Conor Cruise O' Brien

I hope to write something on Conor Cruise O'Brien, who was a well known writer, playwright, lecturer and politican in Ireland. He died some years ago. He was an unusual man who did not fit into the Ireland of De Valera that he grew up in. He was born in 1917. His father was a journalist and his mother was one of the Sheehy family who were well known Home Ruler politicans. His father died when he was a child, and had wanted him to go to a Protestant school, as he himself was an agnostic. Conor was sent to a Protestant school and grew up to be sceptical about religion and to question the heavy depressing Catholic ethos of the Irish state. He next went to Trinity College and then into the Irish civil service where he looked like he was going to have a brilliant career. I will write some more about him later.

The Real Charlotte Part III

Francie is invited to stay at Bruff for a few days, and she is very nervous. Christopher forgives her gaffes but the ladies of the party don't like her at all and think she is common and stupid. She embarks on a flirtation with Gerald Hawkins, who is a soldier - and who plays around with her with no intention of marrying a penniless girl. Lady Dysart and the other women of the party, except for Pamela, Lady Dysart's sweet natured daughter, are chilly with her. She goes bicycle riding and lets young men flirt with her and can't seem to stop herself. She likes Christopher but is uneasily aware that he will not find her all that interesting or suitable if he gets to know her better.. she's not up to his weight. She goes boating and she and Roddy Lambert who is of the party are almost drowned. Charlotte begins to get annoyed with her young cousin. She seems to get into scrapes continually and to engage in vulgar behaviour. Moreover, she can see that Roddy is growing too fond of Francie, and she is jealous. Although he is married, he and Francie flirt and reminisce over when they knew each other in Dublin. Lucy Lambert, his wife, is getting uneasy. Francie is in love with Gerald Hawkins and wants to marry him but he shies away, as he does not want to get tied down with her. Charlotte is more and more irritated by her, feeling that she is throwing away her chances of becoming Lady Dysart, for the sake of a flirtation with Hawkins. Charlotte is eager to increase her land, and manages to get hold of a farm rented by Julia Duffy. Julia is elderly and poor and not able to manage the farm. She is bedridden much of the time and suffering from depression. Charlotte tells Roddy Lambert that if she had the farm, she would use it for breeding horses and would make money out of it, but Julia is just letting it go to rack and ruin. She gets the tenancy, and Julia breaks down and ends up in the local asylum, having lost her health, her mind and her social status. Charlotte moves into the farm, but her servants dont like it as it is further away from town than her other home.. and they are lonely. There is nothing to do but look after Charlotte's collection of cats whom she adores.

The Real Charlotte II

Charlotte invites Francie to Tally Ho Lodge her home, for a visit.. because her old aunt had wished it. However she is jealous of her cousin, who is young and fresh and charming. She does have ideas though of using Francie.. She can see that the girl has good looks and attracts men, and that it might well be possible to make a match for her with one of the local gentry. Christopher Dysart son of Sir Benjamin, is a gentle likable young man whose mother wants to get him married and if Charlotte were to bring off a marriage, her cousin would be one day "Lady Dysart of Bruff" and an important figure in local society in the town of Lismoyle, and Francie would owe it to her that she had achieved this rank. Francie has been living with her cousins, in Dublin in a shabby neighbourhood. She has a small income of her own but it is not really enough to keep her. Her uncle Robert is not making much money and the family are always on the verge of having to move to an even more downmarket neighbourhood. She is not comfortable with the upper classes in Lismoyle, used as she is to mixing only with her uncle's family and their social equals in Dublin. She likes to flirt and frequently gets things wrong, when mixing socially. She is aware that the Dysarts' circle look down on her for being ill educated and inexperienced in "good society". Christopher Dysart however can't help being strongly attracted to her. Her beauty and naievety please him and he's willing to overlook her lack of education.

The Real Charlotte (published 1894)

This is generally held to be Somerville and Ross's best work. It is a serious novel, set in Victorian Ireland. Charlotte Mullen, the anti heroine is a plain woman who seems jolly and pleasant but with a vicious streak that she hides. She inherits a house and a small property from her elderly aunt.. and she has had an education in running a farm and breeding horses, because her father was bailiff to the Dysart estate and she helped him in his work. Her aunt, when dying, felt guilty about Charlotte's cousin, Frances Fitzpatrick, who sometimes visited the country house... and who was from a family that was "shabby genteel", well born but having no money. Francie has spent much of her life living in Dublin, with relatives who were also poor but who gave her a home. She mixed with poorer Protestants and Catholics in the city and she had little or no education - or refined manners. She was good natured but thoughtless and silly. Charlotte also has lower class origins, that she doesn't like to talk about. The maternal side of her family were Catholic and poor. However she has connexions with the upper classes in the area, because she is a Protestant and an intelligent woman who makes the most of her opportunities. Lady Dysart, the leading lady in hte neighbourhood likes her. She is good friends with Roddy Lambert, who is now the bailiff for the Dysart estate, Bruff.. who used to work under her father. Roddy like her is rather vulgar but manages to keep in with the upper class. He and Charlotte had the beginnings of a romantic relationship but Roddy married a woman who had a small fortune of her own, and she settled her money on him for life. Lucy, his wife is a silly but good hearted woman who is devoted to Roddy, and she has made friends with Charlotte, who advises her on handling her marriage. He is a flirt who likes girls and she often worries about his relationships with local women who are pretty. Charlotte secretly despises Lucy for being so devoted to her husband.

Powder and Patch

This is another of Heyer's Georgian early novels. It hasn't got much plot. It is about a young man Philip Jettan who dismays his father by being a bit of a country bumpkin. Sir Maurice, his father, has an estate but he is a sophisticated man who likes to live in the town and to be a man of fashion. He sends Philip abroad to France to try and make him less awkward and dull -. Philip is in love with a beautiful girl called Cleone Charteris, but she also wishes he were more of a fashionable gentleman. In Paris, Philip learns to dress fancily and to be more amusing and charming. He learns to flirt with ladies, to the point where Cleone is annoyed with him. But he asks her to marry him and they fall in love all over again and get married.

Masqueraders By Georgette Heyer

This is one of Heyer's earlier novels, and is set in Georgian England shortly after the 1745 rebellion which attempted to put Charles Edward Stuart on the throne. The two main characters, Robin and Prudence are brother and sister and Robin has fought for the Stuarts so he is a wanted man. So he and Prudence disguise themselves. Robin is small and slender and he passes as a pretty woman and Prue who is bigger and sturdier, dresses as a man. She can look after herself, has learn to fight with a sword and to carry off an imitation of a male. The siblings have come to London, to hide out, and they take part in society. Robin rescues a young upper class girl, Letitia Grayson from someone trying to abduct her, and he falls in love with her. Prue becomes friendly with a young man, Sir Antony Fanshawe, who was supposed to marry Letty, but he is not in love with her. The siblings are called Merriott, and they have lived mostly abroad with their eccentric adventurer father who has engaged in all sorts of different professions. But then he tells them that their name is not really Merriott - it is Tremaine and he is the heir to a viscountcy. He puts forward a claim to be Viscount Barham, and his children are shocked to learn that they are not penniless adventurers of dubious origin but relatives of a noble family. There is another claimant to the viscountcy, a distant relative whose claim is actually very poor. Tremaine knows all about the family and their estate and he is accepted as the Viscount. Robin defends Letty when she is being forced to elope with her previous suitor. She had agreed to elope with him because he had some evidence that her father, Sir Humphry Grayson had sympathised with the Rebellion.. She is not very clever and is easily fooled by a weak piece of evidence. Robin saves her and fights a duel on her behalf and they fall in love. Prue has become close to Sir Anthony, and he knows her secret and asks her to marry him. Tremaine is now Viscount Barham and is delighted that his children have made good matches. I've never been keen on cross dressing romances but I quite enjoyed this one. However its not one I re read.

Also the Hills Part V

Dexter is keeping busy with his farm, and he is not too happy to see Judith back to help Alix with her confinement. He feels that she has shown herself to be quite selfish, in messing him around. She also realises that he is falling in love with Alix and says so to him, rather spitefully. He is hurt, and feels that he has no hope with a beautiful girl like Alix and that at present, she is grieving for Jerome. Alix has her baby, a son and Judith is posted to North Africa. She enjoys her work, and meets up again with Joe Racina who is a war correspondent. But then she is injured by a bomb and left with severe burns on her fact and arms and hands. She is very ill and has to be flown home to the US for treatment. She can't hold things and her face is damaged. But she has plastic surgery and its believed that she will recover and her hands will get better, and her facial injuries will improve. Daniel and Serena have been through a lot of pain and suffering, losing 2 of their children and their third child being badly injured. However they tell themselves that they have Alix who is a lovely kindly young woman and they have a grandson. Daniel tells Serena that they must be prepared for Alix to find a new husband in due course. She is a young woman and she can't live on memories forever. Serena is a little amused at her unsophisticated farmer husband showing such worldly knowledge. Alix decides to go down South to see her own family for a visit. Dexter is upset at her going as she has a cousin, Prosper, who was considered as a possible husband for her and he's afraid that she will decide to marry him and go back to her home state to live, rather than spend all her life in the cold of New England. Judith has reconciled herself to the fact that she can never be an army nurse again and she and Joe Racina get married. He loves her and she him and they begin to write articles together, so she has found an occupation to make up for giving up her army work. Dexter's sister Rhoda gets married to her Jewish fiance, and Benny their adopted child, helps to flush out a German spy in the neighbourhood. It makes up a little for Jenness' disloyal behaviour that the village manages to get rid of one enemy of the US. Alix returns suddenly to the farm and tells Dexter that she would never have married Prosper. But she will marry him. Daniel and Serena have a party to celebrate the changes, good and bad that have taken place over the past couple of years. They have lost Jenness and Jerome but he has left a son behind him and Alix will stay at the farm.. and marry Dexter. Judith is recovering and has a new and loving husband. The neighbourhood has grown and taken in new people from different cultures and made friends of them.

