About
Free Love Synopsis
From Tessa Hadley, bestselling author of Late in the Day and The Past, comes a compulsive new novel about one woman's sexual and intellectual awakening in 1960s London
1967. While London comes alive with the new youth revolution, the suburban Fischer family seems to belong to an older world of conventional stability: pretty, dutiful homemaker Phyllis is married to Roger, a devoted father with a career in the Foreign Office. Their children are Colette, a bookish teenager, and Hugh, the golden boy.
But when the twenty-something son of an old friend pays the Fischers a visit one hot summer evening, and kisses Phyllis in the dark garden after dinner, something in her catches fire. Newly awake to the world, Phyllis makes a choice that defies all expectations of her as a wife and a mother. Nothing in these ordinary lives is so ordinary after all, it turns out, as the family's upheaval mirrors the dramatic transformation of the society around them.
With scalpel-sharp insight, Tessa Hadley explores her characters' inner worlds, laying bare their fears and longings. Daring and sensual, Free Love is a compulsive, irresistible exploration of romantic love, sexual freedom and living out the truest and most meaningful version of our lives.
About This Edition
ISBN: |
9781787333673 |
Publication date: |
20th January 2022 |
Author: |
Tessa Hadley |
Publisher: |
Jonathan Cape Ltd an imprint of Vintage Publishing |
Format: |
Hardback |
Pagination: |
311 pages |
Primary Genre |
Historical Fiction
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Other Genres: |
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Press Reviews
Tessa Hadley Press Reviews
So real and humane and utterly transporting; fresh and yet, with the feeling of a beloved classic. -- Meg Mason, author of SORROW AND BLISS
I utterly LOVED this book!!!!! Tessa Hadley might be my new favourite writer... she is wonderful. -- Marian Keyes
A beguiling novel, deceptively easy to read; beneath the surface swim disturbing and age-old questions about freedom and fate. -- Hilary Mantel
Tessa Hadley is my favourite author. -- Kate Atkinson
Beautifully structured and brilliantly paced. It displays Tessa Hadley's extraordinary skill at making both surface life and deep interiors come fully alive. -- Colm Toibin
I was utterly transported. Tessa Hadley is a true writer and this is such an enthralling novel, just so properly attentive to life. -- Sunjeev Sahota
Tessa Hadley knows everything there is to know about the intricate, complex, contradictory workings of the human mind and heart. Her power to embed that understanding in unfailingly intelligent prose is unmatched in contemporary fiction. -- Neel Mukherjee
Artful, profound and subtle . . . what a great writer she is. -- Geoff Dyer
Author
About Tessa Hadley
Tessa Hadley is the author of four highly praised novels, Accidents in the Home, which was longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award, Everything Will Be All Right, The Master Bedroom and The London Train, and two collections of stories, Sunstroke and Married Love. She lives in Cardiff and teaches literature and creative writing at Bath Spa University, where she has recently been appointed Professor of Creative Writing. Her stories appear regularly in the New Yorker, Granta and other magazines.
More About Tessa Hadley