I was sent a copy of After the Party by Cressida Connolly to read and review by NetGalley.
The beginning of this novel was very engaging, beautifully written and full of promise. However, the further I got into the book it became more like an essay, imparting facts and thoughts eventually in quite a dry way. There was a good deal of repetition with areas of the prose touched on in both the main, dare I say, story and the sections in the first person where the main protagonist is writing a sort of memoir/letter 40 years later.
While the novel tackles a part of wartime history that I wasn’t aware of and found quite interesting, I must admit I found the fact that most of the characters in the novel were wealthy upper-class people whose lifestyles began to wear on me after a while. I really couldn’t bring myself to care much about any of them! I’m sorry to say the blurb for the book made it sound much more lively and interesting than it actually was.

Drawn like a moth to a flame to this intriguing story. A family saga amongst the County Set in Sussex, between the Great Wars. And a piece of political history that I had scant knowledge of, even at my age. Seemingly sensible folk beguiled by the British Alliance, an overt group of fascists.

Phyllis and her husband Hugh return to England after living for several years in Belgium. They stay with sister Patricia in her palladian mansion for a while until sister Nina finds them a place to rent, whilst Hugh searches for a piece of land to build a new property.

It’s 1938. Nina runs summer camps, a cloak for Alliance meetings, and Phyllis with her idealism is captivated by the charismatic Master - Oswald Mosley, who preaches appeasement before war. Women of principle are attracted to the movement, little understanding how they will be ostracised when war does inevitably break out.

One event, at a party will change Phyllis’ life for ever as she recounts in a personal record following her lengthy incarceration. The reason for her time in prison becomes clear as her personal account unwinds.

Difficult to say more without revealing too much. I can say that I became totally immersed in After The Party. It’s different and beautifully written, almost hypnotic. A piece of social and political history that benefits from the revelations in this remarkable book.

My thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Books for the opportunity to read this ARC.

This book was a slow read but an interesting one; at just 272 pages it seemed to take much longer to read than anticipated. I read an unproofed copy courtesy of Net Galley and the publishers, for which I thank you. The publisher's blurb gives the reader the synopsis so I won't repeat that. It is an interesting period in English history and one that makes for a good story. The title is clever. I didn't warm to any of the characters, nor their beliefs, nor their way of life. The book put me in mind of Howard's Cazalet Chronicles but with more politics and less 'pater and mater' influence; rather it's a tale of sibling rivalry, and an uneasy read in some places. The main story is written in the third person and interspersed with the memories of Phyllis written in first person which are presented in italics. So the flow of the book is easy to follow. Worth a read if you are interested in English fascism in the late 1930's - early 1940's.

Phyllis, her husband Hugh and their three children have moved back to the UK after living in Europe for several years because of Hugh’s work. Phyllis had wanted to come home while living abroad, but now that it was a reality she wasn’t so sure. She had missed her family and was looking forward to reconnecting.

The family ended up staying with Patricia and her family at first, but then her sister Nina had helped them to find somewhere to rent while Hugh went about building their new home from scratch. The relationship between the sisters isn’t great, Nina being politically involved and Patricia determined to move in higher circles there was always competition between those two for Phyllis’ attention.

The real pity about the story is that Phyllis and her husband end up in prison because of Nina's associations more than theirs. Her life gets destroyed by no fault of her own in my opinion.

Not really my sort of book at all, but beautifully descriptive to the point that you can visualise everything. Heavy in history and politics to what turns out to be quite a sad story.

This is a book that makes you think. Having been born in 1954, all my life I've been told how evil Sir Oswald Mosley and his British Union was. This book covers the party from a Society Woman's point of view. The world was such a different place. So many people had servants, children away at school and too much time on their hands, the women anyway. Phyllis who we follow doesn't follow politics, she lived through the Great War and just wants peace - almost at any price.

If you want a look at life in the 30s & 40s, the politics - sort of - of the women of the time. I would wholeheartedly recommend this book. I think it will stay with me and make me think for a good while to come.