Also the Hills Part IV

Jenness' death is a horrible shock to her family and they are also pained by her activities before she died. She engaged in traitorous behavior and perjury, and she was clearly involved in a love affair with a man who had no intention of marrying her. Judith is still working in the US, and Jerome has been posted abroad. Then Alix, his young wife, comes up to New England from Louisiana. The family find her charming and sweet and take to her immediately. She is pregnant and wants to have her baby in Jerome's home. Serena likes her very much and gets over her prejudice against Catholics. Alix says that the baby will be brought up Catholic and she wants to get to know the locals in the neighbourhood who are Catholic. Serena is rather shocked to find out that her priest is quite happy to play cards or have a drink. Judith comes to see Alix to see if she can help with her pregnancy and having the baby. Alix also spends a lot of her money on making the farmhouse more comfortable and attractive, the Farmans have never gone in for luxury or comfort and are surprised by how willing Alix is to use her money to do up the house and her good taste. Then the family learn that Jerome has been killed in action. Alix is heartbroken..

Also the Hills Part III

Jenness has a fun time on her trip back to the farm, but her friend Joe Racina who comes as well, is a newspaper reporter. The Farmans learn that there is trouble brewing. It is in the early stages of America's entry into World War Two and there are still a lot of isolationists and pro Germans about. There is an investigation going on to find foreign spies and Germans living in the countryside are suspected. Jenness works for a politican - Horace Vaughn - and he has asked her to send out papers putting forward the isolationist line under a government frank. She is in love with him, and although she recognises that it is a bit dubious, she does what he asks. He gives her expensive fur coats and jewels. But she is now being investigated for her activities. Judith keeps up correspondence with her family and asks them to tell Dexter about her war activities, as she still considers him her fiance. Dexter's sister, Rhoda, is a bit of a dull spinster but she returns to teaching as war work, and becomes a bit more outgoing. She meets a Jewish man in the neighbourhood, a widower with a child.. and he has taken in a refugee Jewish child, Benny. Rhoda begins to plan for a marriage that she never expected. Meanwhile down South, Jerome tells his new bride that he's under orders to ship out, and he suggests that while he is on active service, she might like to go to the North and visit his family. Jenness finds that her boss, who had been flirting with her but is engaged to a well born socialite is now cooling on her as she ends up being investigated...He wants to put all the blame on her and has no intention of marrying her. Daniel is so desperate to help his daughter that he sells the farm to Dexter, with a proviso that he can live there.. so that he has money to engage a top lawyer for her. Jenness is examined by the Grand Jury and found guilty of perjury. She realises that she's going to go to prison and becomes terrified. Joe Racina who has come to see her before her sentencing, tells her that it is terrible but that she must face it and come out the other side stronger. She gets hysterical and says noone would want to marry her if she's been in prison. She begs her father to save her - but there's nothing he can do. She makes a sudden dash for the balcony of her apartment, and throws herself over, and dies.

Also the Hills II

Jenness comes to the farm, from Washington and brings a couple of friends, who are journalists, and she wants to have a party. She is inclined to complain about how bare and basic the farmhouse is, but never offers to help out financially to make it more comfortable. However she loves her family and they love her and she's popular with the local people, because she is so pretty and charming and fashionable looking. Dexter is unhappy about Judith wanting to be an army nurse.. and tells her that if she's not prepared to marry him soon, he wants out of the engagment. Judith however is determined to take on the army nurse role and she claims that she does not regard their engagement as broken. Word comes from down South, where Jerome has been posted, to say that he's getting married. He has met a Southern girl called Alix St Cyr - and she and he want to marry quickly because he might be posted abroad. Daniel and Serena are dumbfounded, especially Serena, who is prejudiced against Catholics.. and horrified that the couple are marrying in a Catholic ceremony...THey learn that Alix, though Jerome met her working in a jewellery store, is actually quite well off. Her mother died when she was a baby, and her wish was that the child should be reared in a convent, and then her father married a rich widow, so Alix has quite a bit of money of her own. M/F

Also the Hills By Frances Parkinson Keyes

This is a novel published by Keyes in the early years of World War Two. It is a story about the Farmans, a New England family, who have a successful farm but who are simple people. They work hard and dont care about creature comforts. Daniel and Serena have 3 grown up children, Jenness, a very beautiful but rather flighty girl, who has left the farm and gone to work in Washington DC as a secretary to a wealthy politican, Jerome, who left a banking job, to join the army.. and Judith, who is still living at home, and who has trained as a district nurse. Judith is engaged to a local farmer, Dexter, who was injured as a child and cannot join the army so he is dedicating himself to farming and local affairs, to make up for this. Judith loves him but she takes her nursing job very seriously, and upsets Dexter in the beginning of the book by telling him that she has to travel away from their local town to nurse some children. He is hoping that they can get married soon but when she comes back she tells him that she wants to join up as an army nurse. More will follow.

Flower of May Part III

Andre follows his family to Europe and flirts with Fanny. She is drawn to him but she's not sure if he is really a serious prospect, and she is not aware of her sister's affair with him, which has happened only a short while after her wedding. Then during the holiday, news comes to Fanny that her mother is seriously ill and she goes home in a hurry. When she gets to the family estate, she finds that Julia is close to dying. The nun who is looking after her tells her that her mother is worrying in her weakened state about her elder daughter.. Fanny stays with her mother until her death which causes terrible pain to her father and to Julia's elderly father. As they begin to recover, Eleanor, Julia's sister, talks to her niece about the future. She had wanted to be a nun but gave up the idea because her father needed someone to take care of him and run their small estate. Now she suggests that she makes over the estate to Fanny, and that will provide her with a small income so that she and Lucille can go to University and study for a career. Fanny is happy to accept this offer, as she knows that she could not marry Andre when he treated her sister so callously, seducing her almost on her honeymoon and she is intelligent and does not want to bury herself in marriage and house keeping. Lucille too is pleased as she feels there is no point in quarrelling with her family over a career when she has no training to do anything better than work in a shop or be a governess.. Eleanor tells Fanny that when her father dies, she will give up her job of looking after the estate and leave it to a manager, and Fanny will get the proceeds... and Eleanor can go to Brussels and while its a bit late for her to be a nun, she can live in the convent and lead a religious life, which is what she always wanted. Fanny and Lucille plan their future, getting into university and studying and preparing for a more challenging career than housekeeping or the like.. and Andre returns to the Continent. Louise and her husband try to get their marriage on track... and Fanny's father tries to recover from his wife's death.

Flower of May Part II

Fanny has Lucille to visit in Dublin, before they go on their continental trip. Louise, her sister is away on honeymoon. The young couple have gone in a car, which breaks down, as motor cars were very new then and prone to problems. Andre, Lucille's brother, has a job as a car salesman and he rescues the honeymooning couple when the car lets them down. He is attracted to Fanny and she is intrigued by him. Fanny goes off with Lucille and Julia, her mother decides to go back to her country home, where her elderly father lives with his spinster daughter. It is a small estate, as Catholics had for a long time been unable to buy property.. but it keeps the family in reasonable comfort and gives them status. Julia loves the country and does not like living in Dublin, but she puts up with it for her husband's sake. She is in increasingly poor health and longs to go back to her home. Before she goes away from Dublin, she sees a young couple in the city and gets an intuition that they are lovers, then realises that it is her own daughter, who is newly married. She goes to the country, and her health weakens. She is worried about her daughter. Fanny and Lucille enjoy their travels around Europe with Lucille's younger brother and her society obsessed mother. The family are kind to Fanny and she is happy to be seeing the world. She has been having religious doubts in recent years, but she is still interested in the Catholic culture of Europe.

Kate O'Brien The Flower of May

This is one of Kate O'Brien's later novels. It is set in Ireland not long before the First World war. Fanny Morrow is just 18 and attending her older sister's wedding. Her sister is a rather vain pretty girl... Fanny is told by her parents that she cant go back to school in Belgium, where she has been receiving her education. The parents dont tell her that they have financial problems and that Julia, her mother is in poor health and needs a companion. She is very upset about having to leave school as she loves learning and has been very happy in the Belgian convent. Her best friend Lucille is still at school, but she too has problems. Lucille's family are very rich and her mother wants her to go into society and make a good marriage. Lucille wishes that she could go to university and get a job, but without familial support this seems impossible. However, she invites Fanny to come on a trip to Europe with her visiting Italy.. and her parents allow her to go.

Ann Granger 1939 -2025

I've just heard of the death of Ann Granger, who has written several different series of novels, mostly detective ones. She died in September 2025. She was born in Portsmouth and went to university at the University of London where she did a degree in languages. She started to work as a clerk in the Foreign office and travelled abroad a good deal. She worked in the visa sections of various embassies and married John Hulme, who also worked in the Foreign office. She started to write romances, then she and her husband came back to England with their 2 children. She began to write full time and decided that she would like to try her hand at detective stories. She started writing a series about a clerk in the Foreign office, Meredith, who has returned to the UK and who gets involved in detective work with Alan Markby, a police officer. The two become a couple and marry after several years. When she had written several Meredith and Markby novels, she changed to a new detective, Fran Varady, who is a young girl living in London, who is homeless because her father and grandmother died, leaving her with no money or home. She lives in squats and has a few friends including a young Asian man, Ganesh and his uncle. She does small detective jobs and works in casual jobs such as helping in Ganesh's family shop, and as a waitress in a pizza restaurant. She gets a flat from a charity, and has a little home of her own and her big ambition is to become an actress but she is usually kept busy at trying to earn a living. Ann wrote 7 Varady novels, and then in the 2000's she began a new series. Ben Ross is a police officer, in Victorian London, and he meets a young woman during an investigation who is companion to a wealthy older lady. Lizzie Martin knew him when she was a little girl living in Derbyshire and her father, a doctor, paid for Ben to have an education, so he could get a better job. She and Ben fall in love and marry, and Lizzie helps him with his work. They are not well off but have a small house and a maid, and enjoy working together. During this time, Ann wrote another series set in present day England, about 2 young police officers who work together. Her last Victorian novel with Ben and Lizzie Ross was "the Old Rogue of Limehouse" about a pawnbroker. Im sorry to hear that Ann has died, and there wont be any more of her Varady and Ben Ross novels.

