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Haunted by phantoms of the Second World War and the Holocaust, young Cressida lives in terror of George Harding, who, severely disfigured, has returned from the front to recover in his family’s stately African home. When he plucks young Cressida’s beautiful mother and her family from financial ruin, establishing them in the old servants’ quarters of his estate, Cressida is swept into a future inexorably bound to his.
In the new setting, she finds that she is, after all, indentured. She is conscripted to enliven George Harding’s nephew, the hopelessly timid Edgar, to make him "wild and daring." And she takes on this task with resentful fury, leading the boy astray and, in the process, learning to manipulate differences in power, class, background, and ambition.
Only slowly does she come to understand that George Harding himself is watching her. And waiting.
"Freed handles issues of class, wealth and dedication with a light but knowing hand, adding depth to a bittersweet love story." - Publishers Weekly
"A strange and beautifully told story of love and growth." - Booklist
"Bright, brittle, fierce and written with verve." - Kirkus Reviews
"The Servant's Quarters is Lynn Freed's best novel yet. Cressida, a young girl who watches those around her patch up their wounds from the war and carry on with the weight of pretense, is as observant and as wickedly truthful as any Jane Austen character." - Amy Tan
This information about The Servants' Quarters was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Lynn Freed is the author of five highly praised novels, a short story collection, and a collection of essays. She was the recipient of the inaugural Katherine Anne Porter Award from the American Society of Arts and Letters.
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