An Irrelevant Woman (Abacus Books)

(This is a novel about the wife of a novelist who, after y...)

This is a novel about the wife of a novelist who, after years of being the only constant one in an eccentric family, undergoes a nervous breakdown and forces the rest of her family to re-evaluate their relationships with her and each other.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0349100403/?tag=2022091-20

The Hopeful Traveller

(A Time of War told the story of a group of Wrens on a Wes...)

A Time of War told the story of a group of Wrens on a West Country airfield, but now the war is over, the girls are dispersed, and must learn to endure the rigours of the early post-war years, as well as the boredoms and perplexities of civilian life. While Kerren takes a job as a librarian and tries to forget her husband, who was killed in the war, her friend, Robin, has married a kind, conventional lawyer and lives in Cheltenham. But the lives of these two are still, though more remotely, linked; their reunions with other men and women from the old Station, and Kerren's efforts to adapt herself to a life far less sheltered than her wartime one, provide both comedy and some near-tragedy. Mary Hocking drew on her own experiences as an ex-Wren to trace the changes of emotional temperature, the disillusionment and the challenges, the need to realize new ways of life and the necessity to re-create themselves, experienced by her characters in this wonderful novel.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1509819460/?tag=2022091-20

The Climbing Frame by Mary Hocking (2016-02-25)

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01K9C9AK4/?tag=2022091-20

The Very Dead of Winter

(In this haunting novel, echoing mystery play and fairy ta...)

In this haunting novel, echoing mystery play and fairy tale, a family is forced to confront the grievances and emotional confusions of their shared past. In the very dead of winter they assemble at a remote country cottage enveloped by snow. Ostensibly they are celebrating Christmas, but festivities are marred by the presence of Konrad, who is dying. Florence, his manipulative wife, views Konrad's imminent death with annoyance; their two grown-up children bear the scars of this imperfect union. At the heart of the novel is Sophia, Florence's unorthodox sister and their host, who seems able to stand aside from family combat, yet guards a secret that has relevance for them all. Here, with characteristic insight and compassion, Mary Hocking unravels different kinds of love and need.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1509819835/?tag=2022091-20

Ask No Question

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000EZKXG2/?tag=2022091-20

The Mind Has Mountains

(Tom Norris has problems of his own, and chief among them ...)

Tom Norris has problems of his own, and chief among them is: who is he? It is a time of general stress and strain, for Tom is Assistant Education Officer to the South Sussex Council, and the County Hall, long threatened by wind and rain on its bleak headland, is about to meet its destruction at the hands of a Boundaries Commission. Where can its strange and unnerved inhabitants find another refuge? While Tom pursues his quest for identity and purpose, he reluctantly takes into his office Phoebe Huber, and otherwise rejected member of staff whose meek manner conceals a formidable gift for subversion. Tom begins by feeling sorry for Phoebe, but chaos is her natural element and she is better qualified than Tom to live in it. As little by little she takes possession of him, the South of England is hit by one of the worst blizzards in living memory. The snow blots out the familiar landscape, order breaks down both inside and outside the County Hall, the boundary between reality and fantasy grows indistinct, the wolf returns to the hills.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1509819614/?tag=2022091-20

Daniel Come to Judgement

(When President Aluwawa purges his country of foreign help...)

When President Aluwawa purges his country of foreign helpers Daniel Kerr, a micro-biologist, returns to Yeominster, feeling displaced and dispossessed. Yet he has a family there. His wife, Erica, more used to his absence than his presence, and two children, Emma and Giles. But family togetherness is short-lived, for Daniel has a gift for disruption, and it is a relief when he is posted to a research unit at Brocklehurst. But Brocklehurst is not his scene and he resigns on grounds of conscience, thus providing the press with a new sensation. Finding a job teaching at his son's school, he becomes entangled in a controversy over a bypass, and when the Yeominster Conservation Society fails in its object, the schoolboy revolutionaries take over traffic control and for one memorable day the life of Yeominster is turned upside down. In a manner which is thoughtful, lucid and humorous, Mary Hocking relates personal problems and private causes to social problems and public causes, neither easily coped with, or avoided.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/150981955X/?tag=2022091-20

Good Daughters (Fairley Family)

(What's so special about a son? Why doesn't she care about...)

What's so special about a son? Why doesn't she care about her daughters?' Mary Hocking brings good humour and sympathy to her depiction of the Fairley sisters growing up in their close-knit West London neighbourhood before, during and after the war. Here, in the first novel of a trilogy, the girls are sheltered in a world whose traditions of hard work and frugality are upheld by their Methodist father, Stanley, and their strong quiet mother, Judith. But, as love comes to Louise and adventures tempt Alice and her friend, unease lurks and terrible rumours travel from Germany - auguries of the catastrophe to come.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1509819118/?tag=2022091-20

Visitors to the Crescent by Mary Hocking (2016-02-25)

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01K92O3QU/?tag=2022091-20

Letters from Constance

(In 1939, as they leave school, Constance and Sheila vow t...)

In 1939, as they leave school, Constance and Sheila vow to keep in touch. Posted to Ireland in the WRNS, Constance marries Fergus, a gregarious Irishman. Before long, stifled by domesticity and motherhood, she envies Sheila, writing poetry and married to the fiercely creative Miles. Gradually, however, a different reality emerges, for Constance has unacknowledged talents of her own, while Sheila's public success is bought at great personal cost. From the war to the 1980s, Constance writes to Sheila of her everyday hopes and sorrows, and through her we learn much of Sheila's gallantry and courage. We learn, too, of the social and political developments that challenge and shape her values, until finally outside events come too close and the fragile balance of Constance's own world is threatened. This is an unforgettable portrait of a friendship, and much more. While Letters from Constance explores personal experiences with humour, tenderness and acuity, it is an equally fascinating microcosm of the years it surveys.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1509819797/?tag=2022091-20