Darling: A razor-sharp, gloriously funny retelling of Nancy Mitford’s The Pursuit of Love

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To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. There is something discombobulating about characters you know being almost but not quite themselves.

The book then follows all of the family – but primarily Linda on her pursuit of love, taking in London and Paris as well as Norfolk. After writing an article in The Sunday Times about her daughter's special needs - her youngest child has DiGeorge syndrome. In her journalism Knight has written often about the importance of cosiness, and here she has the perfect cosy autumn read. The neighborhood looks different too, but she’s still the same woman and it’s still the same place, and as the past erupts into view, they slowly collide.

There always seems to be another volume of collected letters, or a gorgeous edition, or a biography coming out; the most recent was Laura Thompson’s 2016 group study The Six. The plot remains very much the same; Knight has taken few liberties, but has recast the beloved characters and story in a modern mould. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. As we never tired of complaining,” says Franny, who narrates the novel, “we were ridiculously old-fashioned.

Durante o período de teste, é possível usufruir de todos os benefícios da assinatura de maneira gratuita. Okay readers, don’t judge me, we’ve all done it, but I requested this book solely on the basis of loving that simply gorgeous front cover. Darling, it must be said, is all the better for Matthew and Sadie’s delight in one another: it makes the characters make sense.To do the book justice, it's nicely written and zips along at a fine pace, which it what you'd expect from such an insubstantial piece of fluff. There were a lot of sidetracked and half-completed conversations - I could picture them all talking while eating, cleaning the house, watching TV and doing a million other things at the same time. She was determined to escape the ordinariness of life, so she went to Paris, met some eccentric people, married some of them, and lived her life to the fullest. As the hours count down to their wedding, Piglet is torn between a growing appetite and the desire to follow the recipe, follow the rules. Linda’s daughter Moira (deathlessly described by Mitford as a ‘howling orange in a fine black wig’) is gaily abandoned in the original; here she remains a beloved, if semi-detached, family member.

The book is narrated by Frances, a cousin of the Radlett siblings, who has been sent to live with her Aunt Sadie and Uncle Matthew by her flaky mother. Hers is a higgledy-piggledy life that is always buoyed by good cheer, and everyone swept up in her wake is left changed by the encounter, no matter how small or big it is. She wears her heart on her sleeve and doesn’t apologise for it, and is funny and astute in her observations. Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH). Irascible patriarch Uncle Matthew is a reformed rock star and his notorious Great War entrenching tool a bloodstained Brit award he used to brain a drummer while ‘high on pharmaceutical-grade cocaine’.Together, Kit and Piglet are the picture of domestic bliss - effortless hosts, planning a covetable wedding .