THE FURQUITS BOOKSWAP ROUND 2 - Moomin's Book - NTAL by AL

[Wheelybug]

Discuss !

Oh, I really don't know what to make of this book. I was secretly hoping that with the boarding school setting, it would be like 'Mallory Towers' for grown-ups, only it wasn't!

I think the main reason for that is that there does not appear to be a single character in the book who is happy, or at least contented with life. Except, maybe Constance at the end, but then she realises too late that she is settled at Raeburn.

Every other one of the characters is miserable, frustrated or unfulfilled. All the sex is furtive or exploitative, a source of anxiety or fear rather than joy.

Mrs Birmingham and Peachey appear to genuinely care about the girls the people around them, but everyone else is unkind. Sylvia Parry is particularly nasty and I could not work out whether she was unhinged or just damaged - did her father abuse her?

Maybe the setting of the book is just intended to examine the effects of war on generations of women, and a school full of girls seems a logical place in which to consider the issues, but the characters were all so unlikeable.

I finished the book because the plot drove it forward (the stealing, polio, Lionel's health, James' homecoming) I sooo wanted Charmian to be caught!

An interesting read but I am not sure if it is one I would return to. Food for thought though.

I really enjoyed reading this book. I also started off comparing it to Mallory Towers which I suppose is inevitable, and I really liked that is showed a much darker side to that whole set up. I can remember, even as a young girl, reading Mallory that it felt very sanitised, and having been a new girl at a single sex school I can completely identify with Constances struggle to find a place in a society based on best friend 'couples' where everyone has already paired off.

Yes some of the characters were dark, unhappy and quite nasty, Sylvia Parry in particular, but thats true of life I suppose and I liked that it questioned the motives of female teachers, that not all of them would end up teaching out of completely altruistic motives.

I did feel it ended very abruptly, I had to check that the last pages hadn't stuck together! Which left me a bit unsatisfied. It felt like the author had run out of steam and couldn't be bothered to write about the aftermath of Sylvias suicide, James home coming, Contances fate etc. But then again that makes sense if this is the antithesis to a Mallory Towers book, which always ended up nicely rounded off, completely unlike life!

Agree with above, esp that the end was very abrupt. But I really liked it, thought it was very well written, true to teenagers of the generation while still giving the adult staff a voice too. I also thought it really effectively evoked the totally introspective nature of boarding school (having been at one, although not much like Raeburn!). Thanks.

This one didn't grip me, and although I enjoyed it, it took me a couple of weeks to read it. I didn't really care about most of the characters - they were not very likeable.

The language and atiitudes were believable, and waiting for Charmain to be caught kept me reading.

Also not keen on the "unfinished" feel of the ending, but overall a good read.

I read this quickly and quite enjoyed it, I think but didn't love it.

Agree which much of what has been said - unlikeable characters and unfinished ending. I too couldn't work out if Sylvia had been abused or if she had just idolised him (at one point she says she was jealous of her mother).

But, an interesting side to the whole Mallory Towers story !