be back on course, with no grievous loss sustained, no vital organ impaired.”
Rachel’s parents are dead and she inherited her aging accountant—Oscar Livingstone—from her father. Rachel treasures her Saturday visits to Oscar and his wife Dorrie, who rely on her to guide their mid-twenties, reticent daughter Heather into greater independence and to act as ”Heather’s passport to the world”. Rachel hopes that her Saturdays with her faux-family will just last forever: ”. . . I wanted Oscar and Dorrie to remain as they were, fixed points in a volatile universe. I simply wanted things to go on as they were, an unchanging backdrop against which I could conduct my own variations.”
But then Rachel surprises and shocks the reader. As with other early Brookner novels—Look At me especially—the surprises and shocks in A Friend From England are largely interior to Rachel herself. The surprise comes when Rachel painfully realizes that she’s not accepted in loco filiae when Heather moves to Venice for what Rachel sees as an irresponsible and ill-advised second marriage. The shock—the existential shock—comes when Rachel comes to truly understand herself, the Livingstones, and their views of her. Rachel recognizes that she will always be outside of the Livingstone’s family, in fact any family at all, and that she’s unable to understand the Livingstones’ love for and acceptance of the seemingly prodigal Heather. Rachel’s carefully constructed self-regard and self-image of independence crumbles as she realizes that the Livingstones’ regard her with pity rather than with daughterly love. Self-awareness provides the greatest surprise and shock of all. ”What counted was that I was guilty of an error. It was not Heather who was endangered, but myself. I felt shame, penury, and the shock of truth. Something terrible had happened. I did not see how I could ever face those who knew me. . . The fact of the matter was that the wonders of this earth suddenly meant nothing to me. Without a face opposite mine the world was empty; without another voice it was silent. I foresaw a future in which I would always eat too early, the first guest in empty restaurants, after which I would go to bed too early and get up too early, anxious to begin another day in order that it might soon be ended. I lacked the patience or the confidence to invent a life for myself, and would always be dependent on the lives of others.”
Anita Brookner’s prose is always spare and elegantly precise. Brookner’s humor—sometimes droll, sometimes aspish—emerges in inexpected places. Brookner provides sly reflections on Rachel’s solitary life, with the shattering disappointment that accompany her realizing that in fact her self-vaunted independence may appear to others not as independence but as self-deception and weakness. A Friend From England reveals Brookner yet again as a connoisseur of loneliness: Brookner was at her best when writing about solitary lives, the self-deceptions that can propel them, and what happens when greater understanding explodes those self-deceptions.
Rachel’s parents are dead and she inherited her aging accountant—Oscar Livingstone—from her father. Rachel treasures her Saturday visits to Oscar and his wife Dorrie, who rely on her to guide their mid-twenties, reticent daughter Heather into greater independence and to act as ”Heather’s passport to the world”. Rachel hopes that her Saturdays with her faux-family will just last forever: ”. . . I wanted Oscar and Dorrie to remain as they were, fixed points in a volatile universe. I simply wanted things to go on as they were, an unchanging backdrop against which I could conduct my own variations.”
But then Rachel surprises and shocks the reader. As with other early Brookner novels—Look At me especially—the surprises and shocks in A Friend From England are largely interior to Rachel herself. The surprise comes when Rachel painfully realizes that she’s not accepted in loco filiae when Heather moves to Venice for what Rachel sees as an irresponsible and ill-advised second marriage. The shock—the existential shock—comes when Rachel comes to truly understand herself, the Livingstones, and their views of her. Rachel recognizes that she will always be outside of the Livingstone’s family, in fact any family at all, and that she’s unable to understand the Livingstones’ love for and acceptance of the seemingly prodigal Heather. Rachel’s carefully constructed self-regard and self-image of independence crumbles as she realizes that the Livingstones’ regard her with pity rather than with daughterly love. Self-awareness provides the greatest surprise and shock of all. ”What counted was that I was guilty of an error. It was not Heather who was endangered, but myself. I felt shame, penury, and the shock of truth. Something terrible had happened. I did not see how I could ever face those who knew me. . . The fact of the matter was that the wonders of this earth suddenly meant nothing to me. Without a face opposite mine the world was empty; without another voice it was silent. I foresaw a future in which I would always eat too early, the first guest in empty restaurants, after which I would go to bed too early and get up too early, anxious to begin another day in order that it might soon be ended. I lacked the patience or the confidence to invent a life for myself, and would always be dependent on the lives of others.”
