The theme of How It All Began is made apparent from the first page, when 70-ish retired teacher Charlotte Rainsford suffers a broken hip during a purse-snatching. Author Penelope Lively lets us know immediately that she is interested in how circumstances we don't even know about often can determine the directions of own lives.
"The Dalton's marriage broke up because Charlotte was mugged. They did not know Charlotte and never would, though she would sit on the perimeter of their lives."
Charlotte is forced to move in with daughter and son-in-law Rose and Gerry while she rehabs, where Rose meets Charlotte's attractive student Anton. Rose's employer Henry becomes inconvenienced by her absence, so must depend on his niece Marion. While helping her uncle, Marion meets a financial wheeler-dealer, with promise to become her business partner, and Marion's affair becomes known to lover Jeremy's wife, who starts divorce proceedings.
And, so on and so on! In a plot reminding me of "This is the house that Jack built," these very interesting and likable characters deal with the changes, beyond their control, which newly shape their lives.
In addition to a good plot and good characters, Lively's style is easy to read and her insights appealed to me on page after page.
"On a Richter scale of worry, child-worry peaks at a ten."
"The past is our ultimate privacy. We pile it up decade by decade and remember it in shreds, the tattered faulty contents of the mind."
I've been enthusiastic about every Penelope Lively book I've read, and How It All Began is certainly no exception.
Carm, I'm reading this because of your recommendation....and thoroughly enjoying it.
Thanks.
Posted by: Lois | February 23, 2012 at 01:14 PM