About the Author

Dame Margaret Drabble was born in Sheffield in 1939 and was educated at Newnham College, Cambridge. She is the author of eighteen novels including A Summer Bird-Cage, The Millstone, The Peppered Moth, The Red Queen, The Sea Lady and most recently, the highly acclaimed The Pure Gold Baby. She has also written biographies, screenplays and was the editor of the Oxford Companion to English Literature. She was appointed CBE in 1980, and made DBE in the 2008 Honours list. She was also awarded the 2011 Golden PEN Award for a Lifetime's Distinguished Service to Literature. She is married to the biographer Michael Holroyd.

Reviews

An absolute tour de force
* * Guardian, Best Books of the Year * *

Erudite, beautifully written, funny, tragic
* * Daily Mail * *

Masterly
* * New York Times, 100 Notable Books of 2017 * *

Darkly witty and exhilarating
* * The Times * *

Her distinctive narrative voice and soaring prose remain electrifying
* * Telegraph * *

With its echoes of Simone de Beauvoir and Samuel Beckett, this quiet meditation an old age seethes with apocalyptic intent . . . Brilliant
* * Guardian * *

Masterly, poignant and uplifting
* * Mail on Sunday * *

Drabble has pulled off a quietly revolutionary portrait of an age-group whose lives are just as urgent as anyone's but are rarely considered *****
* * Sunday Telegraph * *

Ageing and dying in style . . . Margaret Drabble's sharply drawn characters look back on lives lived and forwards to achieving a good death
* * Observer * *

My novel of the year . . . Like a blood transfusion of ideas, feelings
*LINDA GRANT*