Friday Nights

Another of Joanna Trollope's great books, based on a group of women bought together by a neigbough who invites them to come and spend an evening with her for company on a Friday Night.  So starts their nights of having, friendship, a few drinks and their youngsters, joining in on some of the sessions.

This book reminds me of days when the RAF wives, on my son-in-law's home station, got together, while the husbands went out to the pub or sometimes were on duty, with 10 or 12 youngsters under the age of 7 curled up in carrycots or asleep on the double bed;  What fun they were!  You can feel the fun and excitement that comes out of the pages of the book, and how after a while they change the house where they meet. Sharing the arrangements for their fun night.  

You can also feel the atmosphere change when one of the girls wants to bring her new man along and you are aware that those special nights will not be the same again.  Even the children within the story can feel the that the atmosphere can be cut with a knife because of the intrusion of a man in their girlie evenings.

Joanna is a very clever author who can put real life situations down on paper and make them sound as though they are happening in the street next door to you.  I could imagine this happening in any of the roads where I used to live, friday nights instead of the old coffee morning. So much more appropriate especially as some of the young people she writes about have full time jobs.

This book flows, and reads very easily - and there are many twists and turns within the story and multiple play offs of one character to another.  Some of which lead to tears and others just make you laugh out lound.  Joanna has made some wise and accurate observations, of this group of middle England people which makes this a very cleverly constructed book.

I did enjoy this book especially the rows between the two sisters and also the love they show for Eleanor the person that bought them all together.