One of the books I most enjoyed as a schoolgirl. My mother gave me the French Livre de Poche edition when I was fourteen (translation by Jean Talva, who actually translated all of Lehmann's books into French, except perhaps "A Sea-grape tree") and I read it several times until I was nineteen and a friend borrowed it from me and forgot to give it back. I eventually bought the Virago edition three years ago (more than twenty years after my first read) and, well, had a wonderful time rereading it, for the first time in English. Of course this is no masterpiece : the male characters are poorly portrayed (I found Roddy inconsistent when I was a girl, now I find him utterly irritating - the other three boys are hardly better), but the writing is beautiful (I remember discovering free indirect speech through this book), the settings are exquisitely described, and the female characters, well, finely portrayed.

I used to enjoy the Cambridge episode best, and still do (probably because those boys are away most of the time). I have read somewhere that it is the first description of girl college life in literature. The girls' endless conversations by night sound wonderfully true; Jennifer's portrayal, with its constant association of her with bright colours, is delightful.

What I overlooked at first read was Judith's great loneliness : she is an only child, her father soon dies, her relationship with her mother is pleasant enough but aloof, and she seems to have been acquainted to none but the Fyfes before her Cambridge experiences. I used to find Mariella impenetrable, I now find her most touching : whereas Judith escapes the "magic" circle of the Fyfe boys, their cousin is doomed to remain entangled with these three (oops, two, I forgot that Martin has died, so the two worst remain, but this is no spoiler)... well, let's write it : morons.

Not easy to get into – a strange first section just recapping the past (or, rather, the children next door) though there are some nice bits of writing. I like the section where Judith goes to Cambridge. And the sheer nastiness with which Mabel is described, even though I’m sure I ought to feel sorry for her. Very well structured, excellent ending, just right. But the bit I most enjoyed was the section where Judith is a Cambridge undergrad. And Mabel is by far the most memorable character for me. The boys, around whom everything centres, I thought fairly tedious. [May 2003]