Wives & Daughters

What can I say about American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, the novel that isn't-a-portrait-of-Laura-Bush-but-really-kind-of-is that hasn't been said already? I hate the Bush administration and everything it stands for and I've never been an admirer of Mrs Bush, but I nevertheless loved this book. I think it's because Sittenfeld writes so empathetically in the voice of a woman whose lifestyle and choice of husband few of us are ever likely to have much in common with. Alice Blackwell née Lindgren is presented as a sensitive, bookish child and teenager, whose life is transformed when she kills a classmate whom she has a crush on in a car accident, starts an affair with his dissolute brother and has an illegal abortion arranged by her (lesbian) grandmother. The often seedy side of life that we never hear about in relation to the (bloody) American Dream. She settles into a life as a spinster-ish elementary school librarian and unexpectedly falls in love with the charming ne'er-do-well son of the richest family in the state. I'm not sure if I can fully believe that Laura Bush is a secret liberal, but I could believe it of Alice Blackwell. I think it's important to separate the two. I like the cover, which is exactly how I imagine Alice to look, but I don't think she rides a bicycle once in the novel and the landscape looks far more Little House on the Prairie than small town Wisconsin...

At Mrs's Lippincote's, the first novel by Elizabeth Taylor is a finely written novel, but not one that really resonated with me. Although it is told from several different points of view, I found it difficult to really connect with any of them. My favourite character was precocious young Brontë-obsessed Oliver- I have to admit that I was a bit like that when I was younger. I was also ambivalent towards Angel, so I wonder what it is that's preventing me with connecting with a writer who, going by my usual tastes and preferences, I ought to love. I have a feeling Taylor is a writer who grows on you and I'm certainly not giving up.

I absolutely loved Singled Out: How Two Million Women Survived Without Men after the First World War by Virginia Nicholson, the best non-fiction work I've read in goodness knows how long. This is my great-grandmother's generation- she was one of four sisters born in the 1880s and 90s and she was the only one who ever married (one lived with her lover for years but never married him, another was a fairly well-known artist in lesbian Jewish avant-garde circles and I don't know anything about the fourth) and that was to her cousin. I loved just how readable, sympathetic and moving this book was, the analysis is sensitive and spot-on and the case studies are fascinating. They include the campaigner Florence White (not the same Florence White of Good Things In England fame) and her sister Annie who campaigned for spinters' rights and set up the National Spinsters Pensions Association, Gertrude Maclean who founded the Universal Aunts agency (a fantastic enterprise- women could finally get paid for something that had always been taken for granted), Caroline Haslett, the first director of the Electrical Association for Women (who was cremated by electricity- I love it), lady's maid Rose Harrison who when asked what she'd do if she could live again replied, "I would live my life over again," and countless others. Winifred Holtby's books have also risen rapidly to the top of my TBR pile. Nicholson isn't afraid to take on questions that are still controversial in the C21, such as whether it's possible to be happy and fulfilled without getting married and having children. If these extraordinary women are anything to go by, the answer should be a resounding yes. The First World War was undoubtedly a tragedy of immeasurable proportions that caused all sorts of damage and it's fair to mourn for a 'lost generation,' but it is easy to romanticise what might have been. If it hadn't happened, expectations of women's lives might have remained based on getting married and having babies. I wish my girlfriends and acquaintances who do nothing but whine about their boyfriends would read this book. It puts so many things into perspective.

On the silver screen, I enjoyed An Education, based on Lynn Barber's memoir of coming of age in 1960s suburbia, despite feeling squeamish at the love scenes. It's really scary how Jenny/Lynn's parents encouraged the relationship. For me, the real treat was seeing a host of fabulous semi-obscure British actresses sharing the screen. As many have already commented, Carey Mulligan is wonderful as Jenny with an extraordinary way of appearing very young and older than her years at the same time, Olivia Williams (an actress I absolutely adore) as her English teacher Miss Stubbs (the scene in her flat at the end was beautiful), Rosamund Pike as ditzy blonde amoral trophy girlfriend Helen and Kate Duchene (Miss Hardbroom on The Worst Witch- my favourite TV show when I was 10) as the Latin teacher (I'd recognise that voice anywhere). There's also a cameo from not-so obscure but always brilliant Emma Thompson as an unpleasant anti-semitic headmistress. The period details are immaculate and the ending somehow seemed perfect.