When I read the blurb about this book I really wasn't sure about reading it. However I am so glad that I did. I found myself gripped from start to finish.

Regarding the genre, it is very hard to place the book. It is part family saga, part family tragedy, part historical fiction. I

I loved the style of writing and the way the characters were crafted and developed.

It is difficult to say too much about how the story unfolds, without giving too much away. Suffice to say that the book manages to fully encapsulate the sense of what life was like in middle class rural England in the inter-war years. Into this is added a bit of political intrigue.

This is a book which I will remember for a long time. It will certainly be a contender for my 'book of the year' list.

I give my thanks to Netgalley and Penguin Books UK for a copy of this book in exchange for this review.

This was the absorbing account of Phyllis Forrester who, having returned from living abroad with her husband and children, returns to live near her two sisters, and finds herself being drawn into the world of the British Fascists before the second world war. Oswald Moseley is their charismatic hero and they are all convinced that appeasement and avoidance of war at all costs is the right way to go. The chapters are interspersed with Phyllis' first person account of her experiences as she comes out of prison, (we are not told why she is there at first) and then goes on to slowly unfold the events leading up to this, and then the aftermath. The structure is brilliant and Phyllis' character is extremely well drawn as a follower; trusting, accepting, rather naive, and never having an opportunity to show who she really is. The period feel is faultless and we may gasp at some of the attitudes of the time which are so well depicted here. I found it both entertaining and educational.

After a slow start I became intrigued to read about the followers of Sir Oswald Mosely. Involving a family in the story highlighted how their allegiance to his party affected their lives.

This is a very shrewd,perceptive story of a social class who believe in their entitlement and who dismiss the working people as beneath them and incapable of political views or of anything else worthy of them. Then society changes and those who earn their living triumph. Woven into this is the unusual, and under told, story of what happened to the Mosley supporters. Connolly uses that very cleverly to add to the internal warfare of the family that this book is about. It is a tale of family warfare,social change and deep regrets. To start with,I wondered where it was all going but that gradually becomes evident.

After the Party is an interesting, if a bit of a slow, read mostly set in pre-war Britain against the backdrop of the rise of Mosley's party and fascism. I really enjoy books about the upper classes and aristocracy, how they lived, their beliefs, the snobbery, etc. and this didn't disappoint. The politics the main subject of the story is not an area of history that I am all that familiar with and I enjoyed reading about it, however, overall I felt the book a little slow.

‘After the party’ didn’t grab me with the enthusiasm I expected; it’s a potentially fascinating perspective to explore - those on the edge of the rise (and fall) of the Mosley’s fascist party. Unfortunately much of it does rather feel as if the interesting events are happening to other people rather than the central character, who blithely drifts through the narrative. Short chapters set in the 70s provide perspective and the opportunity for a preview of what is to come, but I felt these were rather forced.
The evocation of late 30s and 40s society feels genuine, but this wasn’t enough to maintain my interest. There’s the material for a great novel here but for me this didn’t have the necessary emotional engagement.

This is the story of Phyllis Forrester and her family ‘drifting‘ into pre-war politics either unconsciously or naively (as it seems for Phyllis, at least). Her family returns to England in 1938 from living overseas. The story is written from 2 periods; pre (to during) WWII and 1979. The sister with whom Phyllis is closest, invites her and her 3 children to a fun-filled Summer camp which she eagerly joins as she is finding it difficult to keep her children entertained in the Summer holidays. It’s cleverly written to show how people can be misled by seemingly innocent entertainments (I though it was a Trades Union’s holiday camp at first, like they have in France)! But it soon becomes clear that it is no such thing.