Ante Room Part III

Miss Cunningham, the nurse keeps on being friendly with Reggie. Agnes however is now torn between her feelings for Vincent and her love for her sister. He tells Agnes that he loves her..and they are both tormented by their love for each other. Divorce in a Victorian Catholic family is out of the question, and even if it were not a Catholic family, as her brother in law, Vincent could not marry Agnes. Miss Cunningham hints to Reggie that she would take care of him, if his mother dies and that his mother is ill and in pain and she is struggling to stay alive for his sake, which is not fair to her. Danny, her husband is hurt as he can see that Teresa loves Reggie much more than she ever loved him. Then Reggie and Miss Cunningham announce that they are getting married. Agnes is rather shocked, but her doctor admirer tells her that Miss Cunningham,as a nurse is well aware of Reggie's condition and that she is willing to look after him and have a sexless marriage.. and he will be content with her, if his mother dies. He points out to Agnes that although she does not much like Miss Cunningham, she is not a bad person and she's a good nurse. She is not well off and its understandable that she should be ready to make a marriage with him, with its various limitations so that she will have a comfortable home.. Agnes can see that he's right and that Reggie will be cared for and his mother will be able to die in peace knowing that her son will be all right. She talks to Vincent and they admit their love for each other. But since their religion forbids divorce and Agnes loves Marie Rose, there is no way they can be together. Teresa tells the doctors that she does not want an operation, she knows that her son is going to be looked after by his new wife, and she's happy to die. Vincent is relieved that things have settled down and he goes out into the garden, with his gun and shoots himself, ending his unhappy life and marriage and leaving Agnes free to recover from her love for him.

The Ante Room Part II

Agnes is lovely and intelligent and has devoted herself to looking after her mother and the house. Her feelings for Vincent, her brother in law, she keeps secret. She loves her sister Marie Rose, and is surprised when Marie Rose suddenly arrives at the house, without her husband. She has come to see her mother and support her, while she is seeing the doctors. Marie Rose is rather silly and flighty but she is good natured and loves Agnes very much. She tells her sister that she and VIncent are not getting on and she left him behind because she does not want to have him around her. Agnes knows that Marie Rose is silly, rather snobbish and not very clever, but she still loves her and is upset to hear that her marriage is not working out. Reggie is very frightened that his mother is going to die, and he refuses to believe it. He depends on her very much to give his life some purpose and to show him affection. He is surprised when the nurse who is looking after his mother begins to show him a little kindness, trying to calm him down about the probablity that Teresa will die soon. She is from a modest background and like governesses, she knows that the families she works for dont see her as a lady and look down on her. Agnes and Marie Rose are not all that nice to her... and begin to wonder why she is being friendly with Reggie. The famous doctor arrives to examine Teresa... and then to Marie Rose's amazement her husband suddenly turns up at the Mulqueen house. She does not want to share her room with him and cries on Agnes' shoulder.

Ante Room Part I

This is another of Kate O'Brien's novels, which is related to her first novel "Without my Cloak". Teresa Mulqueen is the daughter of John Considine, and she did not make a grand marriage unlike her sisters. Her husband was given a job in the family firm, but he was never very intelligent or good at the job. Teresa had several children, and her favourite, her eldest son, Reggie, has been rakish and contracted a sexually transmitted disease which is slowly killing him. Teresa has cancer and she's very ill. A famous surgeon from England is coming to see her, to advise on whether another operation would help her or if she could stand it. She wants to try and live a bit longer, to look after Reggie but she is getting weaker. The Mulqueen house is being run by Agnes, her daughter who is single and very beautiful. Agnes is admired by the local doctor but she has been in love for some time with Vincent, the husband of her younger sister Marie Rose.

Pray for the Wanderer Part II

Matt Costello has had some success with his plays in London and the US. He feels he needs a break from London because he has been involved for some time with a married English actress who does not want to get a divorce. He is very fond of his brother, Will who has a farm near Mellick, and his wife Una is a very sweet good natured woman. He finds it hard to be apart from his mistress but it seems as if their affair is doomed. However he does not like the new Ireland that has come along since the separation from England. As a writer, he finds the censorship and narrowness of mind very depressing. He feels that it destroys art, and that apart from literature, Ireland has no great art unlike other Catholic countries. He supported the fight for Irish independence but is dismayed by what he sees the country has become. (Its believed that this novel was written to hit back at Irish censorship as it came soon after Mary Lavelle, Kate's "Spanish" novel was banned in Ireland. Largely because of its having a lesbian character and the heroine engaging in an adulterous relationship). Una's sister Nell is a supporter of De Valera and a devout Catholic, and although she is attractive and intelligent, he finds himself at odds with her... Una had hoped that he and Nell might get along as Nell is a teacher and well read, but they dont. Nell lives with her aunt who is also a devout and narrow minded Catholic, and her cousin Tom lives with them. He is more open minded and Matt learns that years ago, Tom and Nell were engaged. As cousins they had to get a dispensation from Rome to marry, but in that time, Nell found out that Tom had had an affair with a shop girl, who had his child. He has supported the child and remained in touch with the girl, and she later married a man of her own class, but Nell becomes positively hysterical that Tom was thinking of marrying HER when he had seduced a young woman and made her pregnant.

Pray for the Wanderer by Kate O' Brien

This was one of Kate's mid life novels and it is set in Ireland in the 1930s, the age of De Valera. Kate was not a radical but she was liberal minded and when she lived in Spain she sympathised with the Spanish republic and disapproved of the conservative faction who ruled Spain. She lived in Ireland for some time as an adult but in her later years she moved to England and lived there till she died. Her novels were less popular and she was not well off but she preferred England to the conservative little state that Ireland had become after it gained independence. She had been brought up a Catholic but as a young woman she began to lose her faith. Probably some of this was to do with her realising that she was a lesbian which was forbidden by the Church. However she thought of herself as a European and she regarded Catholicism as part of the wider European tradition and did not entirely reject it. She found Irish Catholicism narrow and depressing and unintellectual. Her hero in Pray for the Wanderer is an Irish playwright - Matt Costello -who lives in London and he comes home for a short holiday to see his brother and his brother's family. More will follow.

Without my Cloak, Part V

Christina tells him that she is settling into New York life and when he tells her he still loves her and wants her to come home and marry him, she refuses. She knows that their class differences will make it impossible for her to become part of his family. Denis is confused. He wants to rescue her and doesnt know why she is so reluctant to accept his offer of marriage. Then she tells him that she has had an offer of marriage from someone in New York and she's going to marry him. Denis doesn't believe her, at first and thinks that she is making it up to save him from having to marry her and take her back to Ireland. But when he meets her employer, he can see that the man, who is quite a bit older than Christina, does love her and perhaps she will be happy with him. She seems so determined to stay in New York, and he knows that she's right about the problems of her marrying into the wealthy Considines. Sadly, he goes back home. He is now close to his 21st birthday and his father is trying to cheer him up by giving him generous presents and a promotion in his job. He is pleased in one way but then suddenly he ralises that he's being trapped, and that he does not want to be trapped. He decides to walk out on the family, and disappears for a day, telling himself he wont come back. His father is badly shaken. Then Denis returns towards the end of the day and meets Anna Hennessy, the daughter of a wealthy Catholic businessman, who is intelligent and attractive. She and he start to talk and he decides that he will stay in Mellick and try to pursue a relationship with her. She is more suitable to marry him than Christina was, and he finds himself falling for her. Im not so keen on this ending as it seems rather callous of Denis to leave Christina, whom he claimed to love, in New York...and he seems to rush into this new relationship with Anna. The book has seemed to claim that Denis is different to his family and has talents that they dont possess, yet he seems to be settling for a dull life in Mellick.

Without my Cloak Part IV

Denis is drawn towards Christina, but knows his family would be horrified at the bare idea of his being friendly with a peasant girl who is illegitimate and the child of a servant. But within a short time, he and she become lovers. He feels like he is deeply in love with her and doesn't know what to do. Then he goes to meet her, one evening and she does not turn up. He finds that his uncle Tom, who is parish priest of the area covering the river, was walking late one night near his home and heard the two young lovers talking. He goes to Christina's aunt and tells her that they must send Christina away to prevent the 2 young people from falling into sin. Her aunt does not care much for her niece, and is willing to push her into going abroad, especially as Fr Tom is willing to pay for her to go away. Denis is furious when he discovers that Christina, who feared going to a big city, has been forced to go-. She has relatives in New York and Fr Tom has paid for her to go there, and given her some money.. Denis angrily tells his uncle and relatives that he and Christina were lovers and they are even more horrified. He says that he is going to America to find her. They know they cant stop him.. but are scandalised that he has been having sex with a girl and that she is a servant's child. Denis sails for America and when he gets to New York, he finds that Christina's aunt who lived there with an abusive husband has moved away from the city and noone knows where she is. So Christina had noone to give her a home when she arrived. He spends weeks searching the waterfront and the poor areas to see if she has found some work and a place to live there. When he has almost given up hope, he finds her one day. She has a job in a small diner and the owner is not unkind to her, but she has to work very hard.

Without My Cloak Part III

Eddy and Denis note that Caroline is now middle aged and not very happy and feel sorry for her. Another member of the family is Teresa, Eddy's sister, who marries a nonentity called Danny Mulqueen. He works in Considine's but is not very clever. She has several children and lives for the eldest boy, Reggie, who is a rakish young man, who contracts a sexually transmitted disease. He is in poor health, and Teresa only half understands what's wrong with him. The Mulqueens appear in one of OBrien's later novels, The Ante Room, where the heroine is Agnes, Reggie's sister. Eddy talks seriously to Denis when the boy is leaving school, telling him that he should make use of the fortune that his grandfather left him, and not go into the family business. He thinks that Denis has some special qualities and he should at least try his luck at something outside even if he does end up settling for Considines. Denis is tempted but he loves his father and finds it hard to walk out on him. Denis starts working in the business and finds it rather dull but he does not want to hurt his father so he starts learning it from the bottom up. His cousin, Tony, goes into an order of Monks at Mount Mellary, and he loses touch with him.. and he can't understand why he has taken on this hard life. Getting increasingly bored, Denis starts going fishing at a river nearby, and enjoys it for a time, but then he meets a girl from a local farm, Christina Roche, who is gathering firewood near the river. Her aunt has a small farm which is rented from a Protestant landlord, and is very poor, living just above starvation level. Denis is struck by her beauty, and she tells him that she is illegitimate. Her mother was a servant who got pregnant and her aunt agreed to take care of her but she is barely able to support herself and her own children. Christina dreads the thought of emigrating to America or even England but she fears that her aunt can't give her a home indefinitely.

