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Original poster

Any fellow Cazalet fans?

34 replies

MarkingTime2020 · 05/06/2020 19:45

I’m reading my way through Elizabeth Jane Howard’s Cazalet Chronicles at the moment - they’re even better than I’d expected, I’ve hardly been so absorbed in a series of books since childhood (or maybe Ferrante Wink).

Any other fans around? I should say I’m only half way through the second one (hence my nickname) so no spoilers please!

Can certainly recommend them as lockdown/pandemic reading - they’re mostly (so far) about being isolated in one place during a time of massive global upheaval...

OP posts:
bookworm14 · 06/06/2020 12:24

They are some of my favourite books of all time. I would agree with comments on the last book though - it just isn’t the same. Everyone out of character and glaring continuity errors.

highlandcoo · 06/06/2020 09:27

They are really great stories, and I have read them all, but my advice is please, please, please do not read the final one in the series, as it is poorly written, full of massive plot gaps and just not true to the earlier books

Could not agree more. EJH wrote All Change about twenty years after the others in the series and not long before her death. I choose not to believe what happened to certain characters as their behaviour was so alien to their previous characterisation, and when I next reread the series for the fifth or sixth time I won't be reading the last book. It went straight to the charity shop in fact.

Only surpassed by Death in Pemberley for awfulness from someone who used to be an excellent writer and should have known better.

Timetospare · 05/06/2020 22:39

I couldn’t resist either! (But I wish I had been warned.Grin )
Her biography is probably a better read instead, and she lead a life very like her characters, heart breaking at times.

TheWashingMachine · 05/06/2020 22:37

I love EJH, I had a binge two years ago, maybe time to revisit The Cazalets. She is a much under rated writer. Martin Amis's stepmother, he has high praise for me.

Original poster
MarkingTime2020 · 05/06/2020 22:16

Yes I’ve heard really bad things about the last one @Timetospare Sad

Not sure if I can resist reading it though...

Agree on descriptions of childhood and childhood relationships - so good!

OP posts:
Timetospare · 05/06/2020 21:44

I’m not sure I’ve ever read a better description of childhood relationships in the first novel.

Timetospare · 05/06/2020 21:43

They are really great stories, and I have read them all, but my advice is please, please, please do not read the final one in the series, as it is poorly written, full of massive plot gaps and just not true to the earlier books.
The characters are not ‘ in character’ and it feels like the publisher just wanted to exploit or monetise her success.

Original poster
MarkingTime2020 · 05/06/2020 21:36

Ah have fun! I can actually already imagine re-reading them Blush

OP posts:
Minty82 · 05/06/2020 19:47

Oh I loved them as a teenager and have been thinking of reclaiming them from my parents’ house and starting again at the beginning...thank you for the reminder!