A Buyer's Market - post IV

It is rare to read a book that manages to wrap you up in a feeling. It is hard to describe but reading through the last pages of this book you start to really understand not just the social landscape of the 1920s/30s but also get an idea of what it felt like to be part of Jenkins’s world.

Everyone is starting to make those decisions that set out the course of their lives and as marriage and death comes for the likes of Stringham and Deacon respectively Jenkins is left to ponder just where he is going.

The book starts with him experiencing an infatuation for Barbara and it ends with him being informed of her engagement. As he leaves a dinner at Widmerpool’s and wanders out into the night the narrative describes that moment when major things start to happen.

In a way it is a testament to the writing that two books into the series and only now do you start to feel that Jenkins is about to start making some decisions that will move him from the role of observer to someone who is playing a more crucial role.

A review will follow shortly…