Once I reached the penultimate chapter, which is a long tedious account, I feared the story would implode. But then this is unexpectedly saved by the last chapter and I’m sorry that no more space was given to Molly, whose character is certainly much more interesting than her mother’s is. Natalie is a vexing but likeable lead in the story as she stumbles from one ill-judged decision to the next. But essentially she is a little hapless, where one move is compounded by the next, all under the radiant benevolence of her new found friend, Lara Channing, a cut above in beauty and class. It is Lara, a swimming champion in her day, with a minor film to her credit, who has spent two years masterminding the renovations at the derelict lido near her house. She is a mover and a shaker and has a sunshine personality that radiates beneficently over those in her orbit. Natalie is drawn like a moth to light. She forges ahead with the new friendship at the expense of her older long-standing friendship with Gayle. Soon her husband Ed is feeling the edge of her friendship, the family life is sidelined whilst she spends time with the lovely Lara. Lois Maynard and her brother Phil live in genteel poverty at The Birches, the family estate. The estate is all that is left to them after the family fortunes took a decided dip after the crash of 1929 and their father's suicide shortly thereafter. Between Phil's job as a middling sort of lawyer and Lois's income as a writer of detective fiction, they just manage to get by. Their sister Judith, the spoiled family beauty, had escaped with a timely marriage to the rich and eligible Ridgely Chandler. She has the world at her feet and Ridgely seems content to let her do as she pleases. So...why on earth does she suddenly decide to divorce him after 20-some years of marriage?

The great thing about this book is that you don’t have the slightest idea of where it will end up. What is the conflict that defines it? Does it concern Natalie, her husband, her daughter or Lara? Or someone else? One question he refuses to engage with is whether he is still pigeonholed as a gay writer. This was the canard that followed him on his promotional tour for The Line Of Beauty, when interviewers asked whether his gayness defined him as a writer and every news piece was headlined, "Gay writer wins Booker". "I have a feeling it's changed," he says. "I spent 20 years politely answering the question, 'How do you feel when people categorise you as a gay writer?' and I'm not going to do it this time round. It's no longer relevant." Will gets a telephone call from James; he has been arrested whilst seeking sex. This is ironic since James's sex-life is non-eventful compared to Will's. It appears to be a case of police-entrapment, with an undercover officer soliciting sex from homosexual men. That's what Lois wants to know when Ridge asks her to chaperone Judith on the trip to Reno. But Judith isn't talking and on top of that she seems to be deathly afraid of something or somebody...to the point of fainting on the train when she looks out over the people standing about at the station. And still she won't talk--except to say that she's decided to cash in on her share of the family homestead and come to stay at The Birches for an indefinite amount of time. Having never been close to Judith, neither Lois nor Phil think this is a spectacular idea, but they can't tell her no. Louise Candlish is a fabulous writer and The Swimming Pool is quite addictive. So dark, yet so perceptive, I loved it.

About this Centre

Though he always had a novel "on the go", Hollinghurst initially saw himself as a poet. He published a well-received volume of poetry with the provocative title Confidential Chats With Boys in 1982, but says the muse deserted him in 1985 on the day he signed a contract for a book of poems with Faber. In any case, by then the novel that was to establish him was well under way.

Just like Natalie. It turns out Natalie was a bully and did some terrible things one summer that had a ripple effect on the victims.A lighthearted, conversational history, with emphasis on the challenges women once faced just getting in the water, and the “swimming suffragettes” who defied genteel disapproval to claim the right to do so. Candlish’s writing is certainly detailed and impressive, and her story is dark and gripping, but personally I could have done with less waxing lyrical about well-off neighbours with expensive taste and terrace views of the newly-opened pool that gleams dangerously in the sunlight, and more of a focus on tightening up her already-intriguing characters and their motivations to turn a good novel into something great. The Swimming Pool in Photography invites readers to dive into the cultural history of swimming pools. associatedDomainLogoutUrls": ["https://www.centerparcs.co.uk/api/v1/guest/logout.json","https://www.centerparcs.ie/api/v1/guest/logout.json","https://www.aquasana.co.uk/api/v1/guest/logout.json","https://www.aquasana.ie/api/v1/guest/logout.json"], The characters are well built and the plot is never boring, although there is little action. In retrospect, I realise that this novel is characterized by a very well defined structure that allows the reader not to lose themselves in its three timelines.