Civil to Strangers - Softcover

Barbara Pym (1913-1980) published fourteen books beginning in 1950 and continued until her death. A writer from the age of sixteen, Barbara Pym has been acclaimed as "the most underrated writer of the century" by the late British poet laureate, Philip Larkin. Her 1977 novel, Quartet in Autumn, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

Understated and proper, maintaining unflappability no matter what's roiling beneath the surface--that's the way of the British and the way of a Barbara Pym story. And that's what we get from Gretel Davis, narrator of CIVIL TO STRANGERS, a posthumously published volume comprising a novel, three novellas, four short stories, and an autobiographical essay on Pym's writing career. Using well-sharpened insight and description, Pym whittles away at mundane lives to reveal the drama beneath the soul-squelching compromises that got the characters where they are. Understated yet full of possibility, Davis's tone seems right for the deceptive simplicity of Pym's stories. T.F. (c) AudioFile, Portland, Maine