Without my Cloak Part II

Anthony is desperately upset by his wife's death. She was only a young woman and had had 8 children. He knows that Molly was not ever very maternal and that the frequent pregnancies wore her body out and made her unhappy but both of them were in love and eager to be lovers. Due to their Catholicism however they could not do anything to protect her against having babies. He travels abroad for work a lot and he begins to take mistresses, and decides not to remarry but to see his women while away from Ireland. Anthony loves his eldest son Denis, very much and spoils him. He is the cleverest and most attractive of the family. Denis loves his father and is delighted that he allows him his own way so much. He takes a great interest in gardening and Anthony lets him re design the garden of their country house... As Denis grows up, he reads a lot and gets a good education. Other members of the family are fond of him, especially his uncle Eddy who runs the English branch of the business and uses living in England to get out from the strict Irish Catholic atmosphere and the rather smothering ambience of his family. It is hinted that Eddy might be gay, but he also has a special love for his sister Caroline, who is married in Mellick and has several children. She however is not that happy with Mellick life or her marriage. She does not like sex with her husband, and after several years, she suddenly runs away, and goes to London to seek refuge with Eddy. During her short stay there, she is aware that her family will be horrified by her walking out, and will pressure her to come back and that she can't escape Mellick or the Considines. She meets one of Eddy's friends and is attracted by him and tempted to sleep with him. But Eddy tells her sadly that she has no real choice. She has to go back to her husband. Caroline returns and tries to tolerate her husband and her life at home.

Without my Cloak, by Kate O'Brien

I hope to write a blog about Without my Cloak, the first novel of Kate O'Brien. It won a prize - the Hawthorden Prize- and launched her on a fiction writing career. It is based loosely on her own family history. In the later Victorian era, a small minority of Catholics began to rise in the world, thanks to the removal of restrictions on Catholics and the fall in population after the Famine. There were a lot less people in Ireland and the opportunities for Catholics to rise in the world increased. They were running successful businesses and forming a new Catholic middle class, which rivalled the Protestant landed class which was beginning to lose its status. Kate's grandfather had been evicted from his home and it worked out well for him, as he moved to Limerick city and set up a sucessful business. By the time Kate was growing up, the family were less prosperous but they were middle class and still doing reasonably well. Without my Cloak is a history of the Considine family who sell fodder for horses... Their start in business was initiated by Antony Considine who stole a horse and escaped from his country home to Mellick (O'Briens name for Limerick) and founded a business. His son, "Honest John" Considine, became very well to do and had a large family. His sons became successful, one a priest, another a doctor.. and his son Anthony took over running the business. Honest John died and Anthony who now had a sizable family, also lost his young wife Molly. M/F

Josephine Tey II

Her most prominent detective character is Alan Grant, who appears in 6 novels. She also wrote a mystery called the Franchise Affair, which is based on an eighteenth century mystery case set in modern times. One of her best known novels is Daughter of Time which is an odd mystery where Grant is confined to a hospital bed after a bad fall. Bored, he looks at some pictures brought in by a friend, post cards of portaits in the National Gallery. He is taken with the picture of Richard III, and starts to read up about him, and to investigate the allegation that Richard killed his 2 nephews. It is a novel that puts me off, as Grant decides that the picture shows a good man and that therefore he could not have done the murders of the 2 princes. He gets friends to help him by looking up documents and finding books for him and he finally comes to the conclusion that Richard is not guilty and that the murders were done by Henry VII. I feel that Tey is refusing to read any evidence that the boys were probably murdered by Richard. Tey led a quiet life, in Scotland, mostly concentrating on her writing. She became ill and became even more private, not wanting to see her friends when she was seriously ill. She was looked after by her sister and died in 1952, aged only 55. Her last novel was published posthumously. She is an interesting person even though she's not my favourite mystery novelist.

Josephine Tey Part I

Josephine Tey's real name was Elizabeth Mackintosh, and she was born in Scotland in 1896, her father Colin Mackintosh had a fruiterer business and her mother was a housewife. She did not go to University, as it was rare for girls in those days, but she instead went to a Physical Training college to become a PT teacher. She spent some years working in different schools as PT instructor and enjoyed her work. In 1914, she also did some VAD work when on holiday to "do her bit" for the war effort. She worked in England and also in Scotland. In 1923, she returned to Scotland to care for her mother who was ill and when her mother died, she stayed on to keep house for her father. She had been injured in a gym accident before she settled to housekeeping, and decided to try her hand at writing. Her first novel was about a Scottish regiment and then she wrote a mystery novel where she created her best known detective Alan Grant who is a police officer. She didn't write many novels with Grant as the lead character but she got good reviews. However her ambition was to write a play and she wrote one called Richard of Bordeaux under the pen name Gordon Daviot. It did well in the West End and she became friends with John Gielgud. She wrote several plays but they did not do that well and she went on writing novels. M/F

Thomas Hardy V

Sue becomes very depressed after the deaths of her children, and begins to get religious scruples. She believes that the children died to punish her for her sins in getting a divorce and living with Jude. She and he separate and to punish herself further, she returns to Philottson and lives with him as his wife though she hates it. Jude returns to Arabella, and she does not care much for him. He goes to get a glimpse of Sue on a cold winter day and becomes ill and dies. Arabella plans to marry a new man. Jude's life has ended in tragedy. The novel is depressing and confusing, with characters changing their minds all the time and moving in and out of marriages. Hardy's vision of life was sad and tragic.... In most of his serious novels, the hero or heroine comes to a sad end...and the more selfish characters do well. Tess of the D'urbervilles has the same kind of chopping and changing of the attitudes of the characters - Tess comes across as very stupid- and she ends on the gallows. Jude got a lot of criticism for the anti religous tone and the sexual activities of the characters... and Emma Hardy really hated it. She was afraid that the novel would damage Hardy's reputation and that it might lead to gossip about her marriage to him. By then Hardy was involved with Florence Dugdale who acted as his secretary, and they were having an affair. Emma became more angry and reclusive and her health declined and she died suddenly. Hardy planned to marry Florence, but he was feeling guilty about Emma. He gave up writing novels and concentrated on poetry, and some of his new poems were love poems to Emma, which upset Florence. They were getting married and now her new husband was writing love poems about his dead wife, whom he had neglected and disliked during their marriage.

Thomas Hardy IV

Arabella leaves Jude and goes to Australia with another man, whom she marries bigamously. Jude persuades Sue to leave her husband and come to him. Their relationship is at first sexless because Sue does not like sex, and dislikes it all the more with her husband. Arabella then comes back to England and brings her son by Jude with her. She and Jude get a divorce, but she leaves the child with him...Sue gets a divorce from Phillotson, and she and Jude begin to have a sexual life. They have 2 children but she is reluctant to marry him. She has radical ideas and is less religious than Jude. But the fact that they are not married is a problem... they lead a nomadic life moving from job to job, and not having much money, and when their unmarried status is discovered Jude usually loses his job. Sue is stressed out by this, looking after her 2 children and "Father time" as they call Jude's son by Arabella... Then after Jude has lost another job, they wake up one morning to find that Jude's son has been brooding over their problems and lack of money, and he has killed his 2 siblings and himself. Sue, who is pregnant again, is horrified and has a miscarriage.

Thomas Hardy III

Im not really a big fan of Hardy's novels, though I have read most of them. They are more like fairy stories than realistic novels. Most of his characters are simple people, and not that easy to identify with.. they seem absurdly naive. His last novel, Jude the Obscure, is about a young man who works as a mason. He is clever and would like to go to Oxford, but he is too poor to think of this. He then is seduced by a coarse and earthy girl, Arabella, who tells him she is pregnant, and he ends up marrying her. They have a son. He is also involved with one of his cousins, Sue Fawley, who like him has ambitions to learn and get on in the world. He is fond of her, but he's tied to Arabella. Sue goes to a teacher training college..and Jude goes on working as a manual worker. Sue is an odd wilful girl who seems to repeatedly do things that turn out badly for herself. Her family believe that marriage does not suit their temperaments and that their marriages usually turn out badly. She marries a school teacher, Phillotson whom she finds repugnant sexually...though she has come to love Jude.

Thomas Hardy II

Hardy was close to his mother, who was rather domineering, and to his sisters and he courted several girls during his youth. He then married Emma Gifford, a girl of a higher class. Her father was a solicitor and she had an uncle who was an archdeacon. However her father retired early and the family were not so well off as they had been and Emma and her sister had to go out as governesses. Hardy was still working as an architect, and was doing a report on a parish church, when he met Emma, who had clerical connexions. She could see his talent, and encouraged him to write. However she was also very class conscious and soon developed the idea that he was of much lower class than her, and that she was his superior. This caused a rift in their marriage. She began to put him down in front of people and she and he grew apart. People found her odd and difficult to get on with and began to think of her as a little mad. His novels were about class differences and tension between the sexes. He began to flirt with other women, and Emma became more reclusive.