Anita Brookner’s prose is always spare and elegantly precise. Brookner’s humor—sometimes droll, sometimes aspish—emerges in inexpected places. Brookner provides sly reflections on Rachel’s solitary life, with the shattering disappointment that accompany her realizing that in fact her self-vaunted independence may appear to others not as independence but as self-deception and weakness. A Friend From England reveals Brookner yet again as a connoisseur of loneliness: Brookner was at her best when writing about solitary lives, the self-deceptions that can propel them, and what happens when greater understanding explodes those self-deceptions.
May 15, 2017
Hmm. How to rate and describe this novel? Brookner is definitely an acquired taste. I've read 9 of her books now, and there's definitely a common thread here. She writes about people (mostly women) who lead quiet, independent, somewhat lonely lives. Somehow they become entangled with people who are unlike them, and it results in some sort of dramatic scene that causes the main character to reevaluate her life. Not change her life, mind you - that would be going too far - but at least see things in a new light. The books are all very much in the minds of the main characters, with thoughts, regrets, anxieties taking center stage. These are books about which some might say "nothing happens." I read her every year or so precisely because I sometimes crave that exquisite, slightly claustrophobic feeling of burrowing so far into a character's mind, inhabiting another person. And goodness, the woman could write! Just devastatingly precise sentences.
If you've never read Brookner before, I wouldn't start with this one. It was too much of a slow burn for me to love. Start with Incidents in the Rue Laugier or Hotel Du Lac instead.
If you've never read Brookner before, I wouldn't start with this one. It was too much of a slow burn for me to love. Start with Incidents in the Rue Laugier or Hotel Du Lac instead.
August 20, 2016
Many years since I read an "Anita Brookner".
I found the First Chapter seemingly repetitive.
I couldn't work out the gender of the narrator...my own fault because I was soon reading carelessly.
At the moment I am absolutely RIVETED...this is a most original Set of Characters.
Well, maybe NOT, it's just that perhaps no other author I've come across
has bothered to write about these characters and develop or portray them with such insight.
One is very self aware and recognises that she has been following a wrong path.
Her "friend" however is determined never to face up to or act on such a difficult reality.
This is original stuff...well, for me.
It is gripping and difficult to put down.
Other sideline characters are also involved in this denial and acceptance to different degrees.
For me this is Real Life.
Perusing other reviews reveals a wide range of responses...which is also fascinating.
I wonder what that says about ALL of us ???!!!
January 14, 2019
This was another odd Brookner. Very internal. In fact the 'action' could probably be summed up in a few lines: Rachel goes to tea with Oscar and Dorrie until they assume she is friends with their quiet and dull daughter, Heather. Rachel becomes frustrated with Heather's unresponsiveness but then discovers she is married to a man with worrying peccadillo. After he leaves Heather she goes to Venice, and Rachel follows, trying to warn Heather off from marrying again. I loved the writing.
But the whole experience was spoiled because the two penultimate pages were missing from the end of the book! It was bought new from Blackwells online, and they are sending me a replacement copy. In the meantime a lovely person on Instagram scanned in the missing pages and emailed them to me. Check your copy before you start reading!
But the whole experience was spoiled because the two penultimate pages were missing from the end of the book! It was bought new from Blackwells online, and they are sending me a replacement copy. In the meantime a lovely person on Instagram scanned in the missing pages and emailed them to me. Check your copy before you start reading!
February 18, 2010
I consider this book to be Ms. Brookner's break-out book. This is the book in which the well-brought-up young heiress, an orphan of course, allows herself to become too involved with the family of an old friend of her father's. So far this is classic Brookner. But in the last quarter of the novel, she has finally had enough and stands up for herself. I hope this is not a spoiler. For Brookner fans, maybe it is. But I consider this to be her rip-snortin' novel, and we will never see its like again. No doubt.
