{"product_id":"an-awfully-big-adventure-9780349116150","title":"An Awfully Big Adventure","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e*'This is one of Bainbridge's best books. The close observation and hilarity are underlain by a sense of tragedy as deep as any in fiction' THE TIMES\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e Acknowledged as one of the best novelists of her generation...\u003c\/b\u003eBeryl's literary fiction can have a quality of a detective story: only when we reach a novel's final denouement do we see that we were given the key to its coded mystery at the start. \u003cb\u003eA certain menace emanates from a story's first page and builds almost imperceptibly to its climax in a refined but savage violence\u003c\/b\u003e * Guardian *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eVintage bitter-sweet Bainbridge\u003c\/b\u003e * Mail on Sunday *\u003cbr\u003eImagine Priestley's \u003ci\u003eThe Good Companions\u003c\/i\u003e as written by Gogol and you will have some idea of \u003cb\u003ethe mixture of waggish humour and sordid pathos in Bainbridge's novel\u003c\/b\u003e * Sunday Times *\u003cbr\u003eA subtle schizophrenic insight into adult relationships ... \u003cb\u003eBainbridge's understated prose and obsessive eye for the smallest and most telling of details have never been better employed \u003c\/b\u003e * Time Out *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA Booker Prize nominee, Bainbridge's latest novel is a compelling read...\u003c\/b\u003eIn Stella Bradshaw, a teenage aspiring actress from the slums of Liverpool, Bainbridge limns a tough but beguiling character. \u003cb\u003eShe also deftly conveys the atmosphere of 1950s England, still grimly bomb-cratered, coping with food rationing and the visible casualties of maimed veterans. \u003c\/b\u003eHer portrait of a seedy repertory troupe, whose members histrionically indulge in love affairs and unrequited passions, is classic...Her innocent but dangerous impulses and her crush on Meredith, whose homosexuality eludes her, makes Stella a sort of Typhoid Mary of psychological injury; one after another, members of the troupe suffer from her impetuous behavior. \u003cb\u003eBainbridge's prose brims with pithy insights tinged with sardonic humor, and her plot moves swiftly to a chilling conclusion\u003c\/b\u003e * Publishers Weekly *\u003cbr\u003eVintage bittersweet Bainbridge * MAIL ON SUNDAY *\u003cbr\u003eImagine Priestley's THE GOOD COMPANIONS as written by Gogol and you will have some idea of the mixture of waggish humour and sordid pathos in Bainbridge's novel * SUNDAY TIMES *\u003cbr\u003eA subtle schizophrenic insight into adult relationships ... Bainbridge's understated prose and obsessive eye for the smallest and most telling of details have never been better employed * TIME OUT *","brand":"Little, Brown Book Group","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48733648126295,"sku":"9780349116150","price":9.49,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/an-awfully-big-adventure-9780349116150","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}