The speeches start, and deal mainly with ‘supporting the Englishman’ – e.g. as in shopkeepers against large chainstores taking over, all rather ‘UKIP’ and as another reviewer has said, a bit Brexit! Speeches focus on avoiding England being drawn in to another war after so many had been lost in the previous one. Although Phyllis seems to remain in blissful ignorance it seems hard that she didn’t pick up on the Fascist parts of the speeches (which must have occurred but are not mentioned). But the movement is shown putting itself forward to people as a pacifist organisation, totally anti-war. If that was the case I can understand ordinary people being attracted to it at the time, having lost so much in WWI. However, the ‘ignorance’ of what the British Union stood for is weakened rather, by the date of the story – It begins in 1938 and most people would have known about the East End Cable Street riots in 1936 by then, and known what this party stood for, surely? Anti-Jewish sentiment is raised at one point, but it’s swept away as a ‘minor issue’; the organisation is portrayed as consciously playing this subject down, always coming back to the ‘protection of the Englishman’ and peace.

You wonder from the start what the narrator has done to end up in prison – and this is quite an education. The ending is quite anti-climactic, it’s more of an explanation and update than anything else. I found it very insightful as an illustration of how people could be ‘taken in’ by cleverly, manipulated rhetoric at a time of need. However, while reading this you do have to remind yourself of what Moseley and his blackshirts stood for, the violence and hatred he stirred up – this story doesn’t touch on that (but that’s not its aim). Another interesting insight is how ‘outsiders’ see political prisoners once they’re jailed – even if they’re guilty of exactly the same crime.

I like this for making me think around a subject we easily say we would never have been involved with. To see how ordinary people could have been taken in; how things can be disguised at the time, of what a party can stand for (though again, it was pretty clear cut after the 1936 riots); how masses can be manipulated by charismatic individuals and how this plays out for one particular family. Wilful ignorance, fascist intentions or just not thinking at all?

An interesting novel which at times feels more like an autobiography of the time leading up to WW2 and the rise of Fascism even in the UK. It is a subject I knew little about and had never really considered so on that level I found it very interesting. Phyllis is the woman who both tells some of the story and whom the main writing is about. I didn't really warm to her or her sisters and their families so as a story it was not reverting and very little actually happens. However as a historical piece it has merit and is well written. I would give it 3-4 stars.

A rather subtle story, interesting and original. Set in the period leading up to and including the Second World War, but very different from most novels of that era. Not exciting or high octane in content never the less quite moving and profound. An enjoyable and interesting read

3.5*

First, this a clever title, given the political side of this book.

I knew very little about the rise of fascism in England during this period and this book is very informative, from that perspective. Indeed, it's as though all of the historical details regarding food, clothing, language and politics of the era were the starting point and then a novel built up around the research from there, rather than the narrative demanding the research, as such. This resulted, for me, in a lack of drive through the novel - it didn't start to really take off until I was at almost 50% of my way through the book. The exception to that was the material from 1979 - that held my attention much more than the chapters set in the pre-war period. That might be because it was told in the first-person and was also direct-address, so I felt I had a deeper connection with the character in this time. The only character I felt I had a good grasp of in the pre-war period was Sarita.

It seemed to me that the story jumped around a lot - one minute you're at a dinner and the next in a yard. That may be the electronic version I'm reading and that there are suitable separations made in the printed text, but even so, there was not a smoothness or flow to the story. When things did start to flow in the second half of the book, I felt there was some repetition.

Without wanting to give anything away here, I found a few elements of the novel difficult to swallow. For example, given Nina and Patricia's relationship, it was difficult to believe that Nina made the decision she did in relation to the sisters. She would surely have named her other sister whom she did not like, for these purposes.

Overall, this is a well-researched novel and it is that research that forms the basis of the work.

With thanks to NetGalley, Penguin Books UK, Viking and Cressida Connolly for a copy of this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

After the Party was an interesting and absorbing read, looking back on a time in history that is rarely dealt with – in fiction the anti-nazi war sentiment is to the fore, of course though there are always shades of grey in any human reaction and this is the subject that Cressida Connolly deals with in her novel.

I can’t say I liked any of the characters that much if I’m honest – but they were highly intriguing and the themes explored were extremely thought provoking. The writing is beautiful and descriptively evocative as we follow Phyllis, reconnecting with her sisters, getting intricately involved with a community and, ultimately, failing on a very human level and ending up incarcerated.