Those scenes where the truth of feelings comes out are very funny. ( I see this played by Helen Mirren as the narrator.) And the humor that shows there ripples backwards, letting Ms. Brookner's comic view spread out over the whole book. It's a wonderful book.
Those scenes where the truth of feelings comes out are very funny. ( I see this played by Helen Mirren as the narrator.) And the humor that shows there ripples backwards, letting Ms. Brookner's comic view spread out over the whole book. It's a wonderful book.
September 19, 2024
This was a re-read.
May 12, 2022
The English writer and art historian Anita Brookner carved out a particular niche for herself during her writing career, producing beautifully crafted novels about loneliness and isolation. Her books often feature unmarried women living small, unfulfilling lives in well-to-do London flats, where they spend their evenings waiting for unobtainable lovers to make fleeting appearances. First published in 1987, three years after her Booker Prize win, A Friend from England is another exquisitely written story of loneliness and self-deception, very much in a similar vein to this Brookner’s other work.
Central to the novel is Rachel, a single, independently-minded woman in her early thirties. The co-owner of a small bookshop in Notting Hill, Rachel lives her life on the fringes of other people’s worlds, avoiding entanglements, amorous relationships, or anything that might lead to a loss of control or demonstration of passion. To her mind, the illusion of romantic love is not for the sensible – only for the naive or the very brave. Despite her role as the novel’s narrator, Rachel remains somewhat enigmatic or difficult to pin down throughout. She drops hints of previous affairs and ‘arrangements’, but little more in terms of detail is ever revealed. Above all, Rachel takes satisfaction from her lack of emotional bonds, a position that ultimately colours her view of others, particularly those who see the world through rose-tinted glasses.
Rachel’s closest friends are Oscar Livingstone – an ageing accountant that Rachel inherited from her deceased father – and his wife, Dorrie. The Livingstones are a kindly couple, treating Rachel almost as if she were part of their family. In short, they see Rachel as an older sister to their twenty-seven-year-old daughter, Heather – someone to guide her in the broader ways and mysteries of the world. On the surface, Heather appears to be a passive person, seemingly content to remain in the company of her parents, sharing their interests and lives until such time as she is ready to marry. While Rachel loves her Saturday afternoon visits to the Livingstones’ for tea, she feels somewhat ambivalent towards Heather and her seemingly circumspect approach to life. Consequently, the two women maintain a friendship, albeit a rather superficial, surface-level one.
While Rachel would be happy for her Saturdays with the Livingstones to continue forever, this arrangement is threatened when Heather suddenly announces her engagement to Michael Sandberg, a strange, childlike man whom Rachel views as somewhat suspicious.
My first impression of Michael Sandberg was that he was blessed with, or consumed by, radiant high spirits. My second impression was that a man of such obvious and exemplary charm must be a liar. (p. 42)
To read the rest of my review, please visit:
https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2022...
Central to the novel is Rachel, a single, independently-minded woman in her early thirties. The co-owner of a small bookshop in Notting Hill, Rachel lives her life on the fringes of other people’s worlds, avoiding entanglements, amorous relationships, or anything that might lead to a loss of control or demonstration of passion. To her mind, the illusion of romantic love is not for the sensible – only for the naive or the very brave. Despite her role as the novel’s narrator, Rachel remains somewhat enigmatic or difficult to pin down throughout. She drops hints of previous affairs and ‘arrangements’, but little more in terms of detail is ever revealed. Above all, Rachel takes satisfaction from her lack of emotional bonds, a position that ultimately colours her view of others, particularly those who see the world through rose-tinted glasses.
Rachel’s closest friends are Oscar Livingstone – an ageing accountant that Rachel inherited from her deceased father – and his wife, Dorrie. The Livingstones are a kindly couple, treating Rachel almost as if she were part of their family. In short, they see Rachel as an older sister to their twenty-seven-year-old daughter, Heather – someone to guide her in the broader ways and mysteries of the world. On the surface, Heather appears to be a passive person, seemingly content to remain in the company of her parents, sharing their interests and lives until such time as she is ready to marry. While Rachel loves her Saturday afternoon visits to the Livingstones’ for tea, she feels somewhat ambivalent towards Heather and her seemingly circumspect approach to life. Consequently, the two women maintain a friendship, albeit a rather superficial, surface-level one.
