Moving: The Richard & Judy bestseller

Product Information

Fern's is the longer section as her story is contemporary to the main incident in the book that is the catalyst for what happens after. Il guaio di essere una moglie e una madre, decide Edwina, è che senti come tuo dovere impedire che accada qualcosa di male alla tua famiglia, ma è un compito improbabile. The novel, if I’m honest, sounded to me like there wouldn’t be much plot, and I assumed that it would be more of a series of comedic essays and tales, anecdotes and stories weaved into one through the shared history of one house.

Moving by Jenny Eclair | Waterstones

Despite its high Goodreads rating, I feel much of this is perhaps due to a slight bias by fans of the author. Just when I had fallen totally in love with Edwina however we find ourselves moving onto another perspective. So easy to read with emotion, compassion, some black humour and as might be expected from JE some choice language but it was in context and character.

They are so normal, in a posh middle class way, all observed with Eclair’s razor-wit and eloquent prose, which makes for a gripping read. The house plays its own role in the novel, rooting the reader and the characters around this one central point.

Jenny Eclair | LoveReading Books By Jenny Eclair | LoveReading

A decade later, she challenged the invisibility of women over a certain age with appearances in Grumpy Old Women and Loose Women, co-writing the Grumpy Old Women live shows. Very abruptly, the story switches to another protagonist, Fern, and I struggled to see how she fitted into the story. This time I was more prepared but I am still impressed by the apparently effortless way she manages to combine humour and tragedy in just the right proportions to make her characters and story utterly believable. This story is full of secrets and the way the author reveals them all is truly exceptional, and also, there are mostly secrets that I didn't expect - and you know how hard it is to surprise me. I thought of Barbara Kingsolver's 'Unsheltered' as I read it, as both books use houses and setting to evoke most of the atmosphere in their stories.I was pleased Fern treated her gay flatmates with indifference at their sexuality, but the author falls into the trap of turning them into sex toy mad lesbians. Turns out she knows what she is talking about as she has a very similar parentage and upbringing as her main character and therefore knows the upper middle class world of the 60- 90s very well. It opens in the present day, with the septuagenarian, twice-widowed Edwina resolving that it is time to sell the south London house that has been her home for more than half a century. In 1995, Eclair was the first woman to win the Perrier Award, now known as the Edinburgh Comedy Awards, at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Further Éclair’s gift for humour is illustrated throughout the novel which is as funny as it is captivating.