Harnessing Peacocks

Rating:
Summary: Not a bad read, but don't expect thoroughgoing farce--
Review: "Harnessing Peacocks" is a sometimes comic, sometimes slice-of-life novel about a prostitute who takes up gourmet cookery and earns money at both so she can send her child to a fancy boarding school. With great effort she keeps her personal and private lives separate. You know, of course, the dam has to break at some point or there wouldn't be a book.

Perhaps it's just my American impatience but I thought the book took too long to get off the ground. Characters' habits and daily activities were explored more than necessary and by the time the farcical elements got going, I felt relief more than enthusiasm. Still, the writing was excellent and the characters were well drawn. I can see why Wesley is a popular author in her native Great Britain.

Rating:
Summary: A gentle, English comedy-of-manners
Review: "Harnessing Peacocks" is one of my all-time favorite books. In some ways, it's a typical British comedy-of-manners, but with terrific, quirky characters and a gentle, romantic plot.

Teenaged Hebe runs away from the home she shares with her grandparents when she overhears them and her bossy older sisters plotting to get her an unwanted abortion.

We see her again as her son, Silas, is growing old enough to question his background. His mother has raised him on her own, cooking for wealthy elderly clients and "tarting" (as she calls it) for several selected men, to be able to provide him with the same upbringing she had. She is smart, fiercely independent, and vulnerable (although she doesn't realize it).

One of my favorite things about this book is Wesley's wonderfully quirky and complex characters.

If you enjoy other authors such as Barbara Pym, Laurie Colwin and Jane Austen, I think you will enjoy this book.

Rating:
Summary: A gentle, English comedy-of-manners
Review: "Harnessing Peacocks" is a sometimes comic, sometimes slice-of-life novel about a prostitute who takes up gourmet cookery and earns money at both so she can send her child to a fancy boarding school. With great effort she keeps her personal and private lives separate. You know, of course, the dam has to break at some point or there wouldn't be a book.

Perhaps it's just my American impatience but I thought the book took too long to get off the ground. Characters' habits and daily activities were explored more than necessary and by the time the farcical elements got going, I felt relief more than enthusiasm. Still, the writing was excellent and the characters were well drawn. I can see why Wesley is a popular author in her native Great Britain.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful, witty, clever
Review: This is a writer of great intelligence, sense of humor and irony. All her books display the same offbeat and surprising characters and are both charming and very funny, as well as humane. I keep rereading them!

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful, witty, clever
Review: This is a writer of great intelligence, sense of humor and irony. All her books display the same offbeat and surprising characters and are both charming and very funny, as well as humane. I keep rereading them!