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Overview
From the writer whose work has been described as "sparingly tragic and unsparingly funny" (Ruth Rendell) and "shimmering with grace and savagery and wit" (The Times, London), a new collection: nine stories about the blisses and irritations of domestic life.The setting is contemporary London and its suburbs. A seventeen-year-old girl, a student of Coleridge and Keats, walks toward her future resolved not to be anything like her successful career-woman mother. At a small cafe in South Kensington, two women, teachers, become tipsy and exchange confidences about their family difficulties and marital turmoils, revealing more than they intend. A celebratory dinner for a timber merchant and his wife in South London turns into something else entirely. In the midst of a sensuous shopping spree, a woman shares with her friend the secret of a state of mind known as wurstigkeit ("sausageness"). At a Robert Burns gala in a Mayfair hotel, poetry and money collide head-on.
These are stories that charm and move us as they catch the special timbre -- part laughter, part wail -- of youngish, more or less sophisticated lives in the city at our particular moment in time.
Synopsis
Hilarious, dark, and thoroughly entertaining, Getting a Life proves Helen Simpson to be one of the finest observers of women on the edge. Set in and around contemporary London, these nine stories explore both the blisses and irritations of domestic life.
An ambitious teenager vows never to settle for any of the adult lives she sees around her. Two old friends get tipsy at a small cafe and end up revealing more than they intended. In a boutique so exclusive that entrance requires a password, a frazzled careerwoman explores the anesthetizing effect of highly impractical clothing. And in the mesmerizing title story, a mother of three takes life one day at a time, while pushing the ominous question of whether she wants to firmly to one side.
New York Times Book Review - Jay McInerney
Simpson has had a devoted cult following in her native Britain . . . [This collection] finally ought to establish her reputation on these shores. Her quirky humor and linguistic dexterity may remind you of Lorrie Moore with a BBC accent.
Editorials
Jay McInerney
Simpson has had a devoted cult following in her native Britain . . . [This collection] finally ought to establish her reputation on these shores. Her quirky humor and linguistic dexterity may remind you of Lorrie Moore with a BBC accent.— New York Times Book Review