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Nov 13, 2014WVMLStaffPicks rated this title 5 out of 5 stars
Every reader should have a favourite author to return to after weathering a succession of less than satisfactory new books. Mine is Barbara Pym. Read enough issues of Staff Picks and you will likely encounter most of her ten novels. This one is the story of the capable, unmarried Mildred, just past thirty and on her way to becoming an “excellent woman” in her London parish. An appreciative observer, she excels at getting involved in others’ lives instead of her own-until the charming, carefree Rocky moves into the apartment downstairs. Once again Pym’s comic flair and eye for the absurdities of human behaviour bring to centre stage those individuals usually regarded as too insignificant for fiction.