Barbara Pym

Wilmet Forsyth is good looking & fairly young, but bored. Her husband Rodney is slightly balder & fatter than he once was. Her interest wanders to the Anglo-Catholic church, where she neglects her household for the company of three priests.

Mildred Lathbury is one of those 'excellent women' who is often taken for granted. She is a godsend, capable of dealing with almost anything. As such, she often gets herself embroiled in other people's lives - especially those of her neighbours.

Dulcie Mainwaring's friend Viola is besotted by Dr Aylwin Forbes, so surely it isn't prying if she helps things along? Aylwin, however, is smitten by Dulcie's young niece. And perhaps Dulcie herself is falling, just a little, for Aylwin.

When Barbara Pym died in 1980 she left a considerable amount of unpublished material. This volume contains an early novel, 'Civil To Strangers', three novellas and an autobiographical essay, Pym's only written commentary on her writing career.