Thomas Hardy

I hope to write a blog about Thomas Hardy soon. He was a poet and novelist, born in 1840 in Dorset and coming from a relatively humble background. His father was a builder and he himself trained as an architecht. He wrote about the poor people of his native land. He called the region of Dorset Wessex and wrote about farmers, builders, labourers, milkmaids and the like. He was brought up in the Church of England but as he grew up, he lost his religious faith. He wrote many novels, but as he grew older he began to criticise society, and the church and the Victorian sexual mores.The public and critics were shocked by his increasingly scandalous writing, as they saw it, and after the publication of his last Novel Jude the Obscure, he gave up novels and concentrated on writing poetry. More will follow

Agnes Grey II

Agnes finds Matilda and Rosalie silly and selfish, and she starts to visit the poor in the village. She is friendly with one old lady, Nancy, who is losing her sight and wants someone to read the bible to her. THe local clergyman is haughty and insensitive, but there is a new curate Edward Weston, who is kinder. Agnes begins to see him around the village and likes him. Rosalie is attracted to him and tries to pretend to be nicer than she really is, to win his interest. However she wants to marry a rich gentleman. Agnes talks to Mr Weston and they build up a friendship. Rosalie continues to flirt with him but is looking for a suitable husband in between flirtations. Agnes is hurt that her one friend is being drawn away from her...Then she has a letter from her sister Mary to say that their father is very ill. She leaves and hurries home but her father dies before she gets there. She feels there is nothing to go back for, as Mr Weston has not made any advances towards her, and she dislikes the Murray family. After Mr Grey's death, she and her mother set up a small school and make a modest living that way. Later, she gets an invitation from Rosalie Murray who is now married to a baronet, Sir Thomas Ashby. She goes reluctantly and finds that Rosalie is depressed and wants someone to sympathise with her. She has grown to hate her husband, who is controlling and selfish and who resents her flirting with other men. She has a baby daughter but is not maternal. Agnes tries to cheer her but there is not much she can do for Rosalie-. She leaves Ashby Park and goes home and soon afterwards she finds that Mr Weston is now working in the next parish. She meets him at the seashore and they talk and renew their friendship. Mrs Grey meets him and likes him and they plan to marry. They have a happy life and produce three children. Agnes is based on the young naieve Anne, and Mr Weston on Willie Weightman... Anne gives herself a happy ending...but the novel is slight. Anne had some talent as a writer but she had not developed very much by the time of her early death. Agnes Grey has not much plot, and like Charlotte, Anne tended to have a biased view of the upper classes. Her upper class characters are not such caricatures as Charlotte's Blanche Ingram.. but her strict morality limited her. Charlotte did not really approve of Tenant, believing that the subject matter was sordid and that Anne should not have written it. Again Anne's limitations show up. Gilbert is a clumsy character, like many Bronte men he has a violent streak which does not fit in with his portayal as a respectable gentleman farmer. He loses his temper unreasonably with Frederick Lawrence and attacks him. Like her sisters Anne did not know many men, and apart from Edward Weston, she tended to portray them as very flawed and often violent. Huntingdon and his friends are alcoholics and womanisers and gamblers and fight among themselves. Gilbert is ready to fight with Frederick Lawrence and is jealous and angry at Helen because she refuses his advances. However she does have a talent, even if her strictness makes the novels hard going and she might have improved with maturity.

Agnes Grey By Anne Bronte I

This is the first novel published by Anne Bronte, which is somewhat autobiographical. It is based on her life as a governess. Agnes is the daughter of a clergyman, her mother is from a well to do family but married for love and the family end up in debt. Mr Grey is not very good at investing money. Agnes is naive and childlike, and wants to help her father,mother and sister, telling them that she can go out as a governess. She has a rather foolish idea that she will love the job, and that childen are sweet little things. She gets a job with the Bloomfield family and finds it is nothing like she imagined. The children are spoiled and unmanageable. She is not allowed to discipline them but is blamed for all their flaws. Tom the son is a brattish cruel boy who loves torturing animals and birds and she tries to stop him. She kills a nest of birds to stop him form hurting them... and before long, she is dismissed. She gets another job with a richer family, the Murrays. The children are older and not quite so unteachable but Agnes is ignored by the family to a large extent. Rosalie, the elder daughter is a flirt, and Matilda is a rough tomboy. She does not like them much but it is a degree better than her last job.

Jane Eyre V

Jane misses Rochester but she has now got a modest fortune and a home. However St John keeps trying to persuade her to marry him, and go to India as a missionary's wife. He does not love her, he is in love with a young woman who is well born but not suitable for the missions and he is so high minded that he gives up all hope of his love to take up a missionary post. Jane refuses. She wont marry a man she does not love. She wonders if she could go as his companion and sister, rather than his wife, but that does not seem possible. Then she hears Rochester's voice calling to her. She believes that he is trying to contact her. She decides to go back to Thornfield and talk to him. When she gets there, she finds that the house has been burned down and Rochester was burned and seriously injured in the fire. He had retired his housekeeper and sent Adele away to school, and then his wife burned the house. He tried to rescue her and was injured and blinded. Jane finds that Rochester is living in a smaller house he owns, and that he's a recluse. She goes to see him and tells him that she has come back. They talk and he's intrigued to find that she has now inherited a fortune and is a woman of substance while he has lost his house and is a semi invalid. He is at first reluctant to marry her when he is helpless but they agree to get married. Jane suggests that Adele be transferred to a less strict school. The couple get married and settle in the smaller house, and Rochester's eyes improve so that he can see a bit. He and Jane have a son, and are a happy couple.

Jane Eyre IV

Jane has very little money but she takes her things and rides the stage coach as far as she can, but then has her belongings stolen. In desperation she sleeps on the moor. She is taken in by a family who live near where she collapsed... and they are kind to her. The family are not very rich but they are gentlefolk and they are willing to look after her. There are 2 sisters, Mary and Diana Rivers and their brother St John, who is a clergyman who wants to become a missionary. He is a rather cold serious man, who is not friendly or warm hearted. His sisters grow fond of Jane and she likes them. St John finds her a job at the village school which means she has a home and a small income. After a little while, Jane tells the Riverses her real name, and they discover that they are cousins. Her uncle Mr Eyre is also their uncle. Then Mr Eyre dies and leaves Jane his fortune, which leaves her quite well off. She feels concerned that her cousins didn't inherit anything from the uncle and she divides up her bequest among the family.

Jane Eyre III

Jane's cousin, Mrs Reed is very ill and asks her to visit and Jane does so. Mrs Reed is dying and tells her that she did her a wrong. Some years ago, Jane's uncle Mr Eyre wrote to her to ask her to come and live with him, and Mrs Reed, hating Jane, wrote back to him to tell him that Jane had died at school. Jane forgives her cousin and when she dies she attends the funeral. Rochester then tells Jane that he was just joking about marrying Blanche, and that he has no intention of doing so. He asks her to marry him. She agrees and they make plans for a very quiet wedding. Mrs Fairfax seems uneasy about the marriage. Rochester has told Jane about his past life, how he spent a lot of time travelling and took mistresses.. the last one was Celine Varens, Adele's mother. Celine left him for another man and left Adele to his care, but he does not really believe Adele is his daughter but he has taken care of her. Jane writes to her long lost uncle to tell him she's being married. A short time before the wedding, someone breaks into her bedroom and tears her veil in half. She is unnerved, but Rochester tells her it is one of the servants, Grace Poole, who drinks. On the day of the wedding, the couple are in the church when someone stands up to say that there is an impediment to the marriage. It is Mr Mason, the man who was attacked at Thornfield... It turns out that he was visiting Thornfield as his sister is married to Rochester and she is confined to the attic of the house because she has become mad. When Mason went to see her, she had one of her maniacal fits and attacked him violently. Rochester tells Jane that he married Bertha Mason, during a trip to the West Indies, and then found that she was immoral and becoming insane. He had to keep her confined and she was looked after by Grace Poole, but Grace sometimes gets drunk and Bertha can escape to cause chaos in the house. Mr Mason is a friend of Jane's uncle Eyre and he learned from Eyre that Jane was marrying Rochester. He hurried to stop the wedding. Rochester tries to persuade Jane to go abroad with him where she can live as his wife, though they cannot marry. She refuses, as she is a strict Christian. She decides she must leave immediately to avoid temptation.

Jane Eyre II

Jane finds the house party stressful, and its not a good part of the book. Charlotte knew little of high society and her upper class characters are pretty exaggerated and badly drawn. They are all snobbish and rude and they make a fuss of Adele but make it clear that they dont like governesses and rate them as no higher than servants. Rochester pays a lot of attention to a young lady, Blanche Ingram, and seems to indicate that he is thinking of marrying her. However he talks to Jane in a friendly way at times and she begins to fall in love with him. She finds Blanche very haughty and unlikable. There are other things going on in the house which unnerve her. She hears strange noises at night, and another night, Rochester calls her, very late, to help him with a man who has been apparently injured by some kind of attack. Jane asks no questions but looks after the man till a doctor can be called. Rochester is pleased with her. The man leaves Thornfield and no more is heard of him. Rochester goes on hinting that he's going to marry Blanche and Jane gets angry. She tells him that if he marries Blanche she will leave and seek another post.

Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre is Charlotte's most famous novel, which was a runaway success for her. It is the story of an orphaned child, who has been looked after by a relative, Mrs Reed. Jane does not like Mrs Reed who is not kind to her and her cousins, John, Eliza and Georgiana, are even more unpleasant. John bullies her and is rough with her, but Jane fights back. She is not a meek or gentle child. Mrs Reed decides to send her away to school, and she is sent to a school called Lowood. It is a harsh place. She makes friends with a quiet shy saintly child, Helen Burns. Illness runs through the school because the girls are so badly fed and treated, and Helen dies. Jane continues to stand up for herself and things do improve. A nicer teacher becomes headmistress and Jane stays there for several years, rising to becoming a teacher herself. When she is 18, she decides to leave and seek a post as governess. She gets a job at a Yorkshire house, called Thornfield, and her charge is a small French child called Adele. The housekeeper Mrs Fairfax is kindly, though strict, and Jane finds Adele silly and vain (she attributes this to her being half French) but not a difficult pupil. She does not meet her employer at first, as he travels a lot. Then one day she is out walking and meets a rather ugly man who has had a fall from his horse. She helps him and he is gruff but not ungrateful. She finds that he is her employer, Mr Rochester. He has come back to his estate and tells Mrs Fairfax that he will be holding a house party there soon. The housekeeper finds the place lonely, so she is not displeased. Jane is intrigued by the man, who seems rude and rough in his manner but he asks her to bring Adele in to meet his guests.

