Consequences - Softcover

Penelope Lively has written many prize-winning novels for adults and children. They include: The Road To Lichfield, According To Mark, Moon Tiger (which won the 1987 Booker Prize), Heat Wave, Spiderweb, The Photograph and Making It Up. Penelope Lively lives in London.

Josephine Bailey gives a subtle, respectful, and low-key performance of this elegiac novel about the consequences of a chance encounter. Matt, an artist, and Lorna, a reluctant debutante from an entirely different milieu in class-bound prewar England, meet on a park bench, fall in love, and marry despite family consternation. Matt dies in the war, Lorna in childbirth, and the story moves to their daughter, and then to her daughter. One could quibble that Bailey sometimes fails to convey effectively the many shifts in the narrative indicated on the page by space breaks, which can make for some disorientation. Lively tends to use that white space to create a drama of what is not being said. In every other way, though, its a lovely production. B.G. © AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine