{"product_id":"a-start-in-life-penguin-essentials-9780241981498","title":"A Start in Life Penguin Essentials","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eAnita Brookner''s first novel, available as a Penguin Essential for the first time. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e''Dr Weiss, at forty, knew that her life had been ruined by literature.''\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRuth Weiss, an academic, is beautiful, intelligent and lonely. Studying the heroines of Balzac in order to discover where her own childhood and adult life has gone awry, she seeks not salvation but enlightenment.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYet in revisiting her London upbringing, her friendships and doomed Parisian love affairs, she wonders if perhaps there might not be a chance for a new start in life . . .\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eExcellent * Sunday Times *\u003cbr\u003eEnormously sophisticated, knowing, often very funny tragi-comedy * Financial Times *\u003cbr\u003eHow can anything be so funny and so sad both at once? Every sentence is an object lesson in compression and wit. -- Tessa Hadley * Guardian Summer Reads, 2015 *\u003cbr\u003eA delight, amusing, beautifully written. * The Times *\u003cbr\u003eEnormously sophisticated, knowing, often very funny tragi-comedy. * Financial Times *\u003cbr\u003eExcellent, brilliantly drawn. * Sunday Times *","brand":"Penguin Books Ltd","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51862519447895,"sku":"9780241981498","price":19.91,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780241981498.jpg?v=1759918014","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/a-start-in-life-penguin-essentials-9780241981498","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}