Finally, a book to review! I just finished Muriel Spark's A Far Cry from Kensington, a 75 cent find at a library book sale. If I've read Spark before, it was in a high school English textbook, which is barely reading at all, often enough, so it was a joy to discover her.
The narrator reminisces from several decades remove on her time in 1950s London as a young war widow living in a boardinghouse and working in a series of odd publishing jobs. She's a fascinatingly strong character, but not overt about her strength. No nonsense without being stern. And she relates her history and her community of coworkers and fellow boarders warmly, matter-of-factly, and sympathetically all at once. I almost felt as though I, the reader, were like a granddaughter, or rather a young researcher seeking an oral history.
None of what I've written really explains why I (punning on the title) decided to stress how unique this novel struck me as being. Maybe it's Spark's voice - that oral history quality. Even more so, she doesn't force feelings or reactions on you, allowing you to take it in however you so choose. It's cerebral, a bit, but not demanding. In that way perhaps a bit like the main character herself. If the rest of Spark's work is of the same vein, I will have found myself a new author.
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