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Good Behaviour

On sale

4th August 2011

Price: £14.99

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Selected: Hardcover / ISBN-13: 9781844087624
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I do know how to behave – believe me, because I know. I have always known…’

Behind the gates of Temple Alice the aristocratic Anglo-Irish St Charles family sinks into a state of decaying grace. To Aroon St Charles, large and unlovely daughter of the house, the fierce forces of sex, money, jealousy and love seem locked out by the ritual patterns of good behaviour. But crumbling codes of conduct cannot hope to save the members of the St Charles family from their own unruly and inadmissible desires.

Reviews

VOGUE ** ''A witty, black comedy of manners... a memorable novel by an Irish writer whose only equal is Elizabeth Bowen.’
** 'An extraordinary tour de force
VICTORIA GLENDINNING, SUNDAY TIMES ** 'Enchanting’
BOOKSELLER ** 'A fine novel, wickedly alive
NEW YORK TIMES ** 'The very best of Anglo-Irish writing’
EDNA O'BRIEN, OBSERVER ** 'May well become a classic among English novels
CLARE BOYLAN
Hilary Mantel
I really wish I had written this book. It's a tragi-comedy set in Ireland after the First World War. A real work of craftsmanship, where the heroine is also the narrator, yet has no idea what is going on. You read it with mounting horror and hilarity as you begin to grasp her delusion
Maggie O'Farrell
I have read and re-read Molly Keane more, I think, than any other writer. Nobody else can touch her as a satirist, tragedian, and dissector of human behaviour. I love all her books, but Good Behaviour and Loving and Giving are the ones I return to most