Muriel Sparks short and sharp novels never disappoint, in A Far Cry From Kensington (1988) Spark takes on the publishing world. Mrs. Hawkins lives in a boarding house while working at a publishing house and is caught up in the lives of her fellow tenants and guesthouse landlord, Milly. The worlds collide in the end as a mysterious anonymous person threatens to report on the unlicensed seamstress and Polish refugee Wanda. It eventually drives her to suicide. Mrs. Hawkins solves the mystery in the end, but there are several events that move the story along before that. Throughout the novel Spark animates her characters with distinctive traits and speech, makes trenchant observations about the types in the publishing industry, all the while ruminating on religion and its role in the lives of her creations.
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