Went to London, Took the Dog

The very start of Lizzie Vogel's story. From the much-loved author of Love, Nina, discover a wildly comic, brilliantly sharp-eyed novel about one family's fall from grace.<BR><BR>'All hail a book that's funny!' Barbara Trapido<BR><BR>*****<BR><BR>Meet Lizzie Vogel, 9.<BR><BR>Lizzie is concerned about her newly divorced mother; thirty-one years old and trapped in a hostile village in the English countryside with only three young children and a Labrador for company. It isn't that having a husband is good, but in 1970s rural Leicestershire, not having one is bad. The women in the village think Lizzie's mother is after their husbands - and no one will let the children into the Brownies!<BR><BR>Worried about their mother's drinking, her (bad) playwriting and social workers sending them off to the infamous Crescent Home for Children, Lizzie and her sister embark on a misguided campaign to find their mother a new husband.<BR><BR>LIZZIE'S STORY CONTINUES IN PARADISE LODGE AND REASONS TO BE CHEERFUL!<BR><BR>*****<BR><BR>'[A] joyous read, full of wit and charm . . . I am already longing for Nina Stibbe's next book' OBSERVER<BR><BR>'Just the right mixture of childhood innocence and incredulity for the necessary deadpan delivery of Stibbe's particular brand of comedy. Read it and be charmed' INDEPENDENT<BR><BR>'A beguilingly comic blend of naivety and precociousness' SUNDAY TIMES

From the beloved author of Love, Nina, a frank, tender, and poignantly funny story about the ebb and flow of female friendship over half a lifetime.<BR> <BR>Susan and Norma have been best friends for years, at first thrust together by force of circumstance (a job at The Pin Cushion, a haberdashery shop in 1990s Leicestershire) and then by force of character (neither being particularly inclined to make friends with anyone else). But now, thirty years later, faced with a husband seeking immortality and Norma out of reach on a wave of professional glory, Susan begins to wonder whether she has made the right choices about life, love, work, and, most importantly, friendship.<BR> <BR>Nina Stibbe's new novel is the story of the wonderful and sometimes surprising path of friendship: from its conspiratorial beginnings, along its irritating wrong turns, to its final gratifying destination.

<BR>From "the reliably hilarious" (Entertainment Weekly) author of Love, Nina: a brilliantly funny and heartbreaking story of growing up and finding the independence you might not actually want . . . Teenager Lizzie Vogel has a new job as a dental assistant. This is not as glamorous as it sounds. At least it means mostly getting away from her alcoholic, nymphomaniacal, novel-writing mother. But, if Lizzie thinks being independent means sex with her boyfriend (he prefers bird-watching), strict boundaries (her boss keeps using her loo) or self-respect (surely only actual athletes get fungal foot infections?) she's still got a lot more growing up to do.<BR><BR>The winner of the 2019 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction, Reasons to Be Cheerful is a novel that lives up to its title, confirming Nina Stibbe's status as one of the most original and delightful writers at work today.