While Rachel would be happy for her Saturdays with the Livingstones to continue forever, this arrangement is threatened when Heather suddenly announces her engagement to Michael Sandberg, a strange, childlike man whom Rachel views as somewhat suspicious.
My first impression of Michael Sandberg was that he was blessed with, or consumed by, radiant high spirits. My second impression was that a man of such obvious and exemplary charm must be a liar. (p. 42)
To read the rest of my review, please visit:
https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2022...
December 8, 2014
All of Anita Brookner's books are essentially the same book - quiet stories about quiet people who are complicatedly dissatisfied with their lives, and who observe someone else's life with fascination or envy - and sometimes that's all you want and it's perfect.
September 28, 2022
I am devastated. SLAIN. Imagine The Ambassadors, or some other spinsterish Henry James novel, told from the POV of an actual spinster... or if Barbara Pym had written Where Angels Fear to Tread... or Molly Keane wrote about Ruth Rendell's London... it's everything I like about novels, in a very slight 200-page story that takes place all in one character's mind.
Both this book and Hotel du Lac ask the extremely British-seeming question: How much does love count in life? Is it better to risk everything again and again on romantic gambles that are sure to bankrupt you in the end, or habituate yourself to a hardened, pragmatically modern but crushingly lonely worldview? Surprisingly, run-of-the-mill bohemianism is aligned with the latter, not the former; but the conservative, pre-feminist roles available for women, to which our reluctantly bohemian protagonist Rachel wants to consign wayward good-girl Heather, are not the answer either. There's a third way, but it's a narrow, dark, labyrinthine, watery path (in other words, Venice) and the only way to find it is to repudiate everything--both good manners AND bad behavior--and just do the impossible, which is to keep living for hope, and the heart.
The catch, for Brookner, is that whichever way the protagonist chooses--whether it's hope in Hotel du Lac) or self-protection in A Friend from England--she loses. Brookner makes it painfully clear that actual love, rather than just its hope, is only for the luckiest and most highly privileged among us--not just wealthy, but raised in a stable household by perfectly wonderful parents who love each other and their offspring. The bitterness of Rachel, in her final outbursts, when she throws that in Heather's face... and the pitying look Heather gives her in return.... go ahead and kick me in the gut a few more times, Brookner, I think I can still stand. Barely.
Both this book and Hotel du Lac ask the extremely British-seeming question: How much does love count in life? Is it better to risk everything again and again on romantic gambles that are sure to bankrupt you in the end, or habituate yourself to a hardened, pragmatically modern but crushingly lonely worldview? Surprisingly, run-of-the-mill bohemianism is aligned with the latter, not the former; but the conservative, pre-feminist roles available for women, to which our reluctantly bohemian protagonist Rachel wants to consign wayward good-girl Heather, are not the answer either. There's a third way, but it's a narrow, dark, labyrinthine, watery path (in other words, Venice) and the only way to find it is to repudiate everything--both good manners AND bad behavior--and just do the impossible, which is to keep living for hope, and the heart.
The catch, for Brookner, is that whichever way the protagonist chooses--whether it's hope in Hotel du Lac) or self-protection in A Friend from England--she loses. Brookner makes it painfully clear that actual love, rather than just its hope, is only for the luckiest and most highly privileged among us--not just wealthy, but raised in a stable household by perfectly wonderful parents who love each other and their offspring. The bitterness of Rachel, in her final outbursts, when she throws that in Heather's face... and the pitying look Heather gives her in return.... go ahead and kick me in the gut a few more times, Brookner, I think I can still stand. Barely.
