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Published Feb 2012
224 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
Coral Glynn arrives at Hart House, an isolated manse in the English countryside, early in the very wet spring of 1950, to nurse the elderly Mrs. Hart, who is dying of cancer. Hart House is also inhabited by Mrs. Prence, the perpetually disgruntled housekeeper, and Major Clement Hart, Mrs. Hart's war-ravaged son, who is struggling to come to terms with his latent homosexuality. When a child's game goes violently awry in the woods surrounding Hart House, a great shadow - love, perhaps - descends upon its inhabitants. Like the misguided child's play, other seemingly random events - a torn dress, a missing ring, a lost letter - propel Coral and Clement into the dark thicket of marriage.
A period novel observed through a refreshingly gimlet eye, Coral Glynn explores how quickly need and desire can blossom into love, and just as quickly transform into something less categorical. Borrowing from themes and characters prevalent in the work of mid-twentieth-century British women writers, Peter Cameron examines how we live and how we love - with his customary empathy and wit.
"Starred Review. The book is suffused with a lonely sadness and an aura of the surreal, and the many dramatic events in Coral's life are entirely plausible thanks to Cameron's skill as a storyteller." - Publishers Weekly
"With its atmospheric fifties setting and stylish writing, this is one of Cameron's (The City of Your Final Destination) finest novels." - Library Journal
"Cameron's shimmering and expectant prose infuses this deceptively simple novel with an incandescent depth." - Booklist
"A slowly unfolding novel that paradoxically contains both engaging characters and wooden dialogue." - Kirkus Reviews
This information about Coral Glynn was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Peter Cameron is the author of Andorra , The City of Your Final Destination, and Someday This Pain Will be Useful to You . His work has appeared in The New Yorker, Grand Street, and The Paris Review. He lives in New York City. Visit him online at www.peter-cameron.com.
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