A House Unlocked - Softcover

Penelope Lively is the author of over twenty books of fiction and non--fiction, including the Booker Prize-winning novel Moon Tiger and the Whitbread Award-winning novel A Stitch in Time, as well as numerous children's books.Lively's awards include the Booker Prize, the Whitbread Award, the British Arts Council National Book Award, and the Carnegie Medal

In the late 1990s, critically acclaimed English author Penelope Lively had to sell her country home, which had been in the family since 1925. It is to our benefit that its loss triggered her decision to "see if the private life of a house could be made to bear witness to the public traumas of a century." In a rich, clear voice, Sheila Mitchell gives a nuanced reading of the fascinating story that resulted. It's a history of nineteenth- and twentieth-century England revealed through familial artifacts. The house's extensive tulip garden leads Lively to the botanical adventurers who found the unusual specimens. An unused wing of the house reminds her of the London children housed there throughout WWII, and causes her to explore the way in which that temporary but huge migration changed English society forever. I could keep giving examples--far better that you listen yourself. A.C.S. © AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine