Review 2282: #DeanStreetDecember! Company in the Evening

I finally could fit a book for Dean Street December into my schedule! This event is being hosted by Liz of Adventures in Reading, Running, and Working from Home.

In 1940 London, Vicky is fairly satisfied with her life. Five years ago, in the midst of divorcing her husband Raymond for infidelity, she discovered she was pregnant. But she is getting along fine raising her daughter Antonia with the help of an old family retainer, Blakey. She works three days a week as a literary agent and devotes the other days to Antonia. She is an independent woman who doesn’t feel the need for company except for an occasional visit or outing and dislikes sentiment and receiving sympathy.

However, she finds herself inviting company when her mother tells her she’d like to sell her house and move in with her sister. The problem is what to do about Rene, Vicky’s widowed and very pregnant sister-in-law, who has little money and no family and lives with Vicky’s mother. Vicky has a spare room and feels she owes it to her mother to offer Rene a place to stay, even though she and Rene have almost nothing in common. She has no desire to invite her, but she does.

Soon enough, she becomes convinced that they are incompatible. Her efforts to get along with Rene usually end up being misunderstood. Worse, Blakey dislikes her. She is always brusque, but to Rene she is sometimes disrespectful.

Then Vicky runs into Raymond. The other woman returned to her husband, and Raymond is just recovering from a bout of tuberculosis and hopes to take a desk job in the army. They begin occasionally spending time together.

This novel takes a thoughtful look at marriage and at Vicky’s preconceptions of how marriage should be as she takes another look at what broke up her own. It is an intelligent, witty, and involving story. I liked it very much.

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