To be honest the inciting event wasn’t as shocking as is foreshadowed but in lots of ways the book isn’t about that anyway – it is about the elite, the idealism of a time in our lives when war beckoned and everything was changing. In that it was haunting and as the blurb says, exquisitely observed.

I liked that “After the Party” tackled some issues that I hadn’t really considered before and overall this was a wonderfully engaging read that left me slightly melancholy.

Recommended.

When Phyllis, the narrator of the first-person sections of ‘After the Party’, describes her appearance after a spell in prison, we are told that her hair is ‘…yellowing white, like the mane of an old rocking horse.’ Not only does this description conjure touch as well as sight with tremendous effect but it also lets us know that here is a woman of a certain social status. How many children would have had a handmade rocking horse to play on as a child? Whilst we know that Phyllis has been in prison from the beginning of the story, we are not sure why for some time. Cressida Connolly gradually reveals that mild, sensible, thoughtful Phyllis is a committed member of the British Union, the notorious Fascist organisation led by Oswald Mosely in the 1930s, as is her husband and one of her sisters.
The political and historical aspects of this novel are very well delineated and very interesting indeed. Whilst most of us will be aware of Mosely’s anti-Semitic Blackshirts, perhaps fewer will know that summer camps for children on the south coast were regular occurrences of Party life and all manner of people were attracted by the British Union’s nationalistic views in the build up to WW2. Details of Phyllis’s imprisonment in Holloway and then the Isle of Man are vividly delineated as is life outside prison before the war – plenty of dinners, parties, and bored privileged women looking for amusement.
There is much to recommend in this novel – these politics little explored in fiction, Connolly’s writing certainly brings this period to life. Her descriptive detail is always very well judged; she can delineate a character with one well-chosen simile and she gives an equally vivid sense of place, whether it be Phyllis’ friend Sarita’s beautiful house, the grim reality of a Holloway prison wing or the Isle of Man countryside. However, the plot is not quite so successful. The last section of ‘After the Party’ lacks the direction and drive of the majority of the novel. Whilst we are told quite a lot about life after the War, it is merely sketched out, almost as if Connolly has become bored of her characters. This tired mood may be deliberate – after all, Phyllis’ life does become rather directionless - but it does weaken the overall effect of the novel.
My thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Random House UK for a copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review.

Family dynamics, elitism and fascist politics all collide in this engrossing novel. Cressida Connolly creates a shocking but nonetheless believable portrait of a family at odds, and a protagonist who feels unmoored and overwhelmed. This a believable depiction of a tumultuous period, with an evocative sense of detail. Absolutely gripping.

A really unusual view of England before and during World War II. The story of three sisters caught up in politics which they either do or don't truly understand. There was some information in here I didn't know about the period about Mosley's Blackshirts being imprisoned for such a long time. Interesting view of social class when the empire was completely dying.

Part family saga, part half-hearted guilt-memoir - what really gives this book its fascination is the setting of the story amongst adherents of Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists in 1938.

So much WW2 historical fiction shows us characters nobly and wholeheartedly disgusted by Nazis - the reality, of course, was never that clear-cut and thus the real interest of Connolly's novel is bringing that shameful ambivalence back onto the table. It's perhaps no coincidence that the British fascists in the novel are also anti-Semitic, do not see Britain as part of Europe, are against the League of Nations, cling to a conservatism which despises 'foreigners' and non-Tories, and believes in the rectitude of the British Empire - shades of Brexit, anyone?

There are places where Connolly could be more incisive: there's much to-do about minor things (the 'event' at the party, for example, just doesn't have the significance that the blurb promises) but I like that she doesn't overstate. For example, she resists introducing either Mosley himself directly into the story or Diana and Mitfordiana - and the book is better for that restraint.

So certainly not a faultless novel but an important reintroduction to fiction of Britain's flirtation with fascism in the run-up to WW2.