When I Was Otherwise (Capuchin Classics)

This skilfully wrought examination of character and relationships opens with macabre impact, as a bland newspaper report describes the discovery of two dead women - one of them a skeleton ? in a North London house. The women are revealed to be the sister and sister-in-law of the man who shared the house. The story of these characters? lives is told through a blend of powerful characterisation and social satire, and summons the mingled tragedy and humour of old age to powerful effect. The author teases the reader towards the known and awful ending by cutting backward and forwards in time, and gradually constructing the complex pattern of feelings and events that define even the most mundane-seeming lives. He plays a similar and equally skilful game with our perceptions of and judgements on the characters, creating believable, fallible and ultimately highly engaging individuals. All the time, the social and cultural backgrounds to the protagonists? lives are described vividly and with great precision