This novel is neither by a Quaker nor about Quakers in particular. It was recommended to the library by a Quaker reader who stated that a Quaker character plays an important role in the story towards the end of the book. The author won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer for her first novel, The King's Peace, and the World Fantasy Award for her later novel, Tooth and Claw.

from the book flap: "One summer weekend in 1949--but not our 1949--the well-connected 'Farthing set,' a group of upper-crust English families, enjoys a country retreat. Lucy is a minor daughter in one of those families; her parents were both leading figures in the group that overthrew Churchill and negotiated peace with Herr Hitler eight years earlier.
"Despite her parents' evident disapproval, Lucy is married--happily--to a London Jew. It was therefore quite a surprise to Lucy when she and her hsband, David, found themselves invited to the retreat. It's even more startling when, on the retreat's first night, a major politician of the Farthing set is found gruesomely murdered, with abundant signs that the killing was ritualistic.
"It quickly becomes clear to Lucy that she and her husband were brought to the retreat in order to pin the murder on David. Major political machinations are at stake, including an initiative in Parliament, supported by the Farthng set, to limit the right to vote to university graduates. But whoever's behind the murder, and the frame-up, didn't reckon on the principal investigator from Scotland Yard being a man with very private reasons for sympathizing with outcasts . . . and looking beyond the obvious. As the trap slowly shuts on Lucy and David, they begin to see a way out--a way fraught with peril in a darkening world."

This is such a great read: an old-fashioned country house mystery novel set within an alternate history premise: what if Hess' mission to the UK had succeeded, and Britain and the Reich had made peace in 1941? It's told from the alternating viewpoints of Lucy Eversley Kahn, the daughter of a conservative viscount who's married a Jewish man in spite of the disapproval of her family, and of Inspector Carmichael, the policeman assigned to investigate the murder of the leading politician Sir James T...more This is such a great read: an old-fashioned country house mystery novel set within an alternate history premise: what if Hess' mission to the UK had succeeded, and Britain and the Reich had made peace in 1941? It's told from the alternating viewpoints of Lucy Eversley Kahn, the daughter of a conservative viscount who's married a Jewish man in spite of the disapproval of her family, and of Inspector Carmichael, the policeman assigned to investigate the murder of the leading politician Sir James Thirkie at the Eversley family's country estate.

It's very atmospheric, and well set up. Walton excels at carrying through the consequences of her set up--there's no pulling of punches here. I really liked Lucy, who had a strong vein of common-sense lying beneath a rather feather-brained appearance; though she narrates an equal amount of the book with Carmichael, I think she's far more clearly the main character, and the better sketched out. Many of the secondary characters are neat sketches of the kind of unreflective, privileged members of the upper classes that you can meet even nowadays in English society. There's a satisfyingly Byzantine level of intermarriage and interrelationships between them all, though the fact that the majority of the main characters in the novel appeared to be homosexual/bisexual/have little problem with homosexuality did strain credulity a little.

Walton alludes with great subtlety to the changes which have occurred in the time-line from 1941 onwards--the references to an isolationist America under President Lindbergh, for example--but there were times when I felt as if she needed to sketch out more clearly how the time-line had moved from A to B. How is the murder of one politician the equivalent of the destruction of a national symbol such as the Reichstag Fire? How does an anti-Semitic, anti-Bolshevik, anti-Other political movement gain such a foothold so quickly without any indication of an accompanying ideological programme? How did the Second World War become commonly known as the 'Jewish War'? I'm not hugely up on modern history, but as far as I'm aware, knowledge of what was going on in concentration camps didn't really seep through to England until after the end of the war; things would have to have occurred very differently, to have been spun very differently, I think, for such a name to gain common parlance, and we don't see how that occurred.

For a book which was so good in evoking a period feel in other respects, I was really surprised to see that it messed up on something so basic as forms of address and descent of titles: surely Sir James Thirkie's nephew should have inherited the baronetcy before him, if Sir James were the younger son; the younger sons of earls are addressed as 'the Honourable' as a courtesy, not as 'Lord.' The Irish police force is also referred to as the Gardaí, not the Garda (which is singular), though I'm more willing to let that slide because, well, it's not something people who're not Irish tend to get right.

These do seem like a lot of quibbles, but really they are the elements I saw which took a good book and kept it from being really fantastic. There's a sequel, Ha'penny, which I shall have to keep an eye out for, and which I hope improves on the promise shown here. ( )

Alternate history in which Britain made peace with the Nazis shortly after the start of World War II. Nine years later, the politicians who were responsible for the peace are major figures in Britain and are seeking to dominate in the upcoming elections. An important member of the party is murdered and a Jewish armband from Nazi Europe is left on the body which throws suspicion on David Kahn, the Jewish husband of Lucy, the daughter of the party leader. As the investigation proceeds, the chief inspector starts to have doubts though.

Farthing is an enjoyable but not spectacular book. The alternate history feels like minor background up until the end of the book. Early on in the book, it is fairly obvious who is responsible for the murder and the reasons behind it, so there is not much of a murder mystery aspect. It does have an interesting portrayal of how democratic institutions can start to erode, although that is hardly a theme original to this book. It was a good enough read that I will read the following two entries in the series to see how this history develops. ( )

(Alistair) Reading a little outside of my usual territory, here; alternate history is very much a minority genre for me, and Nazi alternate histories - popular as they are - even less so, the only one of which I have previously read being Robert Harris's excellent Fatherland.

As the plot(s) opens, it is 1949 in an alternate universe in which a political cabal - the eponymous "Farthing Set" - ousted Churchill and made peace with Hitler in 1941, and consequentially to which and American uninvolvement - the status of the war in the Pacific remains unrevealed - the Third Reich remains in power across the channel. I say plot(s) because while there is a single, coherent ongoing plot thread, it combines two tightly woven ideas: a country-house murder mystery, and the slide of a free country into fascism.

It is a gripping book, but in a different sense to the way in which I might ordinarily use that term; the author successfully produces the "dark fascination of evil" with her depiction of what is also, I should say, a very British fascism.

A good book, overall, but one that does not sit easily in the brain. Recommended.

( http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/ce... ) ( )

Farthing starts off as a standard country-house mystery, with the historical twist that it's set in a Britain which has made peace with Hitler's Germany. "Farthing" is the name of the house itself, and of the political faction focused around the family. Alternate chapters focus on Lucy, the daughter of the house, and Inspector Carmichael, sent down from Scotland Yard to investigate a murder which took place during a house-party weekend. The focus, initially, is on the complicated relationships between the guests - told in Lucy's gossipy tone but of course, a mystery to the Inspector. But gradually it all becomes a little more complicated, and sinister.

I really enjoyed this. The world is well-drawn, and Lucy in particular is brilliant - the reader soon comes to realise that although she talks like an empty-headed daughter of the upper classes, she's far from that. The story is fast-moving and gripping, and kept me turning the pages late into the night. I'm not sure that I buy the blurb that it's a chilling portrait of how easily a world can slip into fascism - but it's still a very enjoyable thriller with its heart in the right place. ( )