Tenant of Wildfell Hall Part III

Gilbert is unhappy and worried that there is gossip about Helen... but then she gets news that her husband is very ill. In spite of her anger towards him, she feels it is her duty to go and see him. He has been drinking very heavily and his health is seriously damaged. He was injured in a fall from a horse, and now, he is dying of gangrene. He is frightened of death but Helen wants him to repent. She tries to be kind to him, but he is very ill and afraid. He dies, and she inherits Grassdale Manor on behalf of her son. The estate is in poor shape because Arthur was extravagant and a bad landlord, but Helen's uncle dies soon afterwards and leaves her a fortune. Gilbert visits, and hears that there is a wedding in the local church. He is upset that Helen is now pretty well off and he is only a gentleman farmer. He goes to the church, expecting to find Helen is getting married, but finds instead that her brother is marrying Esther Hargreave, the sister of Millicent who has been a long term friend of Helens. He speaks to Helen and finds that she still loves him, and they plan to marry. Some of Huntingdon's friends reform, shocked by his horrible death. Millicent's husband gives up drinking and Lord Lowborough gets a divorce from his wife and she is left badly off. He gives up drinking and opium and reforms, and he marries a plain middle aged woman who makes him happy. Helen and Gilbert are also a happy couple and young Arthur grows up under their care.

Tenant of Wildfell Hall Part II

Gilbert reads the diaries, and finds that Helen was married to Arthur Huntingdon, a handsome young man who owns Grassdale Manor. She was young and romantic and in love.. and they were happy at first. But she began to find him selfish and controlling. He was jealous of their son when he was born and Helen grew to dislike his friends, who were nearly all heavy drinkers and gamblers and she found Arthur's drinking very hard to take. She at first thought she could reform him but things got worse. She realised that Arthur was having an affair with his friend's wife Lady Lowborough, and was upset. Another of his friends tried to seduce her but she snubbed him. She grew increasingly unhappy as Arthur began to teach little Arthur to drink and swear and she found that he was having an affair with a young woman who had been engaged as the child's governess. Helen decides to leave him, which she knows will be difficult and scandalous but she is determined. She has a brother whom she did not live with as a child but who is willing to help her, and he is Frederick Laurence, so that's why he visits her occasionally. Lawrence offers her a home at Wildfell Hall, though the house is neglected and she has only one regular servant, her maid Rachel. Gilbert realises why Helen is so cool with him. She has been hurt, and she is not a free woman so she cannot receive his courtship. He tries to persuade her that she owes nothing to her husband.

Tenant of Wildfell Hall I

This is Anne's second and last novel. It is set in Yorkshire, and it starts with a letter from Gilbert Markham, a gentleman farmer, to his brother in law. He is writing to tell his friend about how he, Gilbert, came to marry his wife. Its a rather clumsy entry to the story, but it works. Gilbert has a prosperous farm, though he sometimes longs for a more exciting life. A few years earlier, a new neighbour came to live at Wildfell Hall, a big house nearby which had not been used for some years. Gilbert is intrigued by the new tenant, an attractive woman who has a son, Arthur. The neighbours find her strange as she does not want to socialise much. She tells them that she has to earn a living and she is a painter so she does not have time for parties. She has few servants and seems rather cold and unfriendly. Mrs Markham, Gilbert's mother does not take to her, she thinks that Mrs Graham is too fussy about her son. She disapproves of drinking, and gives the little boy alcohol mixed with emetic, as a medicine so he dislikes the taste of it. Gilbert is a rather clumsy young man, who flirts with one of the local girls but finds himself being drawn to Helen Graham. But he is not much good at paying court. He begins to be suspicious of Helen, that she has a man visiting her privately. He meets Frederick Lawrence, one of the neighbours on the road to Wildfell Hall and over reacts wildly, attacking the man. Helen is upset and gives him her diaries to read so she can explain that there is nothing wrong in her relationship with Lawrence.

The Professor II

William's employer is kind to him and he gets friendly with Mademoiselle Reuter who runs a girls' school. He is attracted by her but then realises that she is not sincere. He overhears her and M Pelet talking about their oncoming marriage and cools on her. He is suspicious of women, especially Catholic ones. Mlle Reuter continues to try to draw him in, and asks him to teach one of her junior teachers, Frances Henri, who is half Swiss and half English, and she wants to learn better English. William likes her, she is not a Belgian Catholic, and he begins to fall in love with her. But Mlle Reuter is jealous of their friendship, and dismisses Frances, refusing to let William know her new address. He is angry and realises that Mlle Reuter has become emotionally drawn to him, in spite of M Pelet. He leaves his job, and searches for Frances. When he finds her, he manages to find a new job at a college and they get married. After a time they return to England and set up their own school. They have a son, and William is a rather strict father to the boy. But they are happy. The story is rather lacking in action, and the awkward William is nothing like M Heger. He is clumsy and insensitive and bigoted. Charlotte revisited the Heger relationship and her time in Brussells when she wrote Vilette which is a much better novel

The Professor

This was Charlotte's first proper novel, which she tried to get published but it continually failed. She and her sisters also produced a book of their poetry but while that was published it failed dramatically. It got a few reviews but only sold 2 copies. Finally Charlotte, while she was nursing her father after his cataract operation, started to write Jane Eyre, and when she sent that to a publisher, George Smith, his reader was fascinated by the novel and found it impossible to put down. It was published, and was a roaring success. But the Professor never attracted much attention. It did not get published until some years after Charlotte's death, after being edited by her widower, Arthur Nicholls. It is based on her time in Brussels and is written from the point of view of the hero, William Crimsworth. William is an Englishman whose brother invites him to take a job in his business, starting as a clerk. William dislikes the work and he can't stand his brother's wife, so he decides to try his luck abroad and to become a teacher. He has a Yorkshire friend, Yorke Hunsden, who helps him to get a job in Brussels in a boys' school.

Shirley II

Shirley is not one of Charlotte's better novels. She researched the history of the Luddite riots in Yorkshire but social comment was not her forte. There is a touch of feminism, in that Shirley and Caroline both discuss careers for women.. but what Caroline really wants to do is to get married. She is depressed when Robert seems to be courting Shirley and Shirley in spite of her friendship with Caroline, seems willing to entertain Robert's addresses. However we learn that Shirley is in love with someone else, who only appears in the later part of the book. Louis, Robert's brother, is a tutor and Shirley loves him in spite of his low status. They get married, Robert's mill becomes successful again and he marries Caroline. The book is rather clumsy, with awkwardly comic portraits of the local curates, who are based on curates that Charlotte knew in Haworth. Shirley is said to be based on Emily Bronte.. but she is not really like her. However it was courageous of her to continue writing the book when she had suffered the awful losses of her two sisters and her brother.

Bad Quarto V

She perceives now what the connexion is between John Tallentire's death fall and Susan Inchman. She also works out that David, the druggie boy that she brought into her college room, upsetting her room mate, is her brother, who like her was brought up in care because of his mother's imprisonment and her suicide. Imogen wonders if Susan might be hiding out on a boat in the area, she's recently discovered that there are several house boats on the canal where people live who like the water or who can't afford a house in Cambridge. She goes investigating but when she returns home she finds Fran waiting desperately to tell her that Martin Mottle has been injured in a fracas at the college, shots were fired and he is in hospital. Imogen rushes there and finds that David Inchman is also in hospital. Martin Mottle has been stabbed and is badly injured but he will live. He tells her that he has been used to carry a gun for protection and in the fight with David he shot at him. David is also badly injured. Susan turns up then to see her brother and she tells Imogen that she caused young Tallentire's death. She was waiting around near VG's room for a tutorial and John rushed past her to go and do his jumping from building to building. She recognised him, and blamed him for being the son of the man who sent her mother to prison... and she loosens the rope knot. David breaks in and says that it wasn't Susan, it was him. Imogen thinks that it is going to be hard to prove who did it, if they both stick to their stories. But she thinks that its more likely that Susan did it. She is stronger than her brother, she has a hot angry temper, and she is much more likely to have managed to loosen a knot than David. She doesn't know what to do. If Susan killed Tallentire, its going to be hard to prove. Duncan Tallentire has said that he thinks no good would come of pursuing a case against whoever killed his son, and he feels guilty because he is no longer sure that his opinion about shaken baby syndrome is correct. Martin Mottle realises that Duncan was probably right. He agrees to try to minimise David's punishment. The two young men go to court and both are given a suspended sentence. Duncan Tallentire pays for David to have drug rehabiliation. Imogen tells Susan that she thinks she killed John, and that while there was a motive, and she has been unhappy and ill treated she is clearly a bit of a loose cannon and she worries about her losing her temper again... she suggests counselling. Susan tells her she is going to drop out of Cambridge and she's going to study law and try and help kids who end up in care. Imogen says that while the John Tallentire case is closed, it could be reopened if necessary and she would probably go down for it, rather than David. Susan looks shocked and agrees reluctantly to go for counselling. She takes David to the drug clinic, and Imogen hopes she will find some purpose in leaving Cambridge and studying law. She herself has been seeing an older man lately, an elderly don who is ill and she nursed him. She had grown very fond of him, and then he dies, leaving her with another broken relationship. But she does her best to recover from her depression. She is glad that the mystery of Tallentire's death has finally been solved.

Shirley - Charlotte Bronte

This novel was written by Charlotte after Jane Eyre's great success. She started it before her sisters and Brother all died, and completed it some months later having been through the appalling multiple bereavement. It is set in Yorkshire during the Napoleonic Wars. Shirley Keeldar, the heroine, is a wealthy heiress who has a valuable estate. She is mannish, likes the outdoors and is considered almost scandalous at times. She is friendly with Robert Moore who has a mill on her estate, and she becomes friendly with a girl of her own age, Caroline Helstone, who is the local clergyman's niece. Robert's business is in trouble, because of the war with Napoleon and he almost loses it. He thinks of marrying Shirley just for her money but she is not interested. Caroline however is in love with him and longs for him to notice her. Shirley feels sorry for the workers but she is a property holder and does not sympathise with them breaking machinery or rebelling against the mill owners. Caroline is depressed that her life is so limited, and that as a woman there's no prospect of her having a job to occupy her mind. M/F

Bad Quarto IV

Imogen is taken aback by the dumb show and the implication that a lecturer however tiresome Venton Gimps is, could have killed a student. However Mottle tells her and her friends from the drama group that he knew John Tallentire from when he was a child and he went climbing with him for years, and trusted him absolutely as a climber. He further demonstrates to her that if Tallentire had tied a knot that slipped a bit, (which he would not do) it still would not result in his falling right into the street and dying. He would have bounced off the walls in the narrow street and just been a bit injured. Mottle is angry about John's death and feels that there is a conspiracy to hide what happened, and that is because it might have been deliberate murder by one of the academics. Imogen feels she has to agree with him, that young Tallentire's fall was caused by someone else. However she meets Duncan Tallentire, his father, an eminent scientist who has come to Cambridge to take up a part time post. He tells her angrily that Mottle has an obsession about the fall, and that he knows what happened to his son, that he was killed but that no good can come of pursuing an investigation. She is startled. Then Susan disappears from college. Some of the staff think that she is just not up to Cambridge standards, and that she knew she didn't fit in there and wasn't clever enough, and that she just left. Imogen likes the girl, so she agrees to go and search for her - starting with a visit to Mary Ollery, her adoptive mother. Mary tells Imogen that most kids in care are damaged by their experiences, and relatively few of them ever manage to get out of the trap they are in, of being poor, lacking social skills and education. Imogen looks up Inchman, her surname, on the net, and finds that there was a woman Valerie Inchman who was jailed for killing her children some years ago.. and then she finds that Susan is Valerie's daughter. Valerie is now dead. Imogen finds out that Duncan Tallentire is often called as an expert witness for scientific issues in court cases, and that there is controversy about how accurate expert witnesses are. There were some cases of mothers being accused of shaking or battering their babies and it is not at all clear if the expert testimony that more than 2 injured children in a family means that the injury is non accidental.