December 31, 2010
A masterful and introspective 'comedy of manners', set against the enigmatic secret lives and desires of Heather, and the narrator, Rachel, who is the real protagonist of this short novel. Rachel comes over as intriguing yet confused; exactly as she wishes not to be seen! We read of her going out into the night, meeting her friends - yet, we never know where it is she goes exactly, and who she is meeting. She revels in the Livingstones (a family that has befriended her, or she it - we are never quite sure) not knowing about her secret life: "... in the Livingstones' little drama, I was the one cast as the wise virgin. I laughed, switched off the lights, and went out into the night."
Rachel's take on the role of women is confusing - she deplores Heather's apparent living in the world of illusions by marrying an Italian in Venice, and begs her to take responsibility and take care of her parents back in England (which incidentally Anita Brookner did, all her life). She is fascinated by the lives of idle women, yet despises the status of married women, preferring to laud independence.
But .... she ultimately fears a lonely future.
I give this top marks for a beautifully crafted work, despite the repetition of certain adjectives, eg, 'shrewd' to describe Heather ..... but even this, I think, may be deliberate!!
Rachel's take on the role of women is confusing - she deplores Heather's apparent living in the world of illusions by marrying an Italian in Venice, and begs her to take responsibility and take care of her parents back in England (which incidentally Anita Brookner did, all her life). She is fascinated by the lives of idle women, yet despises the status of married women, preferring to laud independence.
But .... she ultimately fears a lonely future.
I give this top marks for a beautifully crafted work, despite the repetition of certain adjectives, eg, 'shrewd' to describe Heather ..... but even this, I think, may be deliberate!!
August 19, 2011
Anita Brookner is an author that I keep coming back to, and am never disappointed. Her writing is so intelligent, insightful, descriptive and British! I think the main appeal for me is the opportunity to get to “know” someone, learn how they live day-to-day, what they do, how they think and how they make their way through life. This one was particularly good. I can literally open to any page in the book and find a sentence that astounds me with its clarity and brilliance.
August 17, 2011
The writing is often incisive and sometimes quite lovely, but I just don't care about these characters much. The book is NOT suspenseful as described, and the conclusion, while apparently devastating for the narrator, is utterly anticlimactic to me. The first half of the book was even downright boring. As well regarded as this author is, I want to urge her to "show" more and "tell" less.
August 30, 2011
I really hated this book. The narrator is infuriating, the characters are vapid, the story is annoying. The writing is good, which is why I barreled through it. I literally dumped it in the trash after I was done.
October 29, 2024
This is a brilliant, cerebral novel by one of the best novelists of the twentieth century, though not an author who could ever aspire to mass appeal. Brookner was simply too intelligent. First published in 1987, it hasn't aged.
Brilliant? Because it's a fascinating story about uninteresting, limited characters leading ordinary lives.
Cerebral: Read the following sentences, pulled almost at random from the book, about nothing more ordinary than eating a cookie: "I remember trying to eat one of Dorrie's biscuits and bursting into tears because I thought I must have looked so pathetic: I could see myself choking over this biscuit as if it were a symbol of more beneficent days, and it was at this point that I realized that I must take some resolute action to bring myself back from this brink. I must become what I had always been, even though I did not like that person very much any more."
The first-person narrator of this novel is a classic example of a common feature of modern literature: she is unreliable. She is very judgmental and analytic, and gradually, despite herself, she shows the reader (without realizing it herself) that her judgments are flawed and her analyses are skewed.
Brookner, in her day job, as it were, was an important professor of art history, and her writing shows how sharp her eyes were.
Brilliant? Because it's a fascinating story about uninteresting, limited characters leading ordinary lives.
Cerebral: Read the following sentences, pulled almost at random from the book, about nothing more ordinary than eating a cookie: "I remember trying to eat one of Dorrie's biscuits and bursting into tears because I thought I must have looked so pathetic: I could see myself choking over this biscuit as if it were a symbol of more beneficent days, and it was at this point that I realized that I must take some resolute action to bring myself back from this brink. I must become what I had always been, even though I did not like that person very much any more."
The first-person narrator of this novel is a classic example of a common feature of modern literature: she is unreliable. She is very judgmental and analytic, and gradually, despite herself, she shows the reader (without realizing it herself) that her judgments are flawed and her analyses are skewed.
