Second Fiddle
by Mary Wesley
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Description
Britain's beloved bestselling author delivers "a droll comedy of manners" in a story of desire and dalliances in a provincial English town (Los Angeles Times). Laura Thornby is the kind of woman every man wants--despite their better judgment. Urbane, seductively aloof, and charmingly intrusive, she is the older woman every younger man dreams of bedding, if not wedding. When Claud Bannister meets Laura at a concert, he cannot get her out of his mind. And she cannot resist the chance to show more interfere in his life. As Laura begins molding Claud into a new man, from finding him a new place to live to orchestrating his attempts to become a novelist, her influence over him is undeniable. But his impact on her is underestimated. As the situation slowly spirals out of Laura's carefully constructed control, both of them will discover more about themselves--and their connection to each other--than they ever realized before. Crackling with wit, and sizzling with romance, this "mordantly humorous take on upper-middle-class British life has a sharp and entertaining edge" only Mary Wesley could hone (Publishers Weekly). show lessTags
Recommendations
Member Reviews
A very engaging book that features a cast of characters simultaneously mysterious, intriguing and yet somewhat boring. However the deftness of skill in creating an interesting storyline about a rather commonplace idea is Wesley's strength. She takes the ordinary and infuses it with sparkle, wit and humour, while being neither saccharine nor sentimental. A superb book that leaves one pleasantly satisfied but not satiated.
Short on plot, dreary County town characters and an unconvincing effort in keeping them relevant to the narrative. Best avoided.
3,5 en fait ;))
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Author Information
25+ Works 4,567 Members
Mary Aline Mynors Farmar was born in Berkshire in 1912. She was the youngest of three children and her father was an army officer, so the family frequently moved. In 1936, she married Lord Swinfen, had two children, and divorced in the early 1940's. During World War II, she fell in love with journalist Eric Siepmann and lived with him for several show more years before they were married, which caused Mary's parents to cut her out of their will in disapproval. When her husband died, she was broke with a teenage son. During the late 1960's, she wrote two books, "Speaking Terms" and "The Sixth Seal," but it wasn't until she was in her seventies that her first major novel was published, "Jumping the Queue." Afterwards, she published "Cammomile Lawn" (1984), which is about love and sex in the British upper middle class and was adapted for television, "Harnessing Peacocks" (1986), which is about a young unwed mother who turns to prostitution to pay for her son's education, and "The Vacillations of Peppy Carew" (1986). Wesley's other titles include "A Sensible Life" (1990), "A Dubious Legacy" (1993), "An Imaginative Experience" (1994) and "Part of the Furniture" (1997). She died of natural causes following a long battle with gout on December 30, 2002. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Work Relationships
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1988
- Dedication
- for Robert Bolt
- First words
- Claud Bannister sat beside his mother, enduring the concert.
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 329
- Popularity
- 96,239
- Reviews
- 3
- Rating
- (3.55)
- Languages
- Danish, English, German
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 18
- ASINs
- 10