Bad Quarto III

Imogen meets Susan as she is Samantha's room mate.. and can see that the girl while clever is not really happy in Cambridge. Frances tells her that Martin Mottle, who is the student who has offered the Drama society money to perform Hamlet, is still acting very badly, and the group are worried that the performance will damage their reputation. On the night of the play, Mottle insists that 2 friends of his should be in the gallery. The performance does not go too badly; his acting seems to suit the shorter blunter version of Hamlet.. but at the point where there should be a dumb show, Mottle's friends stage a replication of the accident that killed the young climber John Tallentire... with a rope and a window frame, and a student dressed like one of the more eccentric lecturers, Venton Gimps, appears. The real Venton Gimps has a room near to the one where Tallentire fell, and he likes to air controversial opinions and dress extravagantly so he is not much liked. He is appalled by this implication that he had some part in the death of young Tallentire and storms out, telling everyone that he will call his lawyer.

Bad Quarto part II

Frances tells Imogen that the student who insists on playing Hamlet is a terrible actor, but they are hoping that the one performance wont ruin their reputation as actors and that the money will solve all their problems. Imogen finds herself reading up on theories about Shakespeare, and is surprised to find that nowadays a lot of critics dislike his plays for being Imperialist, conservative, anti feminist etc. She gets a visit from Samantha, a literature student who is suffering from anxiety about her work and doing her exams. Samantha also complains that Susan, her current room mate, is a difficult girl and adds to her worries. Susan is from a poor background and she got into Cambridge via a scheme to help young people who missed out on education at school level but are bright. She is clever enough but she has a hot temper and a chip on her shoulder about her being poor and ill educated and is always complaining. She also brings in a young male friend who is dirty and seems to be taking drugs. Imogen finds that Susan was brought up largely in care, and that her foster mother adopted her when she got a bit older, to try and give her some stability. Drama happens when Samantha is found unconscious in her room and it seems like she's taken an overdose. Imogen gets her to hospital, but she is suspicious about the overdose. She thinks that Samantha didn't intend to kill herself, she just wanted to make herself ill and if she was ill at the time of her exam, she might be given a pass because of illness.

Bad Quarto an Imogen Quy Novel

This is I think the last novel written by Jill Paton Walsh about Imogen Quy. She was then employed by the Sayers estate to write continuations of the Lord Peter novels and concentrated on that. However I have never felt that these were very good and found them hard to read. The Bad Quarto refers to a version of Hamlet which has been around for centuries; it is a shorter less elaborate version of the play, and is occasionally performed. At the beginning of the novel, we learn of a tragic accident, where Imogen was called when a young student fell while jumping from building to building in the college, a dangerous hobby pursued by some students who like mountaineering. The student was killed and Imogen was upset but it was seen as an accident and measures were taken to make this leaping hobby more difficult to pursue. Soon afterwards Imogen goes to a meeting of the college drama society, as her lodger Frances Bullion is a member. They need someone to take minutes and she offers to help. At the meeting, the group discuss a major problem... They had a fire in their rehearsal room probably caused by carelessness by the students, and the room was damaged and the part time caretaker was hurt and is still unwell from smoke inhalation. They had let their insurance lapse through a foolish member of the group forgetting.. the member has now left. So they are liable for the damage and worry that Fred the caretaker might sue them though he is slowly getting better. They dont want to renege on their duty of care but the group is seriously in debt. However they are offered a chance to earn a large sum of money. Another student whose father is rich, proposes that they do a one off performance of the Bad Quarto, with him playing lead, and he will pay them a lot of money. It seems odd but they feel that they need to get the money somehow so they decide to accept the offer. M/F

Silver Wedding V

Deirdre's mother Eileen worries about her daughter as well, telling her that she thinks she failed her. She allowed Deirdre to live a superficial life, trying hard to keep up with the Joneses, and never finding reality. Deirdre had been a bright student, but she gave up studying and the idea of working when she got married. She dedicated herself to trying to make out that Desmond was doing as well as Frank Quigley. She tells her mother that at home her parents seemed obsessed with social standing and getting on, and that she felt inferior to her sister who married a rich man. Eileen says that while Sophie, Maureen's mother and some of their friends were indeed obsessed by social ranking and appearances, she honestly just wished for her children to be happy. And now she fears that Deirdre is so fixated on superficial things that she will never learn to be happy. Deirdre continues to fuss about the whole issue of the wedding anniversary and the day finally arrives. Frank Quigley comes and so does Maureen. He talks to Helen and she seems calmer and more rational; she has given up the idea of being a nun.. He says that he knows of a woman who has a small child. She is a career woman, and needs someone to take care of him, and would she like the job? Helen gets on well with children and she says it might be easier than what she had been trying to do so she agrees to take it on for a while. Des is occupied with his new work as Mr Patel's partner, and does his best to tolerate Deirdre's fixation on the party. He is happy with the new shop, but it does not look as if his marriage will ever be a very close one. He knows that he has disappointed his wife, by the fact that they had to get married and then lost their baby who was the reason for the marriage.. and that his lack of success in big business made her unhappy. At the party, Fr Jim, who is still depressed about his nephew's misbehaviour, thinks that Desmond and Deirdre are still not really happy- they seem to him to be playing at being husband and wife.. As a priest, he should be glad that the marriage has lasted 25 years but it still does not seem real to him. But the party goes fairly well. Frank tells everyone that he and his wife Renata are going to adopt a child, from South America. Brigid the nun has helped him arrange it. So he has found a new centre for his marriage. Maureen is happier too because she has found her father, now a widower, and is thinking of opening a shop in the UK near where he lives. Anna who broke up with her boyfriend a few months ago, has a new admirer and is happy. Brendan is glad that he made the effort to come back for his parents but he prefers Ireland. Helen hopes her new job will work out and Eileen hopes that her daughter will be happy now that she has celebrated 25 years of marriage, but is glad to be with her new beau.

Silver Wedding Part IV

Mr Patel who runs the little shop near the station in Desmonds suburb is relieved when Des offers to take over running the business while he is recovering from his injuries. Des finds that he enjoys being involved in a small hands on business much more than having a vague managerial position in a big firm. He and Mr Patel talk a lot and finally he decides to ask for redundancy and buy into the Patel business. Deirdre is not at all happy. She is still focussed on her preparations for the Silver Wedding, still worrying that people wont admire their party giving abilities and see how well she and her family have done. And she very much dislikes Desmond giving up being a manager to run a corner shop. Anna who is the helpful one in the family tries to soothe her and tell her that it doesn't matter that Brendan works on a farm, and that Helen seems to have no direction in her life. Brendan agrees to come back to London for the anniversary party, though he has always hated having to pretend that the family is doing much better than they really are. Deirdre tries to make the best of things, but she's not happy with all the changes in her family's life. Fr Jim had wondered when she told him she wanted to get married quickly, that she might be pregnant, and she denied it. But it turns out that she was pregnant, and went through a fairly speedy marriage, but she lost the baby early in the pregnancy, and her next child Anna was born a respectable time after the wedding. But Deirdre will never admit to this, to being less than perfect.

Doris Langley Moore Born 1902.

Doris was a writer and historian, who was passionately interested in fashion and items like furniture. She was born in Lancashire but was educated in South Africa; her father was a newspaper editor. She went to university and then in the 1920s she began to write books. She married and had a daughter. She had an interest also in art and theatre, and was the founder of a Fashion Museum in Bath. She also wrote several biographies, she was something of an authority on Byron and wrote biographies of him and his daughter. She also produced several novels, including one called Not At Home, which Ive just read. It is set in London just after the war, and is a wry comedy about Miss Farren, a middle aged woman who is not very well off and has a house which she is renting. She is trying to reduce expenses and decides to let some rooms in the house. There is a terrible shortage of housing in England because of the war damage and people are desperate to find any place. She settles on a younger married woman who is married to an American journalist who is in the Forces. The lady has 2 children who are in the US, and tells Miss Farren that she will be a very careful tenant and no trouble at all.. However, it doesn't work out as she had hoped. Mrs Banks the new tenant is a silly childish woman who is both selfish and dishonest. She moves in and continually has guests staying and she creates a lot of work for Miss Farren's servant. She then cajoles her friends into helping out with the housework, to the point that she drives some of them away. She breaks things and lies about it, and is reluctant to pay for damages. Her husband comes to stay on leave and he is a sensible kind man who gets on well with Miss Farren. She can't understand how he tolerates his wife's silly selfish personality.