Brookner, in her day job, as it were, was an important professor of art history, and her writing shows how sharp her eyes were.
June 12, 2020
Not much of a story exactly, just details of the main character's interactions with a wealthy family. Perhaps the story was too subtle for me? Excellent narration, which got me through to the end, where the protagonist does re-examine her own life.
January 26, 2016
Some books, you get in and ride and enjoy the journey, the twists and turns. Others, like this one, you walk through slowly, munching your way through the words, their truths and meanings. It's not so much a verb as it is a noun. The book "is". It does not "do". The action is in the
Mind, in the minds and hearts of the characters.
Rachel is a sweet independent woman who is friendly with a couple, Dorrie and Oscar, who have a daughter, Heather, who they assume to be great friends but are merely acquaintances, truth be told.
It was a very introspective read. A thinking voyage for single women. I liked it more as I plodded along. When I first started it, I kept waiting for something to happen, some action. It's not that kind of book, so, slow down is what I did.
In my defense, this was the first I have read of this author's books, so now I know what to expect.
and enjoyed the trip.
Mind, in the minds and hearts of the characters.
Rachel is a sweet independent woman who is friendly with a couple, Dorrie and Oscar, who have a daughter, Heather, who they assume to be great friends but are merely acquaintances, truth be told.
It was a very introspective read. A thinking voyage for single women. I liked it more as I plodded along. When I first started it, I kept waiting for something to happen, some action. It's not that kind of book, so, slow down is what I did.
In my defense, this was the first I have read of this author's books, so now I know what to expect.
and enjoyed the trip.
October 24, 2011
If I were rating on the quality of the writing, this book would have to be given the full five stars, but on enjoyability alone, it would have received one star. I often wonder after finishing a book like this, what initial spark brought about its conception. It's bloody hard work to complete a novel and I cannot fathom the driving force here. For me it was a dull book about dull people; uneventful and unmomentous. The narrator is disillusioned and deluded in regard to her own life and takes vicarious interest in the equally dull lives of her friends and acquaintances. She spends her whole time scenario building about others - and those scenarios are much less than riveting. Yes, it is a detailed and convincing depiction of a small life, carefully constructed - but so what. Who cares. Not me....
April 12, 2024
I listened to this on Audible, having read it a number of years ago and am rating it the same. Often, Brookner depicts women who are on the periphery, by themselves by choice and fascinated and somewhat exasperated with those women who have chosen otherwise.
Throughout, I kept wondering about the title and its significance. It only becomes clear at the end and is a master stroke. As usual, Brookner delights with her spare dialogue and insightful observations.
Throughout, I kept wondering about the title and its significance. It only becomes clear at the end and is a master stroke. As usual, Brookner delights with her spare dialogue and insightful observations.
February 26, 2016
Delightfully English.
August 21, 2019
Made it to page 115.
Dull and uninteresting read. I'm used to better things from her.
Dull and uninteresting read. I'm used to better things from her.
August 27, 2022
O no NOT A-Brook playing an elaborate prank on her first-person narrator 😵💫🤌
April 7, 2015
סיפורן של שתי נשים רייצ´ל והת´ר - האחת מהמעמד העובד והשניה ממעמד העשיר ובעצם זה סיפורה של רייצ´ל יותר מאשר של הת´ר.
בבעלותה של רייצ´ל שליש חנות ספרים. היא עובדת קשה לחסוך כסף לדירה ולרכוש את החלק של השותפה הפורשת. ברקע נמצאת מערכת היחסים שלה עם הלווינגסטונים, אוסקר ודורי. אוסקר ניהל לאביה של רייצ´ל את החשבונות וגם לרייצ´ל, עד שהלווינגסטונים זכו בפרס והתעשרו.
לאחר ההתעשרות אוסקר פרש מעסק ניהול החשבונות לחיי נוחות, אבל רייצ´ל ממשיכה להעזר בו לניהול ספרי החשבונות. היא מגיעה לביתם של הלווינגסטונים שבפרוור של לונדון, שם אנו מתוודעים לדורי ולהת´ר הבת שבתחילה נראית כבחורה שקטה הזקוקה לכל סיוע של רייצ´ל כדי להסתדר בשבילי החיים.
עם התקדמות העלילה, הקורא מגלה שדמותה של הת´ר היא למעשה האנטיתזה של דמותה של רייצ´ל. הת´ר נישאת, מתגרשת, מתאהבת וחייה. לעומתה רייצ´ל עסוקה כל הזמן בחשבונות קטנים ובמחשבות איך להציל את הת´ר מהעולם.
כאשר דמותה של הת´ר במציאות אינה מתאימה לדמותה בתפיסה של רייצ´ל וכאשר היא מתגלה כטיפוס חיי ונהנתן רייצ´ל מנסה לשכנע את הת´ר לחזור למסגרת. כאשר היא נכשלת היא מתפרצת בחמת זעם על הת´ר ונוטשת את המערכה.
הספר איטי, בנוי מהמון מלל במיוחד של רייצ´ל המתארת לנו את החיים של הלווינגסטונים.
הוא יכול להחשב לספר טוב רק בדיעבד, כי בזמן שקראתי אותו היה מאוד קשה לי איתו - במיוחד לראות את התמונה הנלאה שהמחברת מכוונת אליה (כל הזמן עסוקים בפרטים ובמעגלים).
בבעלותה של רייצ´ל שליש חנות ספרים. היא עובדת קשה לחסוך כסף לדירה ולרכוש את החלק של השותפה הפורשת. ברקע נמצאת מערכת היחסים שלה עם הלווינגסטונים, אוסקר ודורי. אוסקר ניהל לאביה של רייצ´ל את החשבונות וגם לרייצ´ל, עד שהלווינגסטונים זכו בפרס והתעשרו.
לאחר ההתעשרות אוסקר פרש מעסק ניהול החשבונות לחיי נוחות, אבל רייצ´ל ממשיכה להעזר בו לניהול ספרי החשבונות. היא מגיעה לביתם של הלווינגסטונים שבפרוור של לונדון, שם אנו מתוודעים לדורי ולהת´ר הבת שבתחילה נראית כבחורה שקטה הזקוקה לכל סיוע של רייצ´ל כדי להסתדר בשבילי החיים.
עם התקדמות העלילה, הקורא מגלה שדמותה של הת´ר היא למעשה האנטיתזה של דמותה של רייצ´ל. הת´ר נישאת, מתגרשת, מתאהבת וחייה. לעומתה רייצ´ל עסוקה כל הזמן בחשבונות קטנים ובמחשבות איך להציל את הת´ר מהעולם.
כאשר דמותה של הת´ר במציאות אינה מתאימה לדמותה בתפיסה של רייצ´ל וכאשר היא מתגלה כטיפוס חיי ונהנתן רייצ´ל מנסה לשכנע את הת´ר לחזור למסגרת. כאשר היא נכשלת היא מתפרצת בחמת זעם על הת´ר ונוטשת את המערכה.
הספר איטי, בנוי מהמון מלל במיוחד של רייצ´ל המתארת לנו את החיים של הלווינגסטונים.
הוא יכול להחשב לספר טוב רק בדיעבד, כי בזמן שקראתי אותו היה מאוד קשה לי איתו - במיוחד לראות את התמונה הנלאה שהמחברת מכוונת אליה (כל הזמן עסוקים בפרטים ובמעגלים).
July 12, 2009
One of my new favorite authors. Read this book following The Visitor and Hotel DuLac. Those were 4 stars to me, this one only 3. A 30ish English woman becomes involved in the lives of a local family, with involved, interesting twists and turns in all their lives. "From London to Venice, this elegant, revealing, beautifully controlled study builds to a startling unmasking of its protagonists and their motives.
December 31, 2011
Too much talking, not enough happening. Actually I think the genius of this novel is probably that so little happens and yet we want to keep on reading (or in my case, listening). I found it somewhat tedious the number of times that the narrator Rachel tells us how frustrating and annoying Heather is and still she can't pull away from this odd family. I did like the ending, which is evocative of Don't Look Now, I just wish there had been a serial killer in a red anorak to spice things up a bit!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 83 reviews