Silver Wedding Part III

Helen, Desmonds second daughter is a difficult girl. She is living in a convent which is just an inner city house with women who mostly find her hard to make sense of. They think she's running away from ordinary life and she has a knack of causing problems and getting things wrong. She is it turns out running away from an unhappy sexual experience. While she was still at school, Desmond lost his job in Frank's firm, and Helen clumsy as always tries to find a way of getting it back for him. She flirts with Frank and makes out that she's older and more experienced than she really is. He seduces her, and she freaks out. He realises that she is not very stable and that she is young and he should never have touched her. He gives Des his job back and avoids the family as much as he can, and when Helen is a bit older, she goes to try to find a place in the convent. In the months leading up to the Silver Wedding, Helen meets Renata, Frank's wife, who wants to adopt a child. She visits the convent and gets talking to Helen and again Helen makes a crazy attempt to do some good. A girl whom the nuns visit has a baby, in her bathroom and is so out of her mind on drugs that she doesn't really know what happened. Helen takes the baby and calls an ambulance for her, telling the ambulance people that she did not see a baby. Then she brings the newborn child to Renata who is horrified. A major fuss erupts and the baby is given to a foster carer and Helen realises that she has messed up again. Frank talks to Brigid, one of the older nuns who tells him that she might be able to help him find a child for adoption who would be legally theirs. The nuns feel that this episode is really the last straw and proves that Helen is not suitable for the religious life... so they tell her that after the Silver Wedding she has to make up her mind to leave and find her own path in the world. We also learn about the life of Fr James, the priest who performed the wedding ceremony. He lives in Ireland and is happy with his life as a priest, and he has always had his doubts about Desmond and Deirdre as a couple. He felt that they were putting up a front of being a loving happy couple because that is all they can do... they particularly Deirdre, are facade people. In his personal life, he has had his own troubles. He has a sister who married late in life and had one son. Gregory was a charming boy and studied law, then moved to Dublin to practice. Fr Jim is fond of his nephew till one night he gets a phone call very late. Gregory tells him that he was drink driving, and that he hit a cyclist who came out suddenly. He didn't stop and is afraid to go to the police. His uncle agrees to help him, but when he gets to the accident he finds the cyclist, a young woman student is dead. He covers up for his sister's sake, getting the car repaired and saying nothing. He feels that while Gregory has shown emotion, it is largely selfish fear, not remorse. Gregory tells him that he has given up drinking, and that he is giving money to charity to try to make up for his sin, and Jim wants to believe him. But he soon realises that the non drinking resolution did not last very long, and that Gegory is returning to his bad old ways. He tries to avoid his nephew, and time passes. Then he is visiting his sister when Gregory comes to stay but he is in a sulk because his parents dont want to lend him money. He goes off on his own and Fr Jim decides to go and fetch him from the pub. Gregory is drunk and refuses to let him drive; he takes the wheel, drives too fast. They crash into a traveller family with a cart, and Gregory begs his uncle to take the blame. Fr Jim looks after the travellers and ignores his request to lie for him. He knows this time he has to call the police.

Silver Wedding Part II

We begin to learn the secrets of the lives of the people who are attending the Silver wedding. Maureen's mother dies, and in sorting out her papers she finds that her father is not dead as she thought. He was working in South Africa when she was a child, and he had fallen in love with another woman. He asked his wife for a divorce, but she refused and told him that if he wanted out of the marriage he would have to disappear from their lives and she would tell her Dublin friends that he had died in Africa. Maureen starts hunting around and finds that her dad is still alive and is now living in a home in England. She is hurt and shocked that her mother deprived her of a father, because of her snobbery. She gets in contact with her father and likes him, and she tries to feel sorry for her mother who had only her social standing in Dublin society to live for. She was herself in love with Frank, Desmond's friend and now his boss, and thought of marrying him but her mother was against the idea and Frank took a dislike to her mother and their relationship fizzled out. Meanwhile Brendan, Desmond's son, has settled in Ireland where he can lead a peaceful unpretentious life, working on a farm, and not having to live up to his mother's social standards. He does not want to go back to London. Desmond is getting increasingly fed up with his wife's life which consists of putting on a show of perfection for her family and neighbours.. and he realises that he is never going to get any further in his job. He becomes friends with Mr Patel, the owner of a small local shop and when Mr Patel is injured by burglars, he offers to take over and run the business till he is better. Deirdre is horrified.

Silver Wedding By Maeve Binchy

Silver Wedding is another of Binchy's novels which has a series of chapters covering each character's point of view. It is set mainly in London in the present day, about a couple who are about to celebrate their Silver Wedding Anniversary. Deirdre Doyle, the wife, is a dissatisfied woman, who has little in her life to occupy her. She is disappointed that her husband Desmond has never been as successful as she hoped he would be. He has a managerial position in a food firm but he has not done as well as his friend Frank, who came over from Ireland with him years ago and who married the boss's daughter and became head of the firm. Deirdre and Desmond have 3 children.. Anna who works in a bookshop and who has found her boyfriend is cheating on her, Helen who is an odd girl who can't seem to settle to any work, and who has recently been living in a convent in London hoping to become a nun and Brendan who has left London and gone back to the small family farm in Ireland to work with his uncle. Maureen Deirdre's best friend was bridesmaid at the wedding, and she is now a middle aged successful businesswoman who owns a dress shop in Dublin... Deirdre makes a terrible fuss over planning for the anniversary, because that is all she has to think about. Desmond is very depressed because he is not sure he can hold onto his job as a manager and his marriage is an empty shell. Deirdre is busy with early preparations for the wedding party, when her mother suddenly arrives in London and asks her to come into town and meet her. When she gets there, she finds her mother Eileen, who is a widow, seems very lively and attractive, and is going on a cruise. She feels depressed by this. Then she is horrified to learn that her mother is going with an elderly beau, Tony who seems to be loud and vulgar and she can't understand how her mother, who always seemed obsessed with matters of class and status, would be seen in public with him. She also feels jealous that her elderly mother seems to be having much more fun than she is.

Evening Class Part V

Aidan realises that his marriage is over and he learns that Nell was having an affair, and he knows now that he is in love with Nora and wants to be with her. Nora has by now recovered from Mario's death and has fallen in love with Aidan. They set off for Rome, and the adventure begins. Connie decides to go though it is not the kind of fancy holiday she is used to. She is depressed that her marriage is a failure, and that Harry has ended up in prison for fraud. But he got a light sentence and will soon be out. When she arrives in Rome, she gets a message threatening her, and she begins to worry that it might be Siobhan, Harry's mistress who is angry that his wife reported him to the Fraud squad and that when he gets out of prison he will probably need to go to England to make a new life. But Connie cannot feel sympathy for Harry, since she found out that he demanded large payments from clients who had borrowed money from him, and one of the victims was Gus, Laddy's nephew who looks after him. Gus and his wife had a small hotel, and they had to pay a large sum to Harry's company which left them very close to losing the business and they were only saved by Connie getting involved. Nora is happy to be back in Italy, but she gets a big surprise when she finds that Alfredo, one of Mario's sons is now living in Rome, running a restaurant. She gets a warmer welcome from him than she expected and he tells her that Gabriella, Mario's wife, is dead.. she died of cancer only a few months after her husband. Nora is shocked. Then Alfredo tells her that although they didnt have much to do with her in the village, the children were all aware of her affair with their father and they respected her for keeping the affair discreet and for giving her father good advice. He now suggests that she could come back to Sicily and help in the family business. She doesn't know what to do. She lived there so long, and although she has made a new home in Ireland she is a little tempted by the idea of returning to Sicily. Connie goes out walking alone and finds that she is indeed being followed.. by Siobhan. She is terrified, but tries to keep cool. Siobhan has followed her into a cafe and she is forced to talk to her. Siobhan berates her for turning Harry in to the police. Connie remains calm though she is terrified, and tells Siobhan that she never hated her and was glad that Harry had just one woman - though she knows he also had other affairs. She then tells her that she has left a letter for her solicitors, in case she were to die suddenly in Rome. Siobhan is flummoxed by how cool Connie is being and seems to give up fighting. Connie hopes that when Harry comes out of prison he may go to the UK and take Siobhan with him.. but she is just relieved to have escaped the mistress's vengeance. Siobhan leaves her and she goes back to her hotel. The party go to visit the Italian family whom Laddy thought had invited him to come and see them. They remember him and feel a bit guilty that they inadvertently led him to think that he was to be a guest of theirs, but now they make up for it by welcoming him and his friends. He is delighted. As they plan to return to Ireland, Aidan tells Nell that he loves her and if she goes to Sicily it will break his heart. She tells him she will stay with him and Aidan will get a divorce and sell his house and buy a small flat. She has finally found love and respect from a man... and the group go back to Ireland.

Evening Class Part IV

Fran has to tell Kathy that her father Paul is from a well to do family and that he is now married to a very rich woman, and they are well known socialites in Dublin. She feels upset and angry that her fathers family paid her mother off and that she is poor while Paul is living a luxurious life. She decides to go and see him and makes her way boldly into his office. He is surprised to see her, and touched.. and they get on well. She tells him about Fran, and that her mother had a boyfriend a while ago who went to America but she stayed in Dublin to be with her child. Paul hopes that Fran will be happy some time and he and Kathy agree to stay in touch. Nora manages to extricate Lou from his association with the criminal gang and he and Suzi plan their wedding. Another member of the group is Barry who has a problem with his mother. She is convinced her husband is having an affair, and has gotten very depressed. She attempts suicide and is taken to hospital.. and while visiting her there, Barry meets Fiona, a shy girl who works in the hospital cafe. He tells Fiona about his mother and how its hard for him to cope with her. Fiona starts going to their house to learn cookery from his mother and she confides about how she believes her husband is seeing someone else. Fiona persuades her to smarten herself up and try to be more cheerful - and she finds out that the woman the father is seeing is Nell Dunne, the wife of Aidan. Fiona meets Dan, Barry's father at a party to celebrate the first year of the Italian classes, and Nell is also at the party. She tells Nell that Dan is a womaniser who once had an affair with her own mother and made her miserable, and that he has no respect for the women he seduces. Nell is angry but it scares her, and it appears that Dan is reconciling with his wife. The two of them seem happier and Nell faces the fact that her marriage to Aidan is pretty much over and her lover has also dropped her. Aidan and Nora prepare for the "viaggio", the trip to Rome where they can show off their Italian. Lou and Suzi decide to make it their honeymoon trip and they get married just before the departure for Rome. Tony O'Brien is surprised that the Italian classes have done so well. People enjoy them and noone has dropped out, and he admires Aidan for having had the bright idea of starting them. He and Grania are now together, though Aidan